When it is right, you know it?
I’ve long believed in that, awaiting the validation of truth. Have and keep, not have and have ripped away, burned, exploded or otherwise lost.
The only way to know is to walk forward, open, in anticipation of the uncertain road ahead.
My canvas is white and not smeared with failure.
I do not know, I only hope.
I will fail again, only to procure a new surface to draw upon.
Well, fuck, Blog. Here we are at another cul de sac. Life has reset back to an uninteresting state.
I feel like cold potatoes.
Something good will inevitably come of all this trial and error. Trial and trial. Smash and pancake.
One is gone, but hope remains for a future where fun things are happening.
Button press. Beep. Boop.
Here we go again.
Even in the midst of devastation, there are morsels of undiminished goodness in there too. I am feeling recognized, appreciated and gratified. By melting off my exterior sadness, I have opened the way for something new. The light of possibility shines again!
I did not like being discarded, but it is refreshing to be found once more.
I know why, yes. But now I don’t have to fret over my status but rejoice in the change of it.
I’ve been in Mobile since Friday, departing this afternoon for California. This trip was longer than my last, which gave me time to become acclimated to being with K. It felt like a life together. It was as a very positive trip, with the specter of cancer still ever present.
This morning I broke down. And now too. I’m having a difficult time holding off my sadness and tears. I want to have this life, but so many obstacles and uncertainties are in the way. The unclear future has yet to reveal a long term forecast and that absence sends my anxiety looking for things to speculate about.
One thing I do know is that I love her and it would not be hard to be her partner in a practical sense. I have a confidence in myself and a fear of the unknown. This circumstance is stressful, but also full of love, and friendship.
But I have to go home now. I have to say goodbye to my girl and lock her away inside my phone; until we see each other again. I am holding you in my heart K. I hope we emerge from this tough time stronger, as I am strengthened in facing my pain by the inspirational way you address the difficulties of life. Never have I been more proud to be someone’s partner. That’s what makes goodbye so hard. That’s why I’m crying while I type this little post. I’m scared, and I don’t know what’s coming for us. What I do know is that I’ll love you loyalty and truly for as long as you are around to be loved.
So goodbye K, and may this not be our last adventure together.
Your worry is a shroud of fog that hides a vast world underneath. A veiled reality that the future and events have not yet made clear. I wish I could help you see through to the truth of what can be.
You fret over me but I know this is out of a fear that love will fade as it has in the past; with other men. You are not wrong to fear. Trauma teaches us to be afraid of circumstances expecting an outcome. Those triggers will fire but not be ratified with harm. I am not like the others you have known.
What I don’t think you see is how much you are a part of me now. I know you understand I’m in love, but do you know I feel you in my blood; pumping through my heart? Do you know my every wish is to be together with you? I’d give anything to have that life with you, even amidst the ensnaring mess you find yourself entangled in. Even from this, there is escape. There is hope.
You are my person now, and I am doing everything I can to help you out of where you are. I wish to help launch you into a future you can thrive in. I see you: crinkled, I oppressed and downtrodden. Your life has you confined. Chained. I’m honest in my desire to rid you of those chains forever. One by one, they will be cast aside.
If only you’d believe me. If only I could convince you that it could be real. It’s not a fantasy if it is our reality. It’s only as far off as we allow it to be. I need you K.
I hope this message challenges your doubt for us. I hope it makes you question that fear you have that I may leave. You’ll see my devotion here, my desire for a healthy life. Not just mine either.
Find your rest and reconcile your anxiety. Tomorrow is a day where I take one more step closer to you, and us.
I haven’t been checking in as much as I have in the past. I think this is for a couple reasons: I’m profusely distracted with work things and also in love, so everything is a little brighter. I have that ambiance of tranquility around me and my days feel purposeful as a result of my ongoing interactions with K. That doesn’t mean I don’t also feel down, or exasperated at times. Sometimes I just feel worn out, like there’s no tread left on the balding tire of my available energy. These two things, one not outweighing the other, provide me with a version of reality I can thrive within at the beneficence of stability. I find myself continually making moves in my reality to improve outcomes, promote a more prosperous state of mental wellness, and develop a support structure that can carry me forward as life procures new and tragic events, at random disbursements.
I have to be mindful of my mental health as a top priority. I have done a fairly good job of being introspective in this regard. I did have days where I struggled, and felt depressed in the last few months. I had other days where I was happy or content with my situation. I saw no acute peaks and no devastating troughs and did not linger in any one state for too long. I feel remarkably balanced and expectedly fatigued from my life and schedule. I did take time for myself and I’ve, notably, had a harder time getting back plugged in to my routine since visiting K. This has been the only thing I have felt concerned about in any way. Now, the burden of work will lessen as the holidays approach.
On that front, I bought K a round-trip to CA from AL on Christmas morning. She’ll stay for a week and I deliver her to the airport on new years day. Her situation didn’t seem like it would yield the available funds to procure a ticket in enough advanced notice not to be exorbitant in cost. So, I did it. She’s never been out west anywhere before and this will be pretty mind-blowing for her. Our future together is still years apart, but this exchange of company and trips to each other’s worlds was a necessary step in forming a more permanent bond. Being a part of her reality is something I can now actively imagine as I have been a visitor to her world, for a time. Now she will get the opportunity to do the same for my reality.
I am more than willing to demonstrate my desire to invest in a future with K, and this ticket seemed like a good way to do that. I love her, and I just want to be able to continue taking steps towards a time where we can be together like cheese and tortillas. It seemed worth the money to have her here again in my arms. Money can’t compare to the way she makes me feel: Like exploding sparkle-berries.
Well, have a good day, and I’ll check in with you more often going forward.
In short: it was more than I ever expected. My trip to see K was an affirmation of all the feelings I’d been having and the proof of concept that the physical part of our relationship was good. It was very good. We have a symbiotic relationship with overwhelming sensation and generosity. It’s a functional dynamic I’ve rarely seen in my life. Most importantly, it’s a compliment to our relationship and not the foundation as in times past.
K is the person I’ve been looking for on my journey. A real equal companion. I’m so grateful to have her in my life and I want our worlds to be brought together. I know that day is far off still but worth keeping in mind and working towards.
The threads pull tighter. The affirmations provide strength. The road is long ahead still however.
I’m fewer than 55 hours from flying across the country to see my girlfriend for the first time. We started counting down 52 days ago, and here we are with fewer than 3 days left to go.
I can say I’m very excited. Scared a little too. I’m going far from my safety zone. However, I do know that I will be loved and appreciated where I am going. K and I have been speaking with the frequency of a married couple, and the passion of two halves separated and waiting to be rejoined. I feel a burning for her that, as I have stated, I have not felt in years. Since J.
Now that the certainty of our union is nigh, I feel a sense of satisfaction with my situation. Life is stable for the most part. My career is humming along nicely. My mental health is in fair standing (with the occasional blip).
I did hear Sting’s “Why Should I Cry For You” and it tore me a new/old wound. It’s amazing how much love I had for J that the echoes of my hurt still remain to this day. It scares me a little that I feel the same yearning for K. I don’t ever want to hurt like I did when J left me. K is a very different person though. We love, we perish in flames, we are reborn of the soot of our prior demise.
I will have 3 days of absolute bliss. I feel the push and pull of my dialectic, but now, the superior sensation is ecstasy. The only tingle that pervades is that of anticipation for that moment when her apartment door closes, and we are alone at last.
I haven’t been writing much as a coping tool lately. I guess that would be because I’m not suffering any emotional turbulence in my world that has caused me to reach for more tools. In truth, things are both up and down, but my mood remains “flat.” I don’t mean that negatively, just that there isn’t any vacillation to my states for the most part. I’m going from content to blissful at times, with the occasional bout of stress and pressure.
This all seems pretty normal to me, and does not require massive elaboration to process things that need to be dealt with,
I am in love for sure. head over heels. Topsy-turvey. It is quite a sensation, reminding me of another person I loved wildly who also lived in the deep south. This new feeling though is much more grounded, explored and vetted than any interaction I had with J. These interactions with K have proven that his is a real relationship grounded in commonalities, desire, ambition and friendship. K and I have much more to our partnership now then J and I ever had at any point in our relationship.
Having the physical barrier of being 2400 miles apart has helped cement our interest in each other for lots of other reasons that aren’t lust. Don’t get me wrong, the physical attraction is great, but it shouldn’t be the thread that ties the knot. Physical companionship should be the icing on the cake to make the thing all the more sweet. Embellishment, not essential to the existence of the partnership or love.
We have found ways to be caring and affectionate despite our distance. Every day we are in contact. We are present in each other’s lives. We are learning so much about our pasts and per paring for a future where we can be together. I’m flipping out in my brain about how many emotions and sensations she makes me feel… its like nothing I’ve felt in a very long time. I am devoted to this woman, and she to me.
So things are going pretty damn good. How can life really get me down when my heart is just overflowing with the feels. I feel like I have a friend in my world, and soon, a lover to lie beside. I’ll be there in just a few weeks, where we will finally be in each other’s arms, and in bed together at last.
I feel both remorse and jubilation given all the things I have been through. So many tries at love, and a litany of failures to look back at. I always believe the litter of past transgressions can be removed, leaving a pristine landscape once more, but it does require energy, time, patience to clean it away. I have endeavored to do my part but it was never a thing that could be done alone.
I get the distinct feeling J is still out there, lurking. She being liberated of he need to find a resolution or a process designed to heal, I am simply followed by a vague shadow of someone I once loved devotedly. I find this regrettable. My whole trajectory in the last 6 years has been geared towards helping build bridges and healing people… yet, I can’t heal her. I can’t even talk to her anymore without having my soul ripped in half.
I know her accusations are the only thing she has left to harm me with (and she has), as they are an instrument that can affect change. I regret who I was, and I would change any number of things that happened to produce better outcomes… but the sad fact remains that fretting about my past is not going to change it in any way, ever. The only thing I have left is to try and build a better future for myself.
I don’t know how to bridge the vast chasm that now exists. From my peer support perspective, all healing begins with open, honest conversation. All steps forward that build us up do not also suppress the feelings/emotions/traumas of the past.
In my new life that I have made, I find myself feeling proud of my accomplishments and not ashamed of who I was in an active way. What good does shame do me? I can’t walk forward with it on my back. I can only hope to reconcile the a source for myself since I am unable to control anyone else’s perceptions. My door has always been open, and remains so to any relic of the past who desires to move beyond what was done, into what can be. Shame is not the answer, systemic change is the only remedy.
Maybe because I am feeling these same feelings I had for J that this is coming back. It seems to be a very odd coincidence… I’ll keep you posted if it turns out to be just a Hunter-Seeker.
I haven’t been here in a bit since things are going very well. I have found real love again; the giddy and fluttery variety. It’s been 7 years since I felt this way, and I haven’t even touched her yet.
I just need to continue to stay focused on my life and my responsibilities, which I am doing a good job at.
So much good is happening beside the stagnation of tragedy. It’s difficult to comprehend sometimes.
I’m going to give this a try having done an LDR once before with the wrong person. In this new arrangement, there’s plenty to be happy about, and no frantic rush to implement. This scenario is FORCED to start off with knowing, friendship and the accumulation of trust before lives come together. It’s perfect for me!
But having someone to talk to every day who is keeping track of my life… that has invaluable worth. If nothing else, I feel significantly less alone than I did a few days ago. It was nice having “A” but “K” is a much better fit for my life and personality. We are common in our desire to achieve, strive and excel. What an inspiration! I think I made “A” into more than she was, but that veil didn’t shroud the truth of her motivations indefinitely. K is flamboyantly, attractively assertive and in-control of her own outcomes in a way I find irresistable.
So here’s to 2,400 mile friendships and the possibility of something more years down the road.
I’m sitting here getting ready for my support group. I will admit I’m having some symptoms: anxiety is spiking, depressed thoughts are chewing away at me, and a general sense of dread hangs overhead.
I long for that daily conversation I used to have with A. Now there is a silence that my wheels spin frantically in. I was engaged, and now, no one really cares what happens in my world.
I’ve started talking to other women. There are a few that have responded to my replies. I’m kinda rebounding hard, but this is what happened last time. I had a falling out only to be picked back up again almost immediately. I’m that circumstance back in June, I should have been more conservative. A and I were in bed together on our second date. I don’t want anything like that now. I’m still hurting.
I’d really enjoy talking to someone again. Having a chat buddy to catch up with on the day’s events. Someone who wants to see inside me. It’s so intoxicating to be cared about. I wish I could share my perspective with someone who admired me.
My group will go great tonight. I’ve got a lot I bring as facilitator and person living with mental illness. However, I just want tonight to be done. I’m feeling like I need to close my eyes and shut out the world for a while. I am alone here and feeling like I’m nailed to the shore as the tide comes in.
Things I feel:
Hurt, alone, remorseful, unappreciated, unloved, lost, curious, frustrated and sad.
Things I am resolved to feel:
Confident, stable, convicted, open-minded, reflective, attentive, perplexed, adaptive and proud.
Things I’d like to feel:
Trusted, loved, admired, respected, tolerated, engaged, humored, bantered-with and assured.
Real things that are also felt:
Abandoned, mismatched, unaligned, disconnected, regretful, passionate, unacknowledged, disregarded and done.
I was feeling very confident in my affection for my girlfriend earlier today, until she made it clear we were not on the same page and became my ex. I worked for a bit on compiling this sequence of songs to (ironically) brush over the feelings of despair associated with losing love, only to find it again later in the playlist.
Mournful, yes, was the appropriate tone-setter but not the end of the story. I still feel hopeful for my cause; my desire to be loved and to give love fully. My life is still moving forward. Sharing that with “A” was what I wanted to do, but I never really believed it or committed myself fully. I discussed the possibility of going my separate way many times in therapy but now to have it play out in reality is a whole different experience. I do miss what we had while it was good, and wonder about how it went astray.
I tried to be honest with my feeling in this playlist and effusive/voluminous would be good ways to describe my enduring affection. Breaks don’t just end feelings… they hang on in a painful remembrance which makes the acuteness of my album’s emotional story ring all the more true now that I sit here listening to it again. It aches where she is missing, but I know that won’t last forever.
I have no bridges to cross out of independence to companionship… and maybe it will be that way for a while.
Beer Bottles & Huggy Times
Length: 74 minutes
So A and I are abruptly, suddenly over. The clues I received to her fading interest have led to her reactivation of her dating profile while we were still together. She’s now out of my life and maybe for good.
In truth, I didn’t see this as a big surprise. I do feel over-extended from expressing my affection to her and having that go unrequited. I have a lot of words, music and love to give and I hate it when its not appreciated.
Now, I’m twisting in the wind with my feelings snapping this way and that. I did and do still want companionship, but it seems I create bodies wherever I go and torch the gardens. I don’t have any regrets… I did my part to be a caring partner in all the ways I knew how. I tried to love someone who was not capable of reciprocating the way I needed her to.
Now comes he push back to relevance and strength. I have been able to withstand many such calamities and will continue to do so through this trial. I hurt, and I am sad… but I will transition on to an active state where I set goals and meet them.
I have a lot of explaining I want to do. Let me gush. Pour out my intentions and hope that somehow it’s all understood. Security is so precious in such insecure times. The ebb and flow can just as easily rip apart what it had just brought together. I often find myself perplexed by outcomes.
I’m always trying to adapt better to my circumstance. My carnal inclinations nonwithstanding, I try to approach things rationally. What presents the best odds for success? What scenario preserves mental health most effectively? I guess wrong a lot, but right too sometimes. My current plateau of success is due in large part to that, but is still picked by failure.
My world is not without turbulence. Disruptions are frequent, and I must evolve or perish.
Right now, all the pieces are swirling about. Like dispersed seeds. Where is down? How is stop?
I get close but still, there is only the guess of ground for which to build my empire. I’ve lost many units and now is not the time to stop.
I am a jerk to some people, a star to others. I’ts amazing how perceptions vary while my demeanor pretty much remains the same. I’m done pining for C’s friendship… I have reached the end of my interest in that area. Sometimes things don’t heal… they just rot in plain sight covered over by a veil of lies and dishonesty. Lack of introspective ability leaves no solutions in sight. Farewell. If you’re fine living in this make-believe world, I am too.
Other than that disappointing outcome, I’m doing fine. I was singing today. Really feeling in love with my partner A. I was crawling all over her yesterday when she came to visit before her long trip to Tennessee. I got all my rub and sniff quotas met prior to her departure, and insisted she roll around in my sheets and get the girl smell happening in there. I should be fine until she gets back, and we talk daily anyway so that really helps us stay connected. I am always trying to heal wounds I create, but this area is a place where a lot of positive energy is flowing out of. I have a future here with her, one that we see together. A shared interest in bringing the paths of our lives into one, where we can both entertain and support each other throughout.
There’s no perfect anything, there is only life. Good and bad, annoying and wonderful, it is what it is. I am confident that I am forging a sustainable path, but we are still pretty early on into this adventure with many miles of road left to walk.
So moral: out with the frustrating, in with the appreciation. I hope A feels my love, and knows how important it is that she be available for me to chew on, and sniff as often as I need.
There’s no undo in life. There is only the pain of errors and the reminders of failure. I have many things I regret, but still try to “do right” with my future actions. I attempt to demonstrate an understanding that I have learned, grown, progressed in some measurable way from the moment of transgression. Still, the inescapable burden of guilt remains.
My vomit-hole aka this blog has served a purpose in that it allows my expression an unfiltered faucet of release. Not right, not wrong, just OUT. Get these thoughts away and let them trouble me no longer! Sadly, my noxious words aren’t cured in my consciousness, only sated for a time. There will be other opportunities to vent and pour out the bile as I wrong others or am wronged.
My real life actions do not resonate with this resentment and anger that get expressed here… rather, they are purged since they had a moment to be free, recognized and detached from the bounds of active thoughts. That’s the basic principle of this place, and the reason I keep the blog going is because it works.
None of this matters though. Regret and pain still haunt me wherever I go. I’ve hurt, fled, and left smouldering ruin in my wake time and time again. I long to vocalize, rationalize, yet turn out to be a terrible person to talk with about the sensitive issues of compatibility, love and the future (or so I judge myself to be).
I sense my current partner grows tired of my pondering the coming circumstantial end of our affiliation, yet, I can’t stop thinking about it. A looming storm that is not yet here while I procrastinate understanding for the immediacy of pleasure. Nothing to be done but watch is it approaches, much like my dad’s death being somewhere on the near horizon.
I’m imploding a little today and not feeling very keen on the prospects of the future. Friends alienated, tiring of the working environment, shared doom of the collapse of the current arrangement where love is transacted. It’s a tough time. Plus, my olive branch to C was ignored and that just reinforces that I’m a fucking idiot.
By girlfriend and I have been doing really well; great in fact. I laugh with her (uproariously), and we are communicating very effectively in all area. I’ve had my share of symptoms and so has she yet we keep working through and finding constructive ways to share. That’s what relationships are all about.
Since the med change my mood has been better and more stable. I wake up a bit more groggy but not dealing with the chronic depression symptoms. No psychotic symptoms/precursors. Things in the neurochemical department are stabilizing.
I know I’m not doing so great in the physical domain. My body feels poopy. I’m feeding it bad food consistently. I’m not getting as much exercise. Being conscious of this is half my struggle, and I’ll take the next step by avoiding the temptations of the world around me. Well, at least lower the frequency at which I partake. Small steps.
I am feeling strong in my profession and in my will to continue with my career path. I’m doing the things I need to in order to advance myself occupationally and in terms of preserving my mental health. I have ventured into new areas/opportunities and am all the more well-rounded because of it. I feel very hopeful about this trajectory I’m on, and fortunate.
What the future holds is still uncertain but I do know I’m working hard to achieve positive outcomes both professionally and personally.
I love her. I’m dedicated to building a future where my girlfriend and I can be together indefinitely. This is a happy time. I’m lucky that the circumstance has befallen me such that I’m now in this position to love, be loved and thrive.
I’m on the new meds and things are working fine so far. The antipsychotic makes me a bit drowsy in the morning still.
I’m watching Thor Ragnarok which is cute and fun. I wish I had an MCU person to share my enthusiasm with.
Baseball tonight but I’m losing vs Derpy again. Fuck.
I’m thinking about C with sorrow and regret but A with optimism and hope. I wonder what the future stress will hold for me, but I don’t have any idea what is going to happen. Is partnership going to rip me apart or hold me together? Why do I have these dreams where C is haunting me?
I think about both women but in vastly different ways. Permanence vs chaos.
I need a game to play tonight to tune me out of this conflict. This world on fire. Time to burn a village to the ground!
There’s so much I need to learn, and I’m still very much a fool.
I haven’t given much thought to writing. I seem to be at a place in my coping where I tend to surround myself in distractions of an engaging variety, whereas this place is all about unidirectional expression. I know there is a need for this type of expressive venues, but as my symptoms grow it gets harder to manage opening up and sharing.
I have been sliding downhill slowly, which I believe is a product of circumstance and neurochemical imbalance. This decline has not been without attempts to interrupt… the most recent of which came yesterday when my psych meds were tweaked a bit. I will update the “My Fucked Up Brain and What I Feed It” page when things are set but I’m taking a different level of anti-psychotic as well as anti-depressant. I am only on morning 1 of this so news pending as far as measurable results go.
Having a partner has been a big help too. She is very joyful and loving despite having such a tough circumstance and hostile environments to live in. I have seen her bloom quite a bit since we have been dating, especially when she is in my shared living space (which is our little sanctuary).
I think about the events that led to my finding her and It’s all so coincidental yet very intentional. Just as I broke my personal ties to one woman I was fond of, my response to not be struck down by sadness, rejection and guilt led to my finding a far more suitable partner. The first circumstance was not ready, but my persistence allowed my to inherit a situation that was.
However, relationships are not a cure to symptoms; they can only enable good behaviors or deteriorate them. I find my current arrangement to be highly beneficial, but I still need to use my own coping skills to get myself right.
MH treatment is never really over, it just changes, mutates and finds a new way to inflict suffering.
I got to thinking how fortunate I am. At this time in my life, I have a support person that I adore. She is a genuine fit in my life, and our differences are such that there is much to learn from each other; many things to explore. She’s already taught me so much, and dramatically improved my internet savvy.
I struggle with my feelings at times, but she inspires my strength. Critter was such a salvation at a time when most alone, contemplative and sad. I have been with my thoughts all day and having her far away aided me in realizing just how much I love her. She has a positive effect on my wellbeing and life, and I’ve seen real change since she came into frame.
I’ve been holding my logical reservations and my emotional desires in balance in my dialectical model. “Healthy” is equilibrium with introspection. I don’t feel in any way polarized, but appreciative. Here’s a woman who will put up with my nonsense; someone who improves the quality of life I once held as standard. Someone who points me towards a better future.
So I have been thinking, and feeling. I’m looking back and feeling grateful. I have such a blessing, during a very turbulent time. It’s with her help that I’ll make it through, I believe. It’s a test, and one that I’m more ready for because of her.
It may be morning for you, but already “afternoon” for me. I don’t much care for these dramatic alterations of sleep, needless to say. What mentally ill person does?
I find myself short-tempered, irritable, blurry and uncoordinated. It’s a distressing state that maybe is some form of retribution for my imbalanced life. I did imbibe this weekend, but not recklessly so (those days being behind).
I worry about my dad. Is he tumbling down the slope? Am I watching his precipitous decline and not recognizing it? How can I be so embattled and bitter when his life is slipping away? I feel like a bad son… spite pervades with each selfishly-centered transaction I am engaged in with him. It’s hard to be effectual from his standpoint, granted, but he lives in a hole of self-pleasure and hedonism. I have no respect for that, even in death. It is both disturbing and regrettable. Yet, he’s still my only dad and I’m losing time with him as each day passes. I’m stuck in a place between resentment and sadness with the voluminous thunderstorm of tragedy about to come roiling overhead.
My sex-drive has been revved up… as would be expected with the sort of symbiotic pairing I have cultivated. Does this too add to my tippy scales of mood regulation? I think fucking everything tips the scales, it just depends on how all the things coincide. There’s no escaping the affect of variables… there is only compensation, adaptation and neutralization.
So many threads hang down, dangling, reminding me of work undone and damage caused. I regret, even up to no more than a month ago, and I feel unworthy of love… and yet, I do feel it in my heart. Critter and I have been bonding in this way that feels both safe and familiar. How can such a thing be after less than a month? I can’t explain. I have no logic to justify the complexity of my emotional attachment. I am only clear that this connection is real, yet still delicate. I’m not sold on permanence until permanence is validated (which takes time). Nothing worth having is built in a few weeks… only the true accumulation of trust, consistency and knowledge will shine a light on a union built to last.
Things feel good… I know that for certain.
Today is the start of week 14 (of 26). We are more than half way through and shit is pretty tight all across the spectrum. Here’s hoping a couple of recently injured fellas are able to hop back in the saddle do rad cowboy things with some hat waving.
I keep finding things I regret in my scoring:
.3 per put out is way too much. This makes 1B the most valuable position player in the game
1.25 per batter DPT is too much. Nerfed.
-.6 per K for batters is not harsh enough. Strikeouts are a sin against the Baseball gods.
.75 per IP is not enough. Pitchers don’t compare with position players. Also 1 per APP is not juicy enough either.
These are just some examples. I want balance damnit! No position should be preferable. Just like in my FFL leagues; rosters are based on previewed talent assessments not scoring advantages.
But why batter defensive plays? I do believe they should be rewarded because its incremental accomplishments that plug on both aspects of position player stats. It’s boring to only care when they’re at the plate. However, I needed my numbers to still promote balance despite the events piling up for certain players. So, I diminished some and buffed others.
Batting & Fielding
Runs 0.75
Singles 1.25
Doubles 2.5
Triples 4.5
Home Runs 5
Runs Batted In 1
Stolen Bases 2
Caught Stealing -1.5
Walks 0.5
Strikeouts -1
Put Outs 0.08
Assists 0.12
Errors -3
Outfield Assists 4.25
Double Plays Turned 0.8
Pitching Scoring Categories
Pitching Appearances 2
Outs Recorded ( 1/3 IP) 1
Wins 8
Losses -5
Saves 8
Hits -0.35
Earned Runs -1
Home Runs -2
Walks -0.15
Strikeouts 1
Balks -2
Grounded Into Double Plays 1.5
Holds 4
Pickoffs 4
Blown Saves -6
Still stayed true to my beliefs and edged true offensive achievement over big piles of defensive stats. Now increments break ties and keep my scoreboard popping with green no matter who is on the field. I feel like this configuration sticks in my happy zone.
Welcome to Whammy Slammy Susan III!!
First week saw my landslide victory over hopeless Bangle-Doof. Poor bastard lost by 103. My scoring was an overall nerf compared to WSS2 scoring. I like that.
The standings are a three way tie for first with DerpyDerpDerp leading in points. I climbed up from third to second. This week I get FaceWaster V, which has been bad news for me. His pitchers come through when I’m in the reticle. We shall see if he stays lucky.
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In other news, I’m doing alright. Dad has been ailing lately. I remain aloof thinking that I have no clue what to expect but aware trajedeybmay be very near. “A,” who I will henceforth refer to as Critter, and I are doing very well. It’s more than three weeks in and things are still clicking. Discovery is happening and we are enjoying our time together. She’s curious about me which I find totally intoxicating.
The sex is unbelievable. I’ve never been more in tune with anyone before. We are dialing in on our comforts, and finding the ways we fit well together. I do light her up, and feel so very appreciated for the way we are together. She does EVERYTHING Blog. Dang yo.
My dreams have been confusing and I know there is some lingering part of me that remains unreconciled post Cheyenne. I don’t know what to do with that. Maybe it’s safe to be a friend now that I’m in a sexual relationship, but maybe because of my past attraction to her that’s not a good idea. I don’t like the way it all happened, but there has only been uneasy silence when it comes to the beat and not the appetizers. I broke it and now I’m trying to super glue it back together. It’s probably a waste of time, but I never like hurting people and just walking away.
I think about the future. Critter and I are thinking about the road ahead. So many more steps to make before logic agrees with emotion. She’s an investment I’m glad to make though. She tolerates my nonsense like a pro. Keeper status earned.
Have a great week Blogomites!
I’m feeling the strain of excessive work, family dynamic disturbances and now some persistent nightmares. There are always positives and negatives in life, and with all these potential stressful things come some good things as well. “A” and I are bonding day by day, and especially under the recent calamities we’ve been forced to respond to. Though, I feel detached from effectiveness… like a distant satellite teetering on an unstable, elliptical orbit. I don’t know what to make of it… but I feel it largely has to do with my insecurities and false perceptions.
I get that things shit gets hard at times. It’s unavoidable that we are made to endure suffering and pain. Our prevailing responses are what dictates how we move forward or handle future calamities. Right?
I’m not feeling much like sharing (in depth) about myself today, however, I realize that not talking things out is the opposite of the model I so diligently preach to others. I can’t expect to do well with my own symptoms if I can’t discuss them in this public forum. I don’t want to analyze it… I just don’t like the way I feel. I’m again starting to scrape for ways to escape reality and all my alternatives prolong my misery (but have not turned back to weed or abusing alcohol).
Right when I thought I was getting on track I start to catch fire and head for impact. That’s what this feels like: Rejection, joy, dismay, confusion, trauma… all bundled together in less than a month. Even with companionship, I’m still feeling like I’m not seen, or that who I am is somehow uninteresting and unappealing. The fallout from “C” still hurts in my heart… even though I was mad and burned that interpersonal bridge myself. I feel cast off (despite being found shortly thereafter) in a way I was blindsided by. I’ve created quite a mess for myself haven’t I?
It’s not anyone fault but my own. I am full of feeling, with nowhere to uncork and be recognized. Everyone sees me through the window that I let them see me through. I’m broken and awaiting trauma on the near horizon. Foreboding clouds are amassing.
I’m about to “secure” a third straight defeat in my FMLB league. More than 100 point margin in this: a fantastic humiliation taking my league rank from first to third. Sigh.
Wholesale roster changes commencing. The injury bug has DECIMATED my team. No other roster has been hampered by injury. None. If anyone has a goat they wouldn’t mind letting me “borrow” so I can make an offering to Jobu please let me know. And for the record: I DID NOT STEAL JOBU’S RUM!!
Alas, a new week begins and another chance to get right. Hopefully.
In the rest of my world I went through some dad drama. He seems like he’s doing the best he can to make his slow decline unabashedly miserable for my mom. I’m not present enough to help ease the burden but I do need to earn a living. I’m torn in this capacity as son and man. I can’t propel independence without betraying my foundation. I resent my dad and his hedonistic way of living out his final days. He doesn’t care who he hurts as long as he gets to feel good all the way to the end. It’s grotesque and selfish.
In my secret life, “A” and I are thriving. I’ve troubled her with my symptoms lately and I feel bad about that, but I’m also a human so it seems unavoidable. She has her own life to sort through. Bullying ex. Distant family. She calls me by my first name.
I sympathize with our current plights but see a stable future out there somewhere, and not too far from here as well. I get scared but remind myself of the steps it took me to get where I am. Nothing worth having is achieved without struggle.
I’ve been having strange dreams that border on nightmares. I’ve also been having astoundingly good sex for the first time in many years. There’s a stability here in this dynamic that I’ve been missing. I’m glad to have it. Ow that shit in my family and beyond has hit the fan. So many variables. My antipsychotic is not cutting it at my current dose. I need to talk to my doctor again. Self care.
I’m going to bite my pillow for a while. Bye.
I come out here to cope with things… but there aren’t any words that make things much better. Like everyone, I have stress. I worry about the future. I reflect on my moods. My word vomit carries on into the vastness.
I guess I’m wondering when calamity will come. What will happen to this stilted world I reside in? Collapse of some form seems likely. Do I have the strength to emerge from the rubble?
What am I doing? Why am I walking this path? I have failed at everything I ever reached for, and I keep reaching; as if I can ensnare my goals with just the tips of my extended fingers.
I don’t think I’m a good man. I think I fucked up too much to be “good.” I’m an indentured penitent and bound to honor by shame. I have a wake of angry people behind me and a future designed to mitigate the impact of regret.
I now stand in a place in which I see the potential to absolutely destroy it by being an idiot. Ultimately, I’m hurt and too confounding to be worth loving. My words don’t mean shit once the world is on fire.
I’m hoping for a neurochemical reset. A sleep should help that. See my deterioration in this post? It’s been pretty clear.
Having someone again does tend to remind me of just how easy it has been to fuck it up in the past. Will I ever let someone love me without destroying them first?
It shakes the balance of days,
A strained pluck of the tightest string–
Her echoing chords ring like a dawn bell.
Flipped and perplexed…
In the upside-down world,
My hands on the aching boundary–
The sound of my cleaving breath,
To clear the air of spinning dust.
Concealed by oblivious affliction,
Striking loose the gems of fortune–
Given light from under the skeptic’s soot,
Radiant and accepting… wanting for me…
Her voice came to call.
I’ve been getting to know “A” over the last several days and I notice that this dynamic is forging into uncharted relationship territory. We are dating, so that much is established, but our bond goes very deep… but how? It hasn’t been a week, yet, I feel like I’ve known her for a long time. I had no inhibition with sharing my past and future goals with her, and she has done the same with me. How can we risk such profound vulnerability on what most people might consider “a stranger?”
Honestly, I don’t have an answer, but I do know I’m not at all scared to tell her the truth about who I am. I am also not afraid to be a free and open communicator about my feelings, preferences and desires.
But how did this closeness come to be? I am in a state of dialectic turbulence over this. The more emotional aspects of my consciousness are bonded fast to her, trusting, connected and intimate on a level I would expect of a partner I’d been dating for months or years. My logical, rational aspects are grappling with the uncertainty and newness of this relationship, and eager for stability to preserve this positive feeling I’m having. My mind reels at the thought of how new this is and how strongly I feel connected, but still demands stability, patterns and consistency to seal the deal and entrench my processes. I’m aware that time is only going to tick by as quickly as it does… I must exercise my (lacking) virtue of patience in order to gain the assurance my rationality is looking for.
Notice how I’m not spewing emotional effusions? How I’m not puffing myself up to seem more appealing than I am? I remember with C and S before her (and many others for that matter), I had to try and impress them so that they’d be interested in me, and hopefully, not leave me for someone more interesting. I wanted to keep showing and showing and showing them who I wanted them to see so they’d be attracted to me (especially since my affection was largely unrequited). None of that has happened thus far. I don’t feel any desire to be anything other than day-to-day me, which is refreshing in a way I’ve not known before. I didn’t know what it was like to just be who I am and lay myself bare for exposition, but now I do. She sees me, right through me, to the core, and THAT’S who she wants.
My dialectic continues to leave me in my contemplative wise-mind as I come to terms with the precarious balance of circumstance. It’s refreshing, but scary… trusting, yet unclear. I’m not torn to bits by this, instead, musing and reflective. This feels like what I always imagined healthy would be, and I’m excited to see where my road is going. I know I want her though, not just for now, but for always.
After I was through venting my caustic feelings out here in cyberspace over the last few days, I took action. I said “I shouldn’t languish in sadness, I should get up and show myself that I am not resigned to this lonely state. I deserve to find someone who fits willingly and is not squished into a mold.”
Arguably, that’s not an easy feat by any stretch. I can’t control outcomes, but I can demonstrate a willingness to grow and move on. I reactivated my dating profile on my STD site and decided to let that soak. I had an email waiting for me when I resubscribed so I replied to it with interest. That’s how I met “A.”
The last two days have been unreal. Dreamlike even. The magnetism in both mental and physical realms between A and I has produced a type of genuine closeness I didn’t think was possible this early on. Our bodies agree like we’ve had months or years of practice. My safety and hers are top priorities for us both, and part of a foundation of free and honest discourse.
You know, my stark and unfiltered honesty was something that C resented (or feared) rather than appreciated, but A saw my heart and my intent through my expression and opened herself to me fully, willingly and gladly. The initial explosively is a bit scary undoubtedly, but beautiful as well. I’ve never been so blessed to be a part of something like this before, where the mutuality is so… unimaginably wonderful. Intoxicating, yes, but a little worrisome since now we don’t want to be hurt. We’ve each suffered relationship trauma but managed to still find each other with common ground to share. I can’t fully comprehend the circumstance I’m in, and I’m daunted in a lot of ways, but if this is the real thing it proposes to be, I’ll never want again.
Raise your Busch can or red solo cup to a future that I though just two days ago I was going to force someone unwilling to fit into that now someone enthusiastic wants to. What a miraculous turn of events and I couldn’t be more excited! To a future with A!
I had a restless night thinking about her. I see a couple of things clearly:
She’s a fool if she didn’t see this coming. I was clear, all along the way, that I wanted something more. Yet, this got treated like a big surprise.
I behaved poorly as the result of rejection. Which has destroyed any type of friendship we may have cultivated.
I’m resentful but not going to act on any of my slighted feelings. It’s better to cast away those responses just like my affection.
Obliviousness is no excuse. I felt like I was the only one who made mistakes when I wasn’t. I never got an apology for being led on. I just got denial that it had taken place or a reinterpretation of what actually happened.
I’m pretty resolved in my disdain. I know I hurt her but there’s no going back. My past was used against me in an evidentiary argument. I felt especially angered by that. It caused me to be wrathful in the end. I abolished all bonds to allow myself to dislike her.
Nothing I hate more than having my honesty used against me as though my here and then are the same. How unbelievably insulting. You really don’t know me but you sure do know how to piss me off.
My nightmares were about escaping a circumstance where there was trauma. I traumatized myself quite a bit, pining for someone not interested in me. Mashing my face against the wall. My confidence and perceptions were wrong every step of the way, but why do you think that was the case? Is it because I’m a big dumb idiot?
Am I such an ignoramus that I just made up all the encouragement to feel what I had inside me? I’m so delusional I made it all up? One thing I didn’t have was patience, because I thought there was mutuality. Why are we patient if we both want this, I thought? Because she was happy enjoying my feelings but not interested in reciprocating. I feel duped, then cast away when things got hard. Argued with instead of sympathized. I extended her that courtesy but still advocated for my own feelings and beliefs.
Here I am ranting again. Maybe after the weekend I’ll be calmer. Good riddance though. I’m glad I didn’t invest more than I did. You’re a liar and not self honest. You’d rather I be blamed so your way out is easier. My heart is broken but that doesn’t matter to you. You just wanted to tell me why I was wrong. Now you can see why I’m not interested in being your friend.
My life is pointed up and I’m moving on. I do feel more like things are settling back to a familiar normalcy. Now that I don’t have you to think about (in the sane way), I can direct my efforts to helping people who will reciprocate my kindness. Maybe there is a girl out there for me who won’t flight my affection and taunt me with my honest revelations. Someone who will see me for who I am and not who I was.
She never saw me. Not who I was becoming. Not the life I was leading. Not my pride and conviction. I don’t know what she saw but it is pointless to wonder. I’m done.
Yes, that is the truth of it. I end up ruining more of what I touch than improving it. This situation of ours is no different. I have dashed the glass against the stones, and all that remains are glittering fragments of a once whole thing.
Truth is that I’ve wounded myself because of my inability to regulate my feelings. This is a talent I’m afraid I’ve never learned. I often effuse, and that is received and draws those to me who are enveloped by it. Such a feeling to be cared for so powerfully, honestly and sometimes overwhelmingly. It comes from a deep and unchecked place of loving that I know not how to cap. I have found this to be advantageous in most every circumstance but this one.
Now that has caused me pain and catalyzed my forsaking of the rarest of the rare. I took the bridge away and left her to drown. I left her no way to cross again.
I still have anger, because I acted on something that seemingly wasn’t true… and conducted myself in a way I may not have if not for that invitation or inclination to do so. Did she want me too in the first place? It looks more and more like I just got it wrong and my volatility has created this new and painful rift that I fear will not be mended. My enterprise of selfishness has deprived my life and profession of a highly-valuable individual. I’m ashamed of that. Deeply regretful of my actions, and now suffering the consequences.
What can I do? I can try to lay the first stone back in the right direction but even that seems like it is fundamentally unwanted. I know nothing. I have no insight… only a cloud that conceals her internal discourse. I inflict pain without knowing why, or without the education to respond effectively.
Here I am after that last post saying I wasn’t going to pine… but blog how can I not? I’ve said it time and time again, I’ve never seen anyone like her. It drives me crazy how much I want her and the infuriation of not being able to have her is tearing me apart from the inside. I feel pain, deep and mournful within my chest… knowing she’s very likely gone. What have I done? She was one of a kind and now she’s gone.
I lost her… even the echo of her. All the beauty I came to appreciate I ripped out because I couldn’t have it all. How unimaginably selfish of me. Who the fuck do I think I am?
I did this to myself and she is the victim of my inability to be an effective human. My ineptitude at regulating my catastrophic tsunami of feelings. I am a fool, and yes, definitely and idiot.
Now I have nothing but the memory of how good I felt with her. A reminder of the infantile responses to things I have which cost me a chance at a better life.
It came to an end today. I laid myself bare to her and was rejected. It’s hard to stay a good friend after being turned down like that. I’m back to just having that professional, impersonal relationship that an employer has with an employee. No doubt I’d like to retain her talent, even if she doesn’t think much of who I am.
Really this is no surprise. I wouldn’t have walked down this way if she hadn’t told me there was attraction to me. I was thinking this would be a good thing to explore, but when I did, she ran. Now I have feelings that aren’t shared. Unacknowledged and unwanted. I feel a tad crushed by that. Misled to some extent, though later she was clear about not wanting to lead me on.
I feel a little better knowing that now its really over. I don’t want to be friends. I don’t want to be reminded of what I thought I could have that now I absolutely can’t. Never one word was said to me after that first afternoon we shared together where she told me she was attracted. Not one word to give me hope that we could explore each other. I have been turned away by her silence.
Goodbye C. This is probably the last post where I’ll pine for you and bemoan my unrequited affection. Everyone is entitled to their own choices and you made yours.
I just have to move forward.
I am this person who strives to improve. I hope that I can better myself and keep things stable in my life. Despite the environmental variables, I think I have accomplished that.
Yet I grapple with loneliness. Like any other man, I have the desires. I have instinct that seek to bind with trusted partners. Having never met a man who can make me feel the way I hope, I often find myself looking to women.
This is an imbedded behavior that I am trying to overcome. I must realize that there is nothing. There is no one. There is just me. I have to stop thinking I’m going to be somewhere other than on the path I built for myself with my mistakes and choices. It’s kinda depressing, but it also has enabled me to stronger than I’ve ever been in my life.
I see it. The way forward is full of brightness and events. New people will be crossing my path every day. Places and circumstances I never thought possible will be realized. So much has changed in the last year and there’s still quite a bit of work left to do.
I’m proud. My future is as bright as it’s ever been, yet it attracts no one. A level of closeness I’ve never had seems to be a level I’ll still not comprehend. With all the good, and all the steps, I’m sure I must reconcile to walk them alone with no one to share in my adventure.
Circumstance and undesirability kept C away despite the clarity of my feelings. Maybe that is what ultimately causes her to realize she didn’t want it. I’m too much. Too big. Too overflowing. But mostly because no one notices me. No one tries to see me. No one will, I think. Like a well shaken champagne bottle of neglected emotions.
I feel sad that this door is closed.
Yet, I have a life full of good people and adventure. There’s a great sum of work to be done and I’m hoping to get out there and do it. With no one to share it with. With no one who understands me. Just me.
I said have a good night, but what I meant was goodbye.
It all goes back in and the stopper on top. The finality of it is reassuring but the future seems emptier than before. A cringe and a retreat is my response. No regret but no more future either.
It helps to not have to hope; reality seems more achievable now. My effusions dispersed and evaporated away. The baggage of wanting removed and only the lasting bond of friendship remains. C and I seem like we won’t be, ever, and even though that is sad, it also helps. No I don’t have to dream anymore. I don’t have to yearn in an unrequited spiral. Now I can continue living my life the way I have been, erring a future built on good mental health.
Done. Back to the routine without the beacon to fill the world with light. Much as I always knew it would be. Much as I deserve. So on we go…
I have all these feelings Blog. I get excited, involved, intrigued… and more often than not I do so but for the wrong reasons. FOR ONCE, this is the right reason, time, person to be enthused about. C is miraculous, and still growing into the person she is headed towards being. I want to jump on the bandwagon, shower her with affection and help guide her safely to be the anything she desires to be. Yet, I’m still a fucking idiot trying to make a tough/impossible circumstance something other than it is. I’m still hoping against hope she and I will find each other despite the paradigm of pain we reside within. I mean… I know I’m a good fit for her as she is for me, and we’d do right by each other in the long run… but… how?
I want to invest in her but I can’t have her… I have to bottle what I feel for fear of forcing her into an uncomfortable choice. I have to say I’m not wanting her when I am… Its a dynamic I need to ether be relieved of or acknowledged for and neither is happening. I can accept both realities, but without certainty, I’m twisting in the wind and screaming in the miasma of the unknown.
The chance to explore this world is held from me. The opportunity to go further is restricted. The future remains totally unclear, even in terms of the trajectory I had hoped to at least foresee. Now, I have nothing but the aching silence of wordless agony where I begin to compartmentalize my feelings for the sake of not having to be reminded of what will not be.
This is all on me though. It’s her life and her choice what she does with it. I might as well be an asteroid in distant, fragile orbit. I see such hope… a pairing unlike any I had even imagined. A future where I could be with someone who nourishes me, and I her. A path we walk together that makes us stronger, not casts us in our own distinct and isolatory directions. I’ve had my heart broken so many times, but I feel like she would not. She is different… aware and centered in a world of looking out for her mental health as the top priority. What an influence I could be on her as she already is for me. Such promise, yet, unachievable… remote and in a future that is not happening and is not being realized.
Do I want her to chose me? Fuck yes I do! Will she? I don’t know and I have more doubts than assurances.
We only live one time. We only have this chance. I’ve wasted so much of mine… and I continue to scratch for meaning in the void of unrequited recognition. I’ll let her pass right through me fingers if that’s what she wants… and I’ll keep my eyes open into the future where my window of opportunity closes a little more every single day.
Splinter crisp–
Shatter the space between,
The fresh blood open,
A sensation.
Caught between–
The words broken,
Scattered like sawdust,
Falling into cracks.
Ignited.
Tinder sparking–
Born.
The brightness,
Filling the gaps,
Of dreams.
In an attempt to grapple with my state of emotional volatility, I have again turned to the medium of music as a coping tool. The process of creating these mixed albums helps me express, but also reflect. This composition I have arranged speaks in two voices: one that yearns in an abstract/theoretical sense, and the other that reminds of the parameters by which reality is confined (often toned by fact or obstacle). I have a great well of feeling, and this album helps me quantify and understand my own emotional arc. There is no conclusion to be drawn in such an unexplored circumstance, but as long as I have the ability to express, I believe this exercise will help me cope effectively.
One of the things I noticed here was I found a lot of common ground with some of the artists I used on my Graceful Sniffer album (Since the subject matter is largely the same). Different songs yes, but same melodic motifs and emphasis.
So far though, things are pretty positive, as this album undoubtedly conveys. I’ve listened to it and I’m pleased with the sort of journey of sensation it took me on… I was singing at some points and wiggling around like a sun-baked worm in others (in a good way). It’s an accurate emotional progression and summary of the place have been recently, am at now and will hopefully be going. Weee! Enjoy if you do compile it yourself:
I’m working one last day in the office before departing for the big annual conference. The anxiety has been tough leading up to this point but now I feel a lot better. Maybe that has something to do with conversations I’ve had with friends, coworkers and the work I’m doing on cognitive re-framing.
I’m leaving tonight. Does it sound strange that I hope C is watching my location icon as it moves across the state? The thought of her keeping tabs on where I am going is exceptionally pleasing.
Speaking of C, I’m glad I did my Venty Time because my interactions with her have been so uplifting, and I know they would be much harder if I didn’t have a way to express my feelings and urges in a separate, unknown (to her) space (where they cause no trouble). I’m human, but not inclined to make the same mistakes of my past and bludgeon my prospects with a cudgel of emotional effusion. The promise of a tangible and contemplative friendship is something I haven’t explored since middle school and is clearly worth fighting for.
Now that I have this balance in my discourse, I can go back to being the confident and un-beleaguered individual I am. Just as a note, I do attack my own cities and from time to time and burn them to the ground. My trouble is entirely of my own concoction.
What fun it will be to go and schmooze at the conference! All the people I know and have yet to meet, and C right there with me hanging out in my pocket (technically, trapped inside my iPhone). I’ll be taking pictures and shooting video of all the shenanigans. She’s fantastic blog. Just… kinda unbelievable… having never met anyone with her skillset and personalty type before. I reiterate because I’M AMAZED and keep having the same thoughts about how miraculous this all is! We are already becoming friends and building trust in a healthy way. I’m a Hoover Dam of enthusiasm trying not to over-top myself needlessly.
Have a great day blogosphere, and the time to fly is drawing near (ish)! My dot is going 484 miles southwest! Hooray flying dot!
This helps. The expression of thought, of feeling, in a safe place that is free of the scrutiny of reality. That people give two shits about this thoughtstream amazes me. Ultimately though,. this space is unknown to my social world.
I need a place to feel without having an impact on anyone directly.
Today I learned an important lesson in my ability to regulate my expression, but it doesn’t mean my feelings have gone anywhere. I just need a new place to express them. A secret place.
So here we are.
I have such an attraction to her body blog… she has that perfect chemical balance where all the smells and the touches are good. I get electric when she’s next to me… it hard to explain. I really don’t want to let C know that though… it doesn’t really help me at all in a practical sense.
She lights me up when we hold each other. Enough to think that I am doing more harm by touching her than good. I don’t want her to feel like I have that lust for her even though I do. It’s not something I will ever know and I’m inevitable going to smash my head against the wall the more I long for that.
I can appreciate her from afar… I know that is no small feat but it is what I need to do right now. We are in the beginning part of our comprehension. These feelings I have are undeniable… but don’t have a place in our discourse. That’s why I have this place. Here I can vent that stuff and keep my interactions with her healthy.
I’m doing the best I can to cope. There’s no denying,. there is only a moment of recognition, then, the archives of irrelevancy.
Admittedly, Night Guy was a response to a changing circumstance and search for companionship outside of the traditional paradigm. While he was a fun and exciting fellow, he was not sustainable. I have sen now that some contortion is good, but too much compromises integrity.
This album centers its themes on the insanity, bizarre and inexplicably unique way I manifest my persona in this otherwise tranquil world. The motifs include hasty sex, strange comparisons, odd quirks, depression, fanaticism and balance (eventually).
I feel like this very-closely parallels my current mood and temperament. Have at with the exposition!
Mood Album: Spunk-Rocket Poof Station
Length: 75 minutes
Just completed class 6 of 8 for NAMI Peer-To-Peer. Leading flips my sullen to smiley. Today I was feeling depressed for most of the time I was at work. Then I got busy, but occasionally my sadness would flutter back in. It never leaves the room, but it might land somewhere else for a while. I put on my teacher mask and somehow that rejuvenated me.
Sometimes I feel like I’m being flattened in a vise. Yet, there is still such joy in life. There are beautiful things happening all around. New people I meet. Fresh faces that have their own stories. I see a future where compassion is the currency. I’m an idiot though. I fumble through doing my best as you have no doubt seen.
I wonder about where my path is going. Abstractly it seems positive, but calamity wears many disguises. I’m lonely enough to fall to my doom over a woman, or become ensnared in the deliberations and reconsiderations of work.
The truth is simple: no one else needs to care if I do. I pine for affection, even here in this vast echo chamber. I give nothing of substance yet expect expect expect. I think the world appreciates me, when I could just as easily be a used gum smudge on the sidewalk. Craving your approval, I bend myself to fit a shape you’d desire. This has always been folly. It continues to be.
Have a good night Blog.
I was feeling a little “up” after all the hooplah, but I feel like that’s all wearing off. I don’t think I’m handling things well, but I am trying to improve my behaviors. I’ve left a shadow on the wall of the future, and that’s the best I think I can do given all the turmoil in my life. I try to be present in my reality, but it is often quite painful, and negative. To escape it solves nothing.
I did some work on my peer story for the IOOV program I just got trained in. It will be refreshing to tell the story of how I came to be where I am in terms of my mental wellness. I’m not saying that journey is at all over, mind you. Recovery is never reached, it is only reached for. I hoe to inspire others to seek the help they need to improve their lives.
I think I did good in encapsulating my story in a few minutes. Like 9 to be exact.
I think it’s worth telling because it wasn’t perfect at all. it was a flawed journey of pain and suffering for all. I spared none in my path of destruction. Still even. Still I’m hurting people and leaving bodies in the dirt. I regret that I can’t be friends with the people who’s path diverges from mine. We are all so apocalyptic.
But I’m not an idiot and I do learn to grow and adapt. This whole communication with girls business being a good example of just how easy it can be to get my perspective destroyed and responses all fucked up. I try, I fail, and then I just try something different next time.
I don’t know, Blog. I feel lost sometimes, and other times I feel great. It’s perplexing, this Bipolar disorder. I think after I teach class tonight solo, I will feel pretty good. That activity tends to heal me, or at least boost me up a bit. What am I doing, though? Ah, at this point… who fucking knows? Survive.
It’s clear I’ve been grappling with my self-created frustrating circumstances over the last few days. I’ve also tried to reconcile what I think I’m looking for out there in the world. I came up well short asking too much of A and not able to see the limitations of S through the veil of sex. That’s my fault, and the hurt on both sides is real.
As I do with most life-obstacles, I grow and change in order to survive new circumstances. I have shackled myself to burdensome people in the past and continued to do so until, well, now. I’m grasping for meaning in a place where there isn’t any to be had. It’s a shame I wasted my time in this way, but I’ve also learned a bit about my “wants” when it comes to friendships and beyond.
I need to thicken up my skin, since my lifetime of rejection and dismissal seems headed in the same disappointing direction it always has. I’ve shed my concern for those who don’t fit into my life. Disregard is all I have left. I feel no shame. This is my life last time I checked, and I’m not wasting any more of it investing resources where there is no value in doing so. Nothing I hate more than being unappreciated for the person I am while pouring unrequited, liquid praise on those in my circle.
So enough is enough. No more scratching around the junk pile for the scraps of a structure long demolished. No more reckless attachment to inadequate figures regardless of physical urges. The future must have someone of genuine, undeniable value to be worth pursuing. I’ve said also that I’m only interested in going it alone in my reality, and that’s still true, pretty much. I’m not making any extraordinary effort to find someone, because I really don’t need anyone. I’m consistently doing better mentally when no one else is involved.
Confidence has always been here, it just got smothered by disappointment. Trying and failing can be tough, but even now, my introspective processes are on-point and rational. I can’t say the same for A or S. I’m angry still at them. I feel like I had so much to give, yet, I get tossed aside like a soggy jizz rag. No more I say!
Okay, so I’m pretty angry that my social experiment has totally failed. What was I thinking, strangers don’t get me, past acquaintances still don’t care about me, yet, this was the place I looked to in order to rekindle my connections with people? I put my faith in people who have disappointed me numerous times in the past and total strangers who know nothing about me at all?
I’m an idiot, period. Ima fry because I’m stupid. I’m alone because I invest in projects that I should leave on the junk pile. I need no one but myself.
Yet, I felt the need to appease my aching loneliness with a remedy destined to disappoint and aggravate. S was a sallow and dimensionless simpleton. A has been a disappointment in all capacities since I got with her. WHAT THE FUCK AMI DOING?!?!?
Laugh all you want. I deserve that. My pain and suffering can be your amusement because it’s deserved. I earned this anger and humiliation. I blame no one but myself. Hopefully I contracted HIV and will die soon.
I’ve never cared about how people read me. If you come here thinking some valuable content is going to be dispersed think again. I’m the biggest fucking idiot I’ve ever heard of, and I have not ceased to amaze myself with my own stupidity and foolishness. Go ahead and get a good laugh you troglodytes. Fuck you all. You never did a fucking thing for me despite my pouring my soul out here night after night.
I’m losing my mind. I’m really fucking going insane right now. I hate this. I hate every moment that no one gives a fried shit about me. No one will, ever. I’m alone. I have been scraping the scum to find someone who will care about me, but even I don’t. I wish I were dead.
I messages S and told her I was sorry if I hurt her. I don’t think there was any sort of friendship there. She never once told me that she appreciated our friendship, but did thank me for my kind words. I felt fundamentally unrecognized in that arrangement. I needed to try to express that I did care but didn’t feel like that was mutual. Is it wrong of me to try and explain myself? I acted rashly and that should not go without explanation. We did have a few good moments. However, those ups were overshadowed by my being ignore or responded to with one or three words a day. I mean, why am I investing in that? Why pine for someone who basically doesn’t care what I’m doing? I hate pining. I’m not a beggar, I’m a beacon.
Well I’m probably exiled anyway so at least I tried to reach out and set the record straight. I’m not callous, I just don’t tolerate poor treatment for brief physicality. I don’t pour out my soul to be ignored. Would you?
This is goodnight.
I messages S and told her I was sorry if I hurt her. I don’t think there was any sort of friendship there. She never once told me that she appreciated our friendship, but did thank me for my kind words. I felt fundamentally unrecognized in that arrangement. I needed to try to express that I did care but didn’t feel like that was mutual. Is it wrong of me to try and explain myself? I acted rashly and that should not go without explanation. We did have a few good moments. However, those ups were overshadowed by my being ignore or responded to with one or three words a day. I mean, why am I investing in that? Why pine for someone who basically doesn’t care what I’m doing? I hate pining. I’m not a beggar, I’m a beacon.
Well I’m probably exiled anyway so at least I tried to reach out and set the record straight. I’m not callous, I just don’t tolerate poor treatment for brief physicality. I don’t pour out my soul to be ignored. Would you?
She blocked me so whatever. I’ll settle with whatever awful feelings she has for me. I’ll go forward totally unacknowledged and unresolved. I’m worth more than this bullshit. Why do I even bother with this random matchmaking nonsense. Such crap. Useless expenditure of energy. I tried to explain but why even bother. Fuck her.
It’s the end of the week, but just the beginning in a lot of ways. I keep learning and failure is my teacher.
I need to find better ways to cope with my sadness and loneliness. There’s no external that can mend the internal.
I’m disappearing into routine. There has been too much pain in my heart. Am I done providing a catalyst to destructive situations? Why look where there is nothing to find?
Alone is best.
I was feeling fairly apocalyptic earlier. That has subsided a bit. I am still unhappy, but in a better place mentally. It’s frustrating. I am glad for my friends and support team.
I wish I knew how I was going to get through this, but I know I’m not going to have anyone with me. I will walk alone most likely. Maybe that’s for the best.
I’ve hurt so many. I live with that.
Well I did learn that distant relationships with fleeting intimacy don’t work for me. It’s just not fair to S in the end though. I did just abruptly leave after waffling in uncertainty about the irritating nature of our arrangement. It’s my fault for not at least explaining anything. It’s just not possible for me to healthily have that kind of relationship with someone. I snapped off. Blacklisted. Gone. Back to the cell with my broken toys. I am catalyzing. The reagents for my departure were well in place and only suffered my ignition. This is my fault though. She definitely could handle it while I could not at all. She’s right to be angry, but it will fade when her world moves on and I become irrelevant. Or, more irrelevant than I was before. I was already little more than an afterthought, which is not much to lose at all.
Well my escapade with S has cratered into the fertile soil of regret. Not that it was unexpected, but I was hoping for some semblance of closeness and got nothing of the sort (either physical or mental) Isolation pervades, and I grow increasingly alone on my island. This is typical, since most encounters I have attempted in the past end in revulsion, rejection and outright dismissal. This time though, I was just acting on the flammable material that was prepped and ready to be set ablaze. S has no real interest in me (or anything going on in my life) and I in her (arguable, I was denied access to her life in full), so it was natural that once the sex was gone there was zero left to hold us together. She was upset at me for walking away again (because I tried once already), but I need to say goodbye.
Realistically, I’m giving up on trying to build this bridge and evict myself from my unwanted isolation. There isn’t anyone who fits the criteria that I keep hoping someone will meet. This is a hopeless procedure and, frankly, I was doing much better without trying to make something happen. I am tired of smashing inadequate results into a lasting mold that fits my bizarre reality. There is no future where settling for whatever wanders past is the right choice, and it never has been. Not saying that happened, but all the applications for building something of value have been turned down upon review.
I don’t harbor anything more than a feeling of sadness, since I am shining brighter than I ever have. Yet, most women I meet can’t wait to escape my radius. I think it’s back to reason and the incremental successes of life. A and I are as far apart as we ever were in our past relationship… with no real gratification, feedback or anything to judge the ongoing value of continuation. What is this simple chat we have? Is it anything other than an activity to occupy a few moments of my time? Is there meaning to be had in these defused and innocuous statements? I tire. I think this might also be a product of my frustration and not indicative of the pattern. I feel no less alone like I hoped I would, or like I did at first. I quickly discovered just because you have people to talk to, doesn’t actually mean anyone really sees/hears you. Or cares.
Profile removed. Chapter adjourned. Now just to clear out the jetsam that has accumulated and start over again by myself. Disappointing? Oh hell yes. Crippling? No, not at all. I have done what my instincts were asking me to do. I tried, I had, I lost. It seems like the road to partnership has been overrun with brambles and foul smelling carcasses galore. I have little reason to go back there until long after the stench of decay has cleared out.
Hey Blog, Night Guy here.
This other guy is a kook pretty much now that I’m going over all these notes and things left behind. Anyway, this music medium is how the previous administration tried to convey or interpret a state of being or emotional narrative for processing and comprehension. I’m not as much in to all the fluffy shit that goes along with this activity, but I guess I can scrutinize what has already been made available for me to cast judgement upon. See this album as a prognosis for the former occupant, and an indicator of the turbulent future he carved out for himself. This album is, basically, how it is; sad, stark and laid out there for all to see. Please don’t send me mail about the deeds of the prior administration, it will all get forwarded to the daytime guy.. or whoever he was. He may have fled the country.
**UPDATED**
So after listing to it a couple of times, it just wasn’t Night Guyish enough. I spruced this bad boy up with some silly putty and electric shocks. Enjoy!
Length: 77 Minutes
In light of recent turbulence in my world, I’ve tried keeping a better feel on the introspective pulse of regular function. I’m also aware that I’m subjecting myself to an unusually high level of stress and stimuli in an effort to combat creeping depression. I see all the elements like a confluence of rivers forming a mighty torrent… somehow sweeping my brain away downstream or buried in silt. Nevertheless, I still pry open the inner vault of the self and try to understand things happening to and from it. I feel I’m better at some things I used to be terrible at, but still lacking in quite a few areas. What are my true motivations for my actions? Why do I open myself to every nice person that walks by? Why am I such an insatiable prick? What does being understood feel like?
I sit here in my snowman jammies and wonder if expression really helps, or if it just provides a forum for things to garner attention for a time? I think the more ways I can ventilate this shit-smelling barn the better. Activities like the Mood Albums I do are helpful because they give me the chance to craft a narrative in a medium not often used. I don’t think myself anything other than expressive, curious and expositional about my own feelings and path forward. So as of the last album when I was feeling a fair bit gooier than I am now, I needed to revisit my good friend pain, loneliness and rekindle an ongoing desire to see things change.
Tracks from the previous Mood Album: Spatulas & Bandaids are highlighted in yellow. I have pulled from other wishy-washy type albums as well that have been generated in the past. I didn’t go “all in” on the squish, mind you, but it’s there. As you can see, there has been some pretty severe turnover in the track-list. I have listed the previous two iterations below so the whole three-album progression can be seen clear.
I had a look back at my very expressive and sad album composition I published the other day, and I started having second thoughts as to the accuracy of the portrayal presented. At first I saw it as a tantrum, but then the real hurt and uncertainty of life were ensnared in there as well. The whole first attempt was raw and unfiltered, where now I began to see the value in refining what was already there. I wanted to paint a better picture than the one I had so hastily Pollocked on to the wall. I still felt like the previous album still had value, so bits and pieces remain the same while the framing I had previously put in place are reoriented. So, here is my newly introspective revisit of the Deflaticated Marshmallow (remnants in bold) album:
Having sealed the door, again, I have no choice but to plod forward in depressed discontinuity and lasting solitude. I have much I need to work on internally. I am a flawed, overly effusive person like a boiling teapot of unacknowledged desire. I’m abrupt and direct, which is generally abrasive. All true things.
Yet, this extraordinary volatility only seems to pertain to finding a female partner. I have consistently blundered and misjudged in this regard, and no more. I’m honestly thinking that maybe a man is a better fit for partnership, if ever there was to be any. I’ve never conceived of that before, though not out of the realm of possibility. In the meantime though, I’m just not going to bother with it anymore. I’ve clearly shown myself that I am nowhere near ready for that type of interaction. My continued abstinence goes on, and hopefully, continues for a very long time to ensure my stability. I am never more clear-headed, hard-working and focused than when not also regulating my emotions due to attraction. I’ve never been able to achieve balance in the past, and that is still the case.
So, on I go as I have. I tried, I failed, and now I have learned enough to move on. It’s back to living my life and investing in my future; one that I build for myself.
Well here I am finding all sorts of exciting ways to process what is going on with me emotionally. I find that the act of putting that to music to be highly therapeutic and cathartic. I don’t really know what story I’m trying to tell here, but it is spun towards a reality that now seems bleak, distant and, ultimately, unreachable. A cookie jar on a shelf that is many years of growth away from being able to reach. Maybe there will never be a time when I do get there, or maybe it will happen in no time at all. There is no predicting the future, there is only dealing with the reality that is presently occupying the “now.” At this present moment, I don’t have much hope at all, which I think is reflected in the composition.
These albums are pretty much appreciated by no one who they should affect, and only end up substituting several paragraphs of introspective analysis. It’s a primitive, visceral discourse in melody, lyric and rhythm that I seem to be the only one who finds that medium relevant, expressive and empowering. As per my usual criteria, these are meant to be 1 hour 20 minute max playlists (fits on a single CD). I do have some sort of structure going on here, but it is quite chaotic, and darting from one abstract representation of pain to an ache of sorrow and glazed over with a sickly sweet sugar coating that doesn’t do enough to hide the foulness underneath.
I’ve come to a determination that I’m still going to be alone. I do not fit with others. I have not found someone able to tolerate me as is. I think this is, again, a stopping point.
I’m going no further thinking my abrasive and inconsistent personality will fit with others. I do not see a future where I am understood. I see no one who can relate to me on the level I am at. Maybe I’m too deranged to be fully comprehended. Perhaps that discontinuity is for a good reason; to prevent future traumas.
You all have seen me flailing about. You watch and probably don’t care one fucking bit. I don’t blame you. I’m no one of relevance to you. The last time someone came out of your ranks my life exploded, then imploded. Never again. I say that, yet I yearn for her still.
Is there any hope of tranquility? I suppose a state of total abstinence and solidarity seems the only path left to me. I scorn those who try to care. I rebuke those who don’t fit. I struggle alone in endless solitude. Not a single fucking one of you cares. This is an empty vessel constantly filled with dispersing noises, fading echoes and then nothing.
Despite all the bad shit flying around, I’m doing surprisingly well. I’m taking charge of some aspects of my life in ways that are constructively healthy. After K and I went our separate ways, I was a little disheartened that I would have a similar connection with anyone else. I was very excited about her, and our falling out was, sadly, disheartening.
However, I did not give up. As I do with new challenges in all aspects of life, I endeavored to face them with hope and confidence. With my work, I took on more challenges until my volunteer status changed to employee. Then from 6 paid hours a month to 80. Up and up we go. I also had a passion for reconciling the unacknowledged self; the me that I show my partners. There was a total lack of this in my life and this issue is ongoing.
Now I am back on the dating scene and attracting a lot of attention with my self-honest profile, my achievements and myriad interests. Turns out there are lots of women who’d like to get to know me better, even here in my area. I’m encouraged. If she’s not here now, there is a high probability I’ll meet a woman I really click with sometime soon. I’m looking for the someone who will stay with me for the long haul, and I’m confident she is not far away.
What a feeling it is to be so radiant and attractive that interest is easily kindled and nurtured! I’m a very unique and remarkable person, and I’m proud of who I am. That shows in reciprocated responses.
Succeeding professionally and romantically! Yes! However, I’m still very nervous about the physical aspect of my dating… I don’t know if I’m ready for the real thing. I have been avoiding it with distance, but that is impractical. I must face this with my confidence and set the anxiety aside. It’s been more than 2 years, but I’m pretty sure I still know how. It’s like riding a bike… only WAY more fun.
I search their names online. I don’t know what I’m hoping to find. Do I expect they don’t hate me? That they somehow have changed? Do all these years help us see something new?
No. It is only pain. There is nothing there but the dead space where something once thrived. If I yearn, I do so foolishly. I hope that the feeling of that love would come back and be strong again. Nothing like that is real. Ever.
I scour for some sight of her. Of them. They just go on living their lives and I might as well be nothing at all. I left no mark. I inspire no second thought. I am a wasted human devoid of value in the scales of companionship.
Of all those I have loved, none wanted to keep me. They tolerated me for a time. Then, no more. I hurt them. Drove them away with my illness. Contaminated myself beyond desire. No bridges can span the gorge.
If J was still out there I’d love her with that fire in me that will NEVER go out. If K had a way to see me, I’d try to fall for her, and if E wasn’t lost in a fool’s dream I’d rekindle the passion we once had.
WHO THE FUCK AM I KIDDING??????
My dreams are utter bullshit. Just another stupid fucking idea my infected, dysfunctional brain came up with to alleviate the unquenchable loneliness. There is no phoenix; nothing will ever rise from the ashes I created. It is gone. Forever. I can’t bear it. It hurts so badly. I’m crushed under it. Decimated. Defenseless. Lost.
Not a lot is different than just a bit ago. I ran a Support Group tonight. It was hard to stay on top of my shit. I did though, and it was really good for me to not have been off pooping my brain-pants somewhere alone. I’m still very wounded, having to let go of K again and returning the things I bought for her birthday. It just reminds me how unrelentingly horrible and abrasive I am to everyone not obligated to put up with me. Regardless of incentives, my repulsion is overwhelming.
I keep looking, but I’m despondent. There is no one. There was only “close,” and now, nothing at all. Scaring away potential partners is something I’m just so fucking good at. I’m, like, nationally ranked at that shit.
Well, fuck. I’m tired, sad, dejected and in a big hole right before bed. I imagine I will again dream of things that torture me as they have of late. I have no one to hold me after a nightmare. I have exactly what I deserve. Rejection. Disgust. Solitude.
I haven’t felt like writing. Real life has been volatile to the point of occupying my attention fully. K was back for a bit but now gone again. She’s not the right fit for my life, which is now abundantly clear. Dad is still slowly dying; withering away as I watch helplessly. Mom lost her mind with stress and grief a few days back, which poisoned the world for a time. Am I dealing with this? Have I become depersonalized from my perception of reality? What hope is there of consistency when all the variables are fluctuating?
I have only what skills and strategies I’ve learned in order to survive this life in varying states of decomposition and growth. There’s no making sense of it; I’ve given up on that. Now, I hang on for scrapes and fingernails.
Sad and missing K. To have all that energy just ripped away, leaving a vacancy. I wish I could still have her, but I am a confounding and undesirable person as evidenced by the actions of others. I’m hurt, and I yearn. Goodbye is what we said, but not what I wanted.
My light is out with hands take the shard
Spinning in a desolate hole of alone
Bent upon the regret of actions
Despair of wanting like a bitter stain
Profusely ignored in a place where things are forgotten
No light finds me here
All who come eventually go away
Do I still convince myself it’s not true
To believe the facts is to accept isolation from acceptance
Tonight I miss everything I had
Alone and without
In the center of no one’s concern anymore
There is a place that is again, found missing. It grew and then it died. How badly it aches within me, pulsing with regret and sadness. How it is to be left behind, not advanced into a brighter future. By my own admission, I am deserving of this state. I feel the sorrow, blog. I hurt now, and I will for some time. How I yearn, and how I will scream into the silence. I wish she was still mine, even though she is not. Goodbye to those days when I felt the breath of affection burning my lantern brighter still. Into the darkness I fall, at least for now, to lament what is gone and be present with my sorrow. I never wish to dream again.
I had companionship for a time, but now I am back on my own again. I have been through this before, the tumult of understanding and the gauntlet of truth are punishing arenas in my reality. It is the simple fact of the person I am that has created this division and now removal. I had long ago accepted I would be alone for the rest of my life, and I did appease my sense of unrelenting loneliness by attempting companionship, at least temporarily. Now that my life has gone back to the place it had been at a few months ago, I don’t know how to feel precisely. Am I upset? Not really, but sad, yes. Do I regret? Naturally there are things I can find to blame myself for. Everyone, especially a blundering emotion-tornado such as myself makes mistakes. There are things I know I am and things I try to be, and right now there is a confluence of reasons for why things are now over between she and I. The fact of the matter is simple, and remains.
No one asks for more work in their life or readily accepts trouble into their world. I know I am a great deal of “work,” and trouble in one bundle… there’s just no avoiding that. I do the best I can but here is another example of how that failed. It hurts, very much to lose her, especially after I had developed a fondness, and after we had such wonderful dreams together. Stigma is a wall that can’t often be overtopped, or burrowed under… or even explained away with words. It is damaging, and breaks reason apart with animosity.
Well here we are blog, back to square 1. I am all done trying to find partnership for now. There is no world I see where I find someone who will take on the impossible task of accepting me as I am, and not wishing I could be somebody I never will be. My lesson in all this has been to observe my actions, and decide where to take a next step forward. If anything, I have learned that I am all alone out here (still), and that’s the truth I must stop trying to alleviate. I am my own confidant and guardian, and no one should wrest that from me in the years to come.
Goodbye K. Beautiful, complex, generous woman, you touched my life and lit it up, for a time. You gave me hope, and then dashed it. I know why you did, and I will mourn for us both.
My dad has a limited time left with us, and I’m coming to terms with his upcoming death. I see only one path forward; to be there as needed until the end. I’m his son.
I feel everything one would expect me to feel, but I’m not expressing any of it right now. I’ve made the space in our reality for my mom and sister to experience things while I direct reason and action; providing stability. This role I fill helps us endure the hard times to come, but also works healthily for me since nothing gets repressed. The postponement of response is a promise, not a lock on a safe.
I know my time to process is coming, but right now I accept and embrace the role I have filled in this family unit. I am proud to be a member of it, and fighting to keep us from listing.
Will it work? There’s no telling. I have a good support structure in W and K. I need to be able to use my own tools in a crisis rather than always go looking for the answer outside of myself. I must survive with what I have if I am to survive at all.
It’s not the wanting–
Like fragments tumble in sparks,
Furiously scatter-lit,
Fill the blackened chamber.
Restrain old whispers–
Haunted hallway-dusted,
Once-clawed firmament.
Between the shutter-slats,
Begging at freedom,
Boldness awaits.
I don’t need to process negative symptoms and thoughts when I don’t have any. I just need to keep living my life the way I have been, and allow it to bloom. I’m going to be gone for a while, I’m walking down a new path. Horizon’s shifting glow calls to a future that brings the dawn to the end of night.
Things are headed in a markedly positive direction. I have done the requisite checking and the integers are definitely within margins. I am proceeding with exploratory research. Initiation commencing…
A hammering smack the window glass,
The bitter, howling, grey morass,
Transparently the pounding rain–
Flailing madly in disdain.
The view from through the sealed gate,
A contrast by which to acclimate,
Ensnared in comfort’s clinging grip–
With a steaming cup of tea to sip.
Staring out at fury and storm,
Curiously watching while safe and warm,
The moment when I want her here,
A pathway forward not yet clear,
To hold in dreams until a promised time,
When her touch and grace will yet be mine.
I wanted to highlight something that happened a couple of days ago. I believe in significant acts, and this was one of them.
I injured my back lifting my dad the other day and it is an area that has consistently given me trouble in the past. These sorts of injuries can vary significantly in severity, and this appeared to be a bad one. It was just about his time that K entered my sphere, and her response to my shabby state was to procure a massage session so I could seek proactive treatment. She, thinking of me, did something direct, relevant and useful to assist me in a way I was not able to do for myself. It was a gift, and a memorable one. I can’t recall the last time someone did this for me in such a poignant way, as a partner. Done in honesty and through concern, there is no more wonderful thing to do for someone than to comfort. She took care of me, and the feeling of it is euphoric.
In the past, I have been in both roles, but still, I can’t recall a feeling like this. I don’t recall ever feeling really cared about in this sort of tangible, fundamentally generous way. Something enduring fuels that bond that is forming, which represents a transaction of trust and understanding. She spoke to me the best way she knew how, and it was impactful. It showed real care, from a very early point in our journey, which in and of itself is a fantastic indicator of trajectory.
It also makes me think about my own past and potential generosity. I will soon have a significant income compared to sitting on a leaky balloon as I have been for many months. I’d like to be able to give back to her as well, in kind, but I will need to find unique and relevant avenues to explore to sate my standards of fairness in the immediate future. I am a contributor first and foremost, and a gracious penitent when provided charity. I have my own conscience to deal with, which recognizes the fragility of this; acts accordingly. I give, and I can’t wait to be back in a position to do so again.
My mood scores have been in the 4 area, which is the high end of normal. I am paying extra scrutiny given the change in environmental variables.
However, it is a fact that I’m elated, what can I say? I’m developing real feelings again for the first time in many years. Unlike the previously employed fake-it-to-make-it salve for loneliness, this is the real fucking deal. It has a hold of me somewhere deep, primal, and magnetic. I’m activated in a way I wasn’t expecting at all.
My physical scores have been wonky since my back, and subsequent rub rub rub ouchy time. I’m doing better though. Heat pad required for a bit and not too much wiggle wraggle.
Things are happening!!!
M: 4.5
P: 3
I worked today, and it felt like a real Friday for the first time in two years. I was walking into the weekend with a belt load of credibility, paid hours worked, and a satisfaction of earned stupor. I did deserve this good feeling, this qualified euphoria accompanying a respite from the toils of existence. I feel like my life has finally started to accelerate at an exponential rate towards a glimmering point of light.
I am more involved now in my work and local community than ever before. I’m having to reboot my organizational skills, because I’m juggling more responsibility than ever before. At the same time as that burden is flailing about on a centrifugal axis, I’m feeling strong enough to restrain its pull towards chaos. I believe that this represents a culmination of all the work I’ve put in to refining myself at social awareness, personal responsibility and introspection. From the fragmented person who emerged with a bag of clothes and plastic flip flops from the psychiatric hospital, to right now. Lowest point to highest point (so far), in 4 years, and every positive step built upon the next.
Blog, I’ve met someone special at an absolutely perfect time in my life. Just as I am beginning to transition back to full independence, a miraculous woman has come into my life, and I am thankful to have such a compliment to my own spectacularly fulfilling existence. Her symmetry and mine are stunning, and in a category of imagined personality compositions designated as inconceivable instead of one that might exist.
My loneliness had, until very recently, exposed my past regret and shades of old love eviscerated, caused a great deal of turmoil. In all my attempts to find a partner was a dream for someone who would “fit.” I’ve never really comprehended what a “fit” would be. I had only known one person who had ever really come close, until now. Like a stream of concentrated photons, her arrival blasted through the gloom and dust to reveal a landscape of possibility. I’m infatuated. I’m intoxicated, and having a great time getting to know someone I fully intend to keep in my orbit.
I’ve tried this before. Yes. However, I did so while knowing it was a less than ideal fit. An admitted error of terrible consequence. I was making the best of what was available, or so I justified my transgression. Plus, at those intervals, I sought out of a desire to be complete or propped up to new heights by external adoration. I knew it at the beginning, whether I admit it or not, that I was making a mistake. I didn’t know it would consistently be my undoing, but I was not the introspective being I am now.
at this moment though, I’m complete. Three weeks ago, I was complete. In August I was complete. I wasn’t ever looking to find a missing piece out in the universe. I found a piece that fits that I never even knew could be there in the first place. She augments, adds, compliments and enhances. In this fundamental way, there lies a difference that divides the two motivations for companionship indistinguishably. One destined to fail on the basis of stashed resentment, and the other continuously improving and advancing a mutual circumstance for the benefit of both partners. It’s obvious to you too, isn’t it?
Things around my planet have taken a shift over the last few weeks. My dad fell, and he’s lost almost all his lower body strength. I’m carrying him now, from place to place. It breaks my heart, and puts me in a difficult spot, knowing my mom is largely helpless to fulfill the physical obligations.
In contrast, I’ve met someone new named K. Things are off to a very encouraging start, and I definitely approve of the direction we are going. There seems to be a very unique parallelism that is entrancing, fascinating and wonderful. Unique in a way that is beyond expectation. My introspection upon this experience has helped me to live thoughtfully, keeping vigilance on my core mental health with much needed objectivity. Relationships have been destabilizing factors in the past. However, several key factors are designating my introduction to K as wholly different from previous attempts.
I am aware though. Keenly. My life depends on me being able to maintain cognitive consistency. The only way I go forward is if I can do so and still be healthy and live my life fully. At this mature stage of my life, I’m able to manage the many aspects of life, keeping an alignment rather than leaning on any one and causing a disruption.
Fuck man, I just got the low down on my work today (first paid day): Coordinating 2 programs, web admin for 2 domains, facilitator for 2 support groups, education program leader, WALK sponsorship chairman for and now outreach director. All that in 20 hours a week paid, but looking more like 35 with all the volunteering required to meet those obligations. I’m fucking GLAD to be this busy, frankly. Being unoccupied is a state I do not enjoy, and doing so while being a resource consumer rather than contributor makes it more difficult to remain positive. Now, I’m giving more than I ever have, and here I am feeling the best I have in 5 years. I must be very diligent about making sure my stability, energy and motivation are maintained over the course of years, with gradual improvements likely. Caution with consideration.
Like I said, things are looking up for me. Working hard and living with pride is a pretty rewarding path, I’ve found.
On dandelion winds,
Cinnamon kisses,
Brushed over with delicate leaves.
Boisterous as laughter,
Pounded hollow log thumps–
Push the churned blood,
Enshrined by citrus light.
Upon the cusp of promise,
Shattering rays to reveal–
What lies within.
A sudden mallet shatter. A window blasted open. Sun rays beaming. A world of dust cast into the light. This new turn is a portent of happiness.
The soot brushed away. Flattened cardboard. Curled paper. Crumpled into piles and heaved into the shadows.
Testing cautiously. Pain once so near. Thoughts are below but now rising above. What more awaits to be discovered I will soon learn. A journey of shared experiences.
Twins of twilight–
Pixie-blink a flicker,
The grounded stars dance,
Hands catching–
Their fires alive.
Back across the stretching sky,
Racing alone to a distant–
Faded horizon.
Dust falls to ash,
Dimming until dark again.
My thoughts run tonight, bucking through the crisp air. J is back in my thoughts, as she has been of late, and always to a lesser extent. I can’t help but spin alternate realities where she brings a stabilizing force to my family dynamic and a new balance is achieved. A place where her quirky, clever humor and woman’s perspective provided balance and helped us feel equal together. Laughing with frequency and living in a state where stability was enjoyed. Dreamy, bleary and almost laughable at just how far from reality it actually is.
The world is cruel, and through it I too have also acted cruelly, and kindly. All at the wrong times, it would seem. Now that the alignment of her life and mine has passed, there is no going back to change what has already been written. The view that accompanies this thought is inevitably folly.
I’m embracing my life now as a caretaker and forever disciple of family. It is so nourishing to protect those we love, and do our best to preserve their safety. I only have so much I can give, but what I have, I do. I love them and I will help guide them to peace in whatever way I can. In my dreams, I reach out to J and open my arms to her again, despite the furious rage she has aimed at me. I have always known her regardless. Somehow, there is peace again.
I can’t help but long for a parallel reality as my own comes under strain. I always imagine one with her in it, when I project myself forward. She is still just as jubilant, having not been thrashed by my disorder. I see so many alternate realities where we coexisted splintering off into infinity.
She opened me up: I got tattoos and pierced my ears, and she exposed me up to a world I had never known before, but was curious to explore. I too gave her things as our paths intersected often once we grew. But I was a fool, and so was she. In thus reality, she may have been able to, but I was never going to live that dream.
Night falls on a turbulent evening. It’s at times like this that I feel truly alone, with no confidant within my bubble to relate myself to. I remember having that though, and it is the greatest joy of my life. For a time, I was blessed.
As in my current predicament, I am granted the strength and stability to endure the changes my family is going to transition through. I am fortunate. I can do more. I will do more for them.
I have dreams. They will forever say dreams. I look back, and I am filled with regret.
I just know I will never be over her.
The days are growing again, slowly, coming to bear full as we travel around and around that big yellow thingie. We have been pointed at darkness for long enough, I say.
I’m hoping not to dream anymore. Rips are forming in my canvas, and the formerly delightful introspective brush set seems to paint only in black. It is this dark hour, when cuddling up by a warm seem the most honest if truths, that I mourn. I yearn, pointlessly.
The sun is coming. From out the shadows, it is blooming, growing. Radiating. I wish for that return to the hissing summer ghosts on the dry wind. The far away pollen smells of distant places, deep wet mountains and trees gulping in and breathing out.
Maybe this is it. Maybe not. It’s better to be prepared to deal with a difficult outcome than to be surprised by it. I can be surprised by all sorts of other things, but not calamity.
Down to the last few days before Christmas. Family, friends, fire… and freaking huge buds. Beer, bread and BADDA BOOM! We do know how to have a good time.
I do t think anyone is getting in the circle now. Not anyone new. It’s just too late.
A sinew;
Twisting, stretch-snapping the expanse,
Shredded down to an impossible wire.
But feeling it there–
Some thread still binding,
In unrequited twitterpation,
Escaping the fury of torment,
Yet yanking at the throat–
Scraping the hole left by death.
It’s only in dreaming–
That some bridge still exists,
A span still endures,
Where she can still be found.
Where is this place? My feet are not on the ground. I am compelled by the gusts of pain, upon an uncertain wind of remembering. How to escape it? Flee to some other world where things are different, albeit temporarily. Long for rest where dreams may bring me near to someone I used to love. A pervading sense of ongoing solitude restricting my oxygen. The waves crash ceaselessly. Pounding the craggy shore. Again and again.
I wish my pinky toe would die and fall off my foot. All it brings is pain, being a magnet for hard corners.
There is no resolution here, only an ongoing application of filter to restrain the localized toxicity of reality. The bitter bile of truth, ingested agonizingly.
Before Ja* there was Je*, and last night I was again visited by a spectre of my past. in Je*’s relationship, there was a very physical, carnal, fuel abundance. My dream ventured deep into the entwining moisture of sex, the spontaneity of passion, the strip-down clothes-shredding-seizure that ensures when the moment is nigh. But yes, there was still that anger and conflict. Even amidst that largely satisfactory arrangement, there was the tension of misunderstanding, the vast gorge filled with resentment looming. The fire burned fast, flickered, and then was gone forever.
It is emblematic of my past relationships. Starting with an explosion of similarly mirrored energies, then dwindling as the strands tear in the drift. It makes me wonder if I am going to be alone for the rest of my life. It makes me wonder if I am even capable of being a good partner. It reminds me of what it feels like to be loved by no one who doesn’t have to.
After a night of purging my emotional turbulence (see below), I find myself again, reflectively pointed toward action. Even after all the castigation and ridicule I subjected myself to, those pestering voices tend to get quieter when I’m being proactive in my life or meaningfully responsible, or using the evidence of such to validate the truth. This helps me do battle with that negativity when it shows up, most of the time. I tend to be more rational than spontaneously emotional, so going back over my thoughts and feelings helps me quantify and understand my responses to things. My reaction to J memories returning has been to vent, which I suppose is working in some ways. However, there is no real cohesion to a response or a course of action.
However. there is not a fundamental desire to make this a focal point of my ongoing life, even with some gesturing. Instead, it has taken a passenger’s back seat to several other priority items. Right now, I think I am my most well equipped to be a functional communicator In my life, however, not rushing to fill the space a partner would have. I still yearn for something abstract, shaped like a nostalgically recalled relationship I once had that was seemingly wonderful. None of that is rational. The assignment of emotions and blurriness to the memory is harmful at best, and arbitrary in nature since any number of other emotions are attached this way as well, and not destructively.
I see my wound, that place inside me that is still hurt, but there is no action to take, no tool to pick up and use. I just get up, and continue walking forward undeterred. She and I hurt each other, and now that pain reminds me of how not to fall into a similar situation, for myself or anyone else. My learned diligence as a result of my collapse has helped me take on the responsibilities I have today, and the fulfilling life so-far crafted. It was a scarring, agonizing lesson to fail, lose everything, reboot… and I still remind myself of that failure, as has been apparent.
What am I doing? I’m coping through expression, the best I can, to deal with my mixed up feelings and try to appease the part of me that is still fractured and splintered with pain. If I will never be able to help her resolve her pain, then at least I can work to resolve mine. It frustrates the logic motor to have nothing to “do,” per-say, no way to repair or permanently heal, other than to do one’s best obelisk impersonation for as long as possible. Survive, learn, and adapt. The pain will never stop, but it does not have to be a focus as it has been of late…
I find myself engrossed in the mud of memory, slipping Back with each grueling step forward. There is sadness dragging me down, forcing me into the decompositional murk.
It is J. The memory of her. The impact she had in my life. After 4 years, the sting of her absence is just as real as the day she flew away. I know not how no let go of that pain. I feel her like a piece missing in my soul; at the very core of who I am. She reached me like no other, and I must accept she is gone forever.
I have not been able to do this because I still love who she was. I still love what we had when it was beautiful. She understood me like none before, and now she will never come back. The pain I feel here is something years have not reduced. Her departure is as fresh and bloody as any recent wound. Now, during this warm and family time of year, I miss her the most.
In times like this, when I remember, I tend to reflect in order to preserve my sanity. Having no word from her but another hateful disconnect in our frail communications is all I have left to remember her by. Her animosity. Accusing me of rape. She must truly despise me, which is a pain I must accept. I hurt her beyond repair, and now… now I am scum. A criminal. A pile of dirt. I wish. I wish she could see how I still love her. I wish she knew.
Blog, I come here to express, not to resolve. Unless clearly stated, my feelings are cast out into the ether with no expectation of understanding or compassion. I have only my own life to answer to.
I got a job today, and now I will have an income. I am a part of a team growing into future successes and possibilities. A whole new life built on pride and honesty is available for me. It is a future brighter than I have had in a very long time. I wish I could share it with her. I wish she was here with me, in these joyous times. I love her. I will not be able to stop, even if she wishes I was dead. All the wishes in the world will fall into the endless silence. There will be no reply. The dead do not respond. My broken place remains as it was, ever hoping, never knowing.
Pierce the tangible vail,
An echo timeless–
Her figments arrayed,
Through the fractured parallels.
Meet me there–
Where only our shades dance,
Dreamers in life,
Estranged from reality,
The final bastion of us.
It started with a big social gathering at some neutral site. J was there, but she wasn’t how I remembered her: she was tanned, rounder but absolutely beautiful. We sparred with playful words across the ballroom then retreated to the side. I saw what I felt was true in her eyes.
There was a house, but it was Kyle’s house. I don’t know anyone named Kyle, but we were both invited to go to stay. The house was huge beyond comprehension. I was on the top floor with my cat in a room that was strewn with papers, books, clothes and other loose objects. Other cats were lingering outside my door which worried me.
She was in another room somewhere, but we were so far apart we had to call each other on the phone to talk. We expressed our explicit desires, intentionally, and fully.
When i found her in the house, the same fire she had from my memory of our past was there as we tossed, giggled and touched lips briefly in our private bedroom. There was untapped passion there, just on the edge of revelation. We did not go to all the places we could have; there was ecstasy in savoring the moment.
The house began to spin. I stumbled to find a way out. I tried to rescue my cat as it was assailed on all sides by resident cats. They attacked, clawed viciously. I grabbed them by the scruff and tossed them away, but they kept coming.
I made my way to the bottom, but kept tipping over, crashing into things, scattering books across the floor, hitting the ground and getting back up. I got out, but fell down on the concrete curb outside, for the last time. She was there, but she couldn’t rouse me as my consciousness slipped away. She wished desperately that I would wake, but I was gone.
Kyle’s house was on the shore, and as I looked out for the last time, the tide was coming in.
C Score: 2.5
E Score: 1.5
The drag of time. A hook sunk deep into the meat, constraining and directing. Sometimes questions are louder because they can’t be quickly answered, if at all. Screams echoing in the chasm. Where ambiguity pervades, depression follows.
I don’t long for companionship in a way that dictates action, and have no motivation to flip reality upside down to satisfy the ache. In the end, I’m too enmeshed to risk toppling stability over an uncertainty. Knowing when to extend is a talent I’m getting better at. Still, old harmonies remind, and invite a reprisal. The palisades and balconies in my dreams are the only vistas she still makes sense in. This figure who is with me. Whoever she has or will be.
I’m lost to old glimpses. My edifice paraded by uneasy crowds, ingloriously, in a city frothing with unrest. Little more than an icon from a long dead time. My world is made of things that can’t be forgotten.
Maybe the next few upcoming days will provide some clarity, or maybe there is no escape from the shadow of love. For all my griping, I remain untethered.
Reflecting after group, I see how common issues build bridges of compassion or understanding. I’m feeling extra introspective:
I keep hoping I’ll dream about J like I did a few weeks ago. She’s the only echo left… all the others have faded into nothing. In my dream, we had a strange encounter, but it reminded me of several aspects to my past feelings that feel very real now. In that moment with her, things were like they used to be… a familiar sort of estrangement. A sense of elusive excitement. It was a piece I could hold in my hands that now is shrinking down into nothing.
I know I’m not doing my best. I have recently, but not anymore. My best is too expensive; all I can afford is meh. Dwindle.
Longing for spark, or poof & rabbit. The friskyfied feelings. The electric arcs fingertip snapping their crackle. I remember what it was, that I had it, but that was long ago it seems.
This is a fool’s errand.
The cauldron churns some new rancid elixir which will grant stupendous charisma at the cost of unfathomable isolation.
The carousel of experience continues at a dizzying pace but all the while I wish for the silence of a moonless night. I can hear little teeth chattering across the floor. Chitter chatter chitter chatter.
What is being? Where is the anchor of meaning? I’m a desperate pilgrim on a journey too vast to comprehend. All I can think about is the hill directly ahead.
There’s only me. No one is likely to get inside the laugh box again. I’m too skewed from center to be reconciled, it seems. I think I have pretty much come to accept this. Almost two years now and no more desperate than when it started.
Flattering the obelisk only has so many permutations. So shiny and hieroglyphics so nice. But what else can you say? Someone else comes along and it all sounds so fresh and real. I don’t know what it is; it’s simply ear candy. Something missed.
Goodnight.
Sunk-shaft in throat-deep brown,
Residual, pungent excrement of time,
Aspirate viscous words,
Review abhorrent scenes–
Snarled in knotted forever nevers,
Plopped firmly in the mud of then.
The stink of hate–
Long permeated through cracked windows–
Careless doorseams,
The dank, mildew-wet scent–
Of irreconcilability.
I was thinking disparagingly about my exes tonight, which is usually a bad thing. I thought: now, with all the fuck-tastic awesomeness of my evolved self, there is no place where you would ever fit. You see, I pine for them still. I yearn for them as though it were years ago. This is unhealthy.
Irrelevant. This word fits perfectly in the now, because metaphorical organisms shed versions of themselves not suited to survive in the ever changing circumstance of reality, in order to prevail in survival. I mean, I compare myself not spitefully, but logically or factually.
I get into this rut of thinking these past relationships contain some present-day worth other than what I have gleaned through introspective reflection, post destruction. I am somewhere far away from where I used to be, which makes parallels useless.
Tonight was week 5 of my support group, which inspired me to create the following list of adjectives: communal, open, emotional, cathartic, safe and joyous. I feel fantastic, which maybe is why I cast aspersions at my past. None of them can now or ever did truly see me for the fucking awesome person I am, even if only a glimmer of it was visible back then. I don’t need positive reinforcement; all the proof is right here! I am the book!
Even if I’m the only one who really knows, at least I found a place in this world where I both belong and can make a difference.
I’m okay. I’m going to be just fine. I need to be both grateful and resentful sometimes. This is real life where shit often hits the fan, which rarely results in anything not having shit stuck to it.
I’m seeing that there are a stack of factors contributing to my degraded mental health in the last few weeks. In my effort to be constructive, there are some steps I’d like to take in addition to diligence respected since last required. On that specifically: the one activity I have neglected has been my exercise, which I am suspending only because of the air quality. My recognition of the state of emotional decline does not have a logically rationalized outcome, despite my brain trying to address it as such. Some factors simply have to be understood or accepted as they are. I don’t have any sort of spirituality, but I do have a sort of faith that my own struggles were necessary to harden me into who I am now. How I proceed with my “struggle” will define who I am, what I stand for and provide a path forward from despair.
The accountability of self-honest justification binds me. Period. I wear such shame from the past as it is now… crushing shame. Memories I can’t ever erase or actions I cannot undo. Why would I further burden myself with new regret when life under the weight I have can be relentless? When I stare into the mirror, I see someone who I was ashamed of, for a time. How should I spend these precious additional days I have been granted? What is going to help alleviate the burden on my consciousness? What must I do to not continue to be someone I regret being?
I don’t feel anything but agony in surrender. I do not have zero worth. No one has zero worth. There is always something within that is 100% unique. I have that too, and it enables me to give back honestly, proudly. In the end, I’m only looking at myself. Only I have seen the whole journey. Can I ever be truly understood, or better yet, who would want to know? I contend that may not be anyone who would care enough to untangle such an elaborate, confounding knot.
I try to measure reality in terms of variables that are unlikely to change, and ones that are. I have moved companionship to a nearly inactive state, which has its own consequences. I have been in a mode where the avenue to this potential emotionally effusive destination is little more than a cul de sac of my own consternation. Having changed as much as I have in recent years, I begin to feel a glimmer that I may have acquired the skills to, at least, increase the probability of being successful. Maybe I’m sabotaging myself by having a standard of expectation to high to be met or to high to be rationally deserved. All I have left to do is experiment with the variables I can change, and hope for a positive outcome of some kind.
This blog has always been my thought stream splash pad, and now more than ever I am glad I have a place I can go to work through the various responses to my symptoms and changing factors in my circumstance. To survive, and not be at the mercy of my surroundings, my behaviors, actions, thoughts and expectations have changed. Is this a 2.0 moment, or are we still in beta?
If there’s any lesson to be learned from all the hashed and rehashed potato memories fried up on the blog it’s that cooking food too long burns the shit out of it until it is unrecognizable charcoal.
I’ve been writing things with frequency, and indulging my memories (however painful). I’m not trying to deduce anything, but endeavor to accept the things I can’t change.
How hard is it living in my current stasis of passive recognition? Clearly the tumultuous words which have come splattering out of the thought-faucet are evidence of the regurgitative, expressive process I’m ensnared in. There is no processing anything to resolution, only a realization which plateaus at unquestioning understanding.
I count almost two years in physical and mental isolation from companionship. In that time, I’ve realized that I may be alone for the rest of my life, which I am accepting of (but not okay with). How can one be satisfied in such an unrewarding and lonesome dynamic? I know I can’t be truly happy without that now vacant place inside me growing with love. It is a separate matter to both love and appreciate the self, but another matter entirely when someone else sees it too and flourishes with honest interest.
In my most callously logical of states, I doubt the height of the exacting standards by which my future relationships are to be held is a mark anyone would be interested in contorting over to achieve companionship (with someone like me). The bar must be impossibly high, because anything less is bound to half-life itself to oblivion or deposit the waste of resistant resentment into a chasm which widens as more is deposited.
No, there is only one path ahead: it is long, precarious and only wide enough for one it would seem.
All this revisiting of my past, and for what? It seems like an inherently counterproductive venture, but I assure you it’s not. Note that I don’t spend much time acutely regretting, chastising or otherwise reiterating failures. I must know now to then know better later on.
An irreconcilable divide. The constant gaping wound. Just one trigger unleashed a series of impassioned posts. I wasn’t expecting to go there, but I did, and gladly. I’ve had positive thoughts about the way I processed all these images and feelings.
The gain is strength from acceptance. The past goes on unchanging, but each new step carries the memories. How to address that effectively? I write. A lot. I write as much as it takes to exfoliate the brain meat.
I have tons of stupid fucking thoughts. Don’t you? It’s hard not to judge even though it’s my brain.
The consciousness glops like cold molasses out of a drippy faucet. There is no good time for brain. Only time.
Tonight enacted, lather, rinse, repeat, repeat. Shabam-mode.
A grin to a nudge is just the friend of a glance to a raised eyebrow or some such.
The contrast between masks is shocking, dizzying at times. AAH!
All this stepping leads somewhere good, right? I don’t need to know, but it would make me happy if I did I suppose.
Like I said, blah blah send the fucking probe. No one out there in whatever market, nebula or quadrant gives a flippity-fuck about me and my stupid fucking probe.
I have to try a little, that seemed inexcusable in light of bemoaning the state. Right?
Glancing is not trying. Glancing is trying to trick sorrow into having hope, while choking out any chance of there being any.
As requested by High Command, we have fired a scientific research probe off to study the anomaly.
The probe will take a long time to fully study the area, and we do not expect to hear back from it for many days or longer.
However, Commander, we are fulfilling the NEW Prime Directive to always venture out into the furthest reaches of explored space, and find what unknown mysteries lie in the darkness beyond our current perception.
Previous probes that have been sent to existing systems for additional study/analysis have been decommissioned at your request, and all forward facing starships are to send their probes to the outer limits.
This update has been brought to you by: Uncontaminated Dirt. “You never knew how much you needed it, until you didn’t have it,” they say. Get some Uncontaminated Dirt at your local starbase or stable M class planet today!
Seeing her shifting through the periphery of my attention, she radiated warm waves of indulgent excitement as we drove. I snared infrequent glimpses of the smooth cheeked beauty, flashing and vanishing erratically in the sulfuric light of the passing street lamps. Ringing and abounding with jubilant laughter, she sighed, and held out a slow burning ember from within; about to be set ablaze by a gust of cool, fresh air. The curl of her grin was laden with intent, desire and a sense of belonging despite the circumstance of being apart and constrained. Though, that was no barrier for her.
Her intent, a crackling wave of incendiary heat, sending tinder sparking and popping to tiny burning pieces… vanishing into the night sky. Smooth, wet, and eager, there were no bounds to her, no ties that could shackle her in place; no star that could outshine her glimmering brightness.
Where the world was, or what it was doing no longer mattered; what remained in the bristling atmosphere between us was a transcendent state of acceptance and acknowledgement. We saw each other briefly, and in that mutual space where our desires met, there was profound togetherness.
But even as this tempering realization was present, the electric spark of her youth, curiosity, fearlessness and desire became the direction of her hasty actions. In boundless, oblivious ecstasy, there was no time that was not ours, no boundary we could not cross together, no one else in the world who mattered… no fire like the one that was in her eyes she she beheld me. Though, beset by my own limiting discretionary conservation, it was not out of disapproval for her that we returned to the world… and this I hope she knew.
There were times that I saw her, and many more in which I could not, or failed to. Where was the objectivity I needed then… was it always there but undeveloped? I contemplate my journey, drawing no needless conclusions and refusing to sully beautiful recollections with my frustrations, failures and ineptly accepted concessions.
…Flickering light, casting those brief shadows across her curves, her frisky hair… and the recognition of such beautiful physical harmony that we shared.
Deep in past moments such as these, where I still see her smiling, I know that life has blessed me with memories I will never forget. They resound poignantly, which I cherish, for the many feelings of her love are not unknown or forgotten, but remembered forever. It was a time when I touched happiness, held it even… if not to eventually let it slip away. The nights we had, like the memory above, remind me of how wonderful the world can be. Even if I do not live this life now, I still hold my experiences as the most valuable, formative and essential knowledge of my journey thus far. Without them, I would not know the spectrum of all there is to experience while being alive.
A letter I have written before, but write again as the clarity improves to the benefit of my understanding. For my heart, for my mind, these words are sent:
~~
Dear Birdy,
There seem to be no words that can be said to bridge the span that lies between us, but I am nevertheless compelled by my conscience to send these words out into the expanse as a mark of my intent, truth and the desire of my heart to be at peace:
In my life, I have transitioned from state to state, trying to achieve stability with my mental illness since I was diagnosed. In my right, back when we first met, I lured you unknowingly into that turbulent dynamic and you were destroyed by it in many ways because of my inability to prepare you for it. I did not adequately equip you for how to respond to my mental illness effectively, nor did I remotely or appropriately respond to yours when you called out for help.
I remember in the truck one evening with you coming home from my parent’s RV. I was stoned and you were a bit tipsy. You remembered a trauma about your old best friend and I was chastising you for thinking about something from the past, like it wasn’t important because it had already happened. I think back on how you were hurting that night, with tears in your eyes, and it breaks my heart. You were calling out to be comforted, and I just argued with you, scolded you. I was not able to see the way to hear your pain, and acknowledge your trauma, or even to comfort you when you are feeling vulnerable. I failed then. I know it, and I accept that I must grow to do better. I am sorry for this time, and the many others like it.
I did not have the tools to communicate effectively with you or express my feelings to you appropriately. I was not able to help you, when you needed a partner, a friend, someone to trust. This disparity and neglect is my greatest regret, for the beautiful person you are was hidden by my inability to see you, address your feelings, and be the partner you needed me to be. I was not a healthy person and did not deal with my issues in a functional, sustainable way in the time that we knew each other. I lied to you, hid things from you, and never told you how I felt inside. The lesson of my inability to sustain our relationship has taught me the skills I needed to survive further calamity and caused me to regret the missed opportunity to have done better with the woman I loved more than any other.
I am responsible for harming you, abusing you mentally, psychologically… because of my unchecked disorder and poor coping skills. My sanity was not consistent, and I was reeling in the end, compensating poorly, neglecting frequently. I have a great deal of ongoing shame over this which keeps me thinking about how I can be a better communicator in my future interactions. I was not the person I needed to be to have properly participated in a relationship, and for all the damage that caused to you, I am sorry. With a pain that I feel every day, I am sorry for what happened between us. I have never been over it.
There is no word, or words that can take away the trauma, the pain. I must bear that responsibility forever. I have done what I can to learn and listen or try to. I am accepting of my part, but only hoping to release the emotional burden by the recognition of spoken, actualized thoughts. For all the times these powerful words and memories have been whispered between my ears, I give them back to the endless void, echoing on into the silence: thank you.
The night that creeps in is wet and chilled. The weight of it is like resin or gooey snot seeping, sludging and glopping in. The smells of the coming winter.
Do you ever feel not alone in bed at night even though you are? When the cold comes in, and it surrounds, do you feel the echo? I do. I remember, and sometimes that’s a nail in my chest, and other times it still warms me. Perception can be momentary, circumstantial.
Now, there is only a space for understanding. A process where comprehension takes a back seat and settles for not knowing where the car is going. Think too hard and the tunnel develops a slope downward. For me, I often find myself contextualizing and interpreting: wrongly, optimistically, starkly…
Logic’s devices are stunted with emotion’s geyser-like eruptions. That’s the place where the echo comes from, I feel. The indelible imprint of a soul touched, the intoxication, idiosyncrasies, passions that once flared but are long silent, and have been. Something that I have know is there, and will clearly linger for the rest of my life. What to do with all the images? Cherish, I say.
We have so little time to be alive. Only a blip. A tiny fragment of a fragment. I’ve been guilty of abusing that gift… squandering it; laying waste to it on occasion. The fact that I still have it despite myself is a thing that can’t be ignored.
But here, now… this fragile place where the remembrance is strong… she remains with me. In some delusion where peace had pervaded, the outcome was different… the story continued, but changed to survive. Again and again we see that those who are suited to adapt, endure the cycles of changing chance and circumstance. Such is the case in our lives, however brief they are.
Why? I won’t deny I missed her. She was right there with me again. It hurt to wake up. I was bleeding. I won’t forget. I dreamed for a reason; and will never deny that.
Sometimes the best thing to do is dream, for it is there where I will see her again, in a place where no new harm can be incurred.
Clearly this sort of activity truly excludes me from my peer group as most people my age hate all the crap I listen to. This is a good filter though, as this portrait is a fairly good rendering of myself in music. Though, the aspects I chose to depict, and how I chose to express them, is a matter of some debate. Nonetheless, the album is here and it is full of contrasts and apt comparisons. I highly recommend giving it a listen if you are old and h really have nothing better you could be dong. I find this type of thing puts me back in touch with my traits and memories of varying emotional gravity. I highly recommend toiling in this way. The act of pairing oneself to aspects of music seems inherently like it’s at least exploration and quite possibly transformative.
I filled out this silly character sheet like thing way back in the beginning (2012). Perceptions have changed a bit since then, needless to say. The original can be found here for comparison.
Hey Buddy,
I know about the thoughts and reservations that you have been having lately… which now seem to be coming to a peak moment. You have, to this point, failed to truly respond to any of those nagging doubts and have led your current relationship down a road it will not survive. This is the primary reason why I am here in this non-existent moment of comparative fiction.
In your neglect of your own mental health, you have greatly contributed to the soon-to-be demise of your relationship as well as hurt any chance you have at a normal life going forward for some time. You are headed to an explosion of epic proportions, tomorrow as a matter of fact, and you will try to take your own life. She will leave you, the same night you are hospitalized in fact; she will sleep with another man and never come back. I’m here not to change things, clearly, but to offer you a glimpse at the world that will come to be as you progress further from the smoldering ruin your life is about to become. That lesson will show you the importance of having a complete self and help you push forward in the world with your feet in the real world’s mud.
First, I want to say that I am aching in my recollection of the hurt you are going to feel, and most of it will be incredibly painful since it was self-inflicted. Right now, you have been compensating for your downfall with substances, food, cigarettes, just about anything you can get your hands on to take you away from the reality you are in. You haven’t dealt with anything; it has all been bottled and fermented into resentment. You never tried to talk to her the way you would now, and maybe even if you had, she wouldn’t understand. You refused to address the issues up-front or with any level of self-admission, and therefore, you are going to suffer a calamity as your most precious relationship breaks apart forever. The hurt that this event brings will not be resolved for more than 4 years, continuing to this very day as a matter of fact. You loved her in this intense, abstract, not functional way, and you neglected your responsibilities in your relationship which contributed to its destruction. It will take you many years to fully understand and adapt beyond this moment. She had a part to play in this mind you, but there is nothing to gain from summarizing things that are outside of the self, as they can’t be changed.
I am so sorry. You are going to feel broken for a long time after tomorrow night. You will miss her in ways you never knew were there before, and feel her absence deep inside the core of the most vulnerable self. You will understand how she was neglected. She was the person you loved the most so far in your life, and her loss with your assistance is something you will not be able to move past. In a subconscious/telepathic, you are still linked to her, as though some invisible tether connects you despite the distance, and hatred lodged between, and that twitching bait has incited more trauma, more pain…
This upcoming disaster happened because you needed to learn about the value of self-love. I had to acquire this knowledge painfully, humbly, but earnestly. I can’t undo things that happened, and I will never erase the place inside me that still belongs to her… but I can learn. I can adapt and grow.
If it is anything for you now, know that because of this event, you will learn that your mental illness is the thing you need to be most concerned about in your life. You will find a way to help yourself defend against the same issues you have had in the past, and fallen victim to. The truth of this journey is the ability to appreciate who you are without restraint. Pride and acts that demonstrate a morally honest compassion for things that are “right” in terms of common sense are going to be the evidence you use to build up proof through action.
Your love has been sought from without in the past; filling you up with a feeling of worth that is artificial, untrue and not properly earned. It is similar to presenting the one you desire most with an empty vessel and expecting her to be excited to fill it. Without the lesson of the soon-to-be failure, you might never have known how to find who you were and live that life proudly into the future. Speaking for myself, there has been no greater remedy to the onset of depression than the long road of positive steps that have led me to this moment. I know you, past me, are not there yet, but you will be headed out of the deep hole in not too long. My echoing thought for you is to tolerate this great sadness with an idea that it will not last indefinitely, but must be respected properly. Let it sink deep into you and know it. You will feel the lowest moment of your life and this is part of the understanding that you will gain.
The realization of pain will help you avoid situations like that in the future, while also garnering you the most success and self-worth you will know, at least, thus far. Hurt, regret, sadness and anguish are a part of how we learn. I remember the agony, and I know some things not to do to avoid feeling it again. I do not wish to fall into the same ancestral rut that contains the bones of all the other me versions before? I refuse.
I am there to help you, but only to provide you with a look farther down the road. There is always the next day as long as you are alive, and I know you will continue to do something with the existence you have created. That shape will change depending on who you chose to become, but if pride is the needle that guides your direction, I think things are going to be just fine. You have already done more than you ever have, and this is only the beginning of where your life will go along your new road.
Hold on friend, you will soon be feeling the sun on your face.
Sincerely,
You
Some stimuli has led to a jolt within, where new factors were given a rise of prominence. Still the backdrop of self-inflicted undesirability remains as repugnance is accepted. I’m summarizing grossly.
My hypothesis on status remains the same, since my pie slice is already big enough. I do like pie though. Pie. Tasty pie. Flavors.
An exploratory thought under the oncoming tsunami of gurdge. I’m so overflowing with sludge that it gets everywhere, and smells bad. Can the sludge ever be contained?! On our next episode we’ll find out.
To grunk or not to grunk?
Nothing of supple invitation ever seems to become a happy or a friend.
Sometimes the dirt stays on; an unwanted passenger that degrades what it congeals upon. I feel this way with my brain: the coatings of splattered muck are easy to diagnose, or render a few good whacks upon them to dislodge.
There is are a series of security clearances and clean rooms preventing immediate action, but not deliberation. Part of me says the past is mud, the other can’t let go of the string the red balloon was tied to. He hasn’t seen the balloon in years but still holding on.
Everyone should try love on for size at some point. I found the whole thing to be an exfoliating activity which has subsequently scraped off my desire to know any more. Trauma has that effect, along with a once prominent self hate. Some things are setting while others are about to rise above the horizon.
What am I doing out here?
I remember sniffy sounds at night.
Radiant, passive, trusting.
Currently snagged in a gooey resentment.
Rejected, discarded, regretted, history.
Smeared streak across glass–
Prune-like pulp chunk,
Blasted splat to barrier.
Vacantly gulping–
Eyeball-seeking,
The other side.
—
Embossed in “la la” afterglow,
A faded twirly skirt no one wears,
In a vacant room–
11th floor–
A light was left on.
Spatula’d off the surface–
Plorped into a dustbin,
Mingling with the glops–
Deposits within firmament.
For me, being a part of “something” is a carnal need. I do not exist to affect nothing or no one. The beauty of being alive is a one-time gift even in the darkest recesses of contemplation. Have the traumas of my life shaped who I am? Undoubtedly and proudly. There is no strength quite like being whole unto oneself. Am I there yet…? No, I’m not. There is still a big nasty growing of snaggy brambles and thistles in the way. Better than I used to be, though. This last should be a damn mantra by now. I believe, I act, and I empower. The answer has always been in me, which makes me aware of how to stimulate the joy of realization to someone in need.
Today positively added to my recovery journey. I ventured out to talk with my psychologist and enjoyed a table outreach event at a utility company campus. I’m looking back on all the events I’ve done this. So many more than I would have projected months ago. I’m growing, Blog, and I feel myself unfurling and snipper-snapping into a crisp breeze. I am making my path through the world, proudly.
Reaching people is a wonderful feeling. Establishing a connection, agreeing to build a bridge, or even just a firm, earnest handshake can be beneficial. I see the pieces of realization scattered about in disarray for the present. One day soon, the picture will begin to develop from all those pieces. Integration, driven by genuine enthusiasm promotes my outward identity. Put the mask on and vanish into a persona. I wish I could take it off and show someone my real face. I have many strings being pulled by loneliness.
The empty space. A hole in my core self that can’t be healed. Ever. Trauma takes me back there, for a time. This is acceptable in comparison to stuffing feelings into an already crowded lunchbox.
There’s today’s thought-vomit. Enjoy? >.>
Have a good night.
Ghost-fingers cold–
That spine-shuddering touch,
Eyes scream out in unknowing fear.
Emptied of dreams; memories–
They fall into a dark chasm,
Forsaken, purged by lightning,
Agony–
Again! Again!
Those hopes in trust–
Smeared into opaque nothingness,
Irrelevantly hoping–
Still met by a stranger,
Bereft of words,
Emotions swirling downstream.
Cast into the crucible of torment–
Straining against the surges that come.
Once proud foundations–
Crumbling decay into rot,
Detritus swept away by an outgoing tide.
Score: 3
Today was one of the better that I’ve had recently. I was active, productive and further entrenching my relevance in the workplace.
Tonight though, I’m still a little sad. I played a lot of music that brought me back. I do miss them, and their love, but the time for that has passed. I am what I have earned. I carry the weight of my decisions, every day. There are just some moral boundaries I will never cross, so no guilt or need of repentance is shielded from plain sight.
There is no point in struggling over the past, and the tendrils of regret slithering their way through it. Nothing can be resolved. Never. Wounds that don’t fester, but stay open and fresh, reminding. That is my quandary.
I have already said goodbye to them. There is no more to be done but turn away and walk into a new yet distant narrative.
Expectations should be realistic, and therefore, achievable. There is a big cookie of satisfaction for those who meet their target. I have on multiple occasions enjoyed that glorious victory cookie, but have also dropped it into the cat litterbox more than once. Goals should be achievable, not powder puff nor Mount Everest.
I feel relevant. Involved. I’m not fading away in shame, I’m thriving in the only reality I know.
12. We will never give up hope.
Scrapes of curling bitter rind.
Deliverance lashes the already bloody.
Pain, revisited, endured, revisited.
Replenished with bile, ready for the next.
I have found my words to be infrequent. I’m less inclined to open, having found safety in being closed.
I’m understanding my uniqueness better, in terms that aren’t shaming (mostly). I feel untethered from possibility because of the inherent isolation imposed by my traits, flaws, preferences and composition. The bridge I built to acceptance spans a mighty chasm, but will endure (show me how to unknow something and you can have my adoration).
Bricks are appropriate because you can’t make anything with just a couple and it usually takes a shitload of them all piled up to assemble something worth marveling at.
Just like bricks, their integrity remains solid until the ground starts moving.
I see out from the peephole. I’m here, but I only want to come out if I have one of my masks on. I have become familiar with how it fits, but it is still taking little pipet-drops away each time. I don’t notice it happening, I just do what I have to in the present. I see the quantity getting lower only as I glance away and back again after a time.
This is the mode. Survival is paramount; effectiveness depends on forward momentum. The masking suits that idea, while shielding. I won’t argue that it’s healthy, but it is not overtly destructive. My personas help move my life forward in most cases, and they are still me. Yet, they dissolve away in my solitude, and the truth hidden behind the guise is exposed. Within me lies the pile of smelly socks that is the inmost nature my true self. Having a history of repulsion, the imagery seemed appropriate.
Do you know what I’m talking about? I have simply embraced my “never” and moved on. Do you know what “never again” feels like? I do. I remind myself every day that choices have consequences.
More words will come, and maybe they will be more coherent next time.
Neurochemically Challenged 
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