quotes of the day

From a late night episode of Scrubs...

"the easiest way to lose something you really want is to want it too badly".

yep, i think that'd about cover it.

and history has shown it's true.

another one, from who knows where:

"if you love something set it free. if it comes back to you, it's yours. if it doesn't, it never was"

but what if you loved it, -thought- it was yours and set it free? since it was never yours, it'll never come back, will it? (btw, the answer is "no")


and yet another one:

"hold on loosely"

coz that way, when they leave, it's not as messy.

The Night Swim

the breeze washes over me, just a bit too cool and goosebumps appear on my arms. the air feels damp, but clean and new, not heavy with humidity like before. the moon no longer rides on the horizon like it did; it's high now and much smaller. although it's out, it casts little light on the world i see. looking south, down the beach, i can see the waves no longer crashing with the ferocity displayed earlier, but just lightly tumbling onto the sand as if apologetic for the fury just hours before.

i put my feet on the metal bars of the balcony (they're cold) and push back, rocking my chair onto the two back legs, back until my shoulders touch the wall. i like sitting like this, always have. the wind blows my hair into my face and i brush it aside. a splash of foam from the waterline catches my eye and i watch the waves in their endless, timeless assault on the land. the angle at which the waves approach draw my eyes further down the beach until earth, sky and water merge in the darkness.

i wish i still smoked; it'd be a perfect moment for a cigarette. that thought strikes me as so strange considering i haven't had a cigarette in over 20 years. i wish i had a drink but i don't feel like getting up. being right here feels good, right, and i want to hold onto that for as long as i can. it's not often that feeling good and i are in the same room.

i remember feeling good. it was a long time ago but i can still feel it. well, remember it anyway. it was easy then, almost seemed like there could be no other way but to feel good. no worries to speak of. the usual stuff - money, health, terrorists, disease. all those fears were there but they didn't really carry much weight. before that time of my life, when good was easy, i worried about them a lot. then i didn't. there was so much that was good in my life, so much happiness that there just wasn't time or energy to spend on fears.

even when that time ended though, i didn't start worrying again. i just didn't care anymore. fuck it. what was the difference, anyway? the words from a long ago song stream through my head, "running on empty....running blind", jackson browne i think. seems fitting, somehow, but i don't have the energy to finish the thought. doesn't matter anyway.

blink.

the moon has moved, a lot. my butt is tingling. more lost time. i wonder where i was, what i was thinking. looking out into the water i see a blinking light, a boat. i don't remember it being there before, it must have come into sight while i was 'away'. i let the chair thud down on all four legs and stand, back aching. it occurs to me that the boat and the light are just what i need, just what i was waiting for. the pins and needles shoot down my left leg as i limp toward the waters' edge. two buttons and my shirt drops away behind me, leaving me just in shorts. i start to wonder which shorts they are, start to look down - fuck it. what's it matter anyway?

the coldness of the water grabs my feet; i didn't expect it to be so cool. i guess i'd always thought it would be warm, comforting somehow. another illusion lost. fuck it. what's it matter anyway? fuck it all.

for a fleeting instant i think to turn around for a quick look, but i don't. why bother? fuck it. let's go. the chill of the water rises around my legs as i wade into the water, into the cold dark quiet.

heart attack

Definition: a cardiac event where one or more blood vessels in the heart become blocked, cutting off the flow of oxygenated blood to part of the heart muscle. If not corrected quickly, the affected heart muscle will die and be replaced by scar tissue.

in most cases, the heart destroying blockage is, obviously, something internal to the affected blood vessel.

sometimes, the heart destroying blockage can be completely external to the body.

could this be?

let's just start out the right way and get it outta the way: she was right.

but ya know, it's hard to accept things that you haven't kinda come to the conclusion on your own.

fine, i'm there. or getting there, anyway.

this life can't continue this way.

drinking way too much. other things. hermiting.

watching everyone else go by and knowing full well that no matter how long i wait in the end i'll still be without her.

so i guess she's right. i should move on.

no drinking tonight... one night at a time.

i may even go somewhere new this weekend... to indulge another vice, gambling. we'll see.

sometimes there is no right way

or: i really do always get it wrong.

i purposely looked for cards that didn't have "love" or "sweetheart" or anything to do with "the love of my life" in or on them. instead, i went for more "friend-y" coz i didn't want her feeling like i was (still) trying to force my feelings onto her.

likewise, i didn't write anything on those lines. nor did i want to ?emphasize? how she should be concentrating on fixing her relationship with him instead of being distracted by me. so i went for (what i thought was) positive, "best time of your life" instead.

wrong. on both counts.

"cute". "great." "obvious and different."

clearly being or rather, trying to be "sensitive" is NOT my forte'.

i can let her have all the feelings and emotions and keep her distracted from her life and relationship and therefore trapped and unhappy. or, i can stop trying to pull her away (which is not gonna work anyway) and let her be mad and unhappy about what we've lost.

two choices: bad and worse. but at least in the latter she'll eventually turn back to him and start fixing herself and their relationship. and if it's not fixable she'll figure that out and eventually leave. but at least she'll do what's best for her.

i've tried and tried and tried, but can't figure out any way to make this a win/win situation. either he wins and she wins or he loses and she wins.

i'm not gonna have her, so i lose no matter what.

(everyone who's tired of hearing that, raise your hand... 1, 2, ... 4,564, 4,565... okay, i get the picture...)

milestones made and missed

this week has a special event for her, something that only happens once in a lifetime.

mazel tov, love.











and i failed to meet an unofficial milestone. but, nothing new there.

a new milestone

well, we've reached a new milestone in our relationship.

as we were talking at lunch, it became obvious that her mood had changed (something i said, i'm sure, it always is). so i asked if she wanted me to let her go.

"yeah, i think so."

first time ever.

a new low for me.

a sure signpost.

and probably the best thing she's done for herself and her relationship in a long time.

The Class - review

I've been rather eagerly awaiting the premier of the series The Class. the ads for it have been very good - a series of them showing the main characters in an elementary school spelling bee. very good ads, very funny.

funnier than the show, i'm afraid.

well, that's the crib notes version of the review.

it was... okay. my biggest peeve is the frikkin laugh track. geez, do they really think the public is so stupid that we won't know when to laugh? (er, um, okay, granted, most of the public IS that stupid, but that's a rant for another time.) actually, they probably added the laugh track because it was cheaper than getting good script.

truthfully, it bears a couple of more viewings. some series even take a season or two to find themselves. so, i'll stay tuned, for a couple more weeks anyway.

it reminds me of Friends and thirtysomething, kind of a cross between the two. my gut reaction to the show was why would i want to watch something that highlights how fucked up -my- life is? i'm thinking back to thirtysomething (which was one of my favorite shows) and i remember that people either loved it or hated it, saying who'd want to watch yuppies complaining about their lives? i was a fan, and now i wonder if i liked it because maybe that period of my life wasn't so bad.

anyway, let's see what happens. I'll give it a 5.5 outta 10, but with potential.

weekend recap

finally played at a mid-south casino. overall, yuck. small, crappy rules and odds. for example, at a $5 blackjack table, if you play more than one spot, your minimum bet has to be $10 each spot. Huh?

oh, and those famous casino buffets? make sure to try 'em... in vegas and atlantic city.

oh, and g-d forbid that two employees talking and laughing about some personal conversation should interrupt their day to answer a question.

got to watch a blackjack player get a pair of K's, SPLIT THEM (no, really, i was there!!), get another K, SPLIT THEM AGAIN, and lose all three hands. yeah, i lost about $50 playing too, but geez....

started (well, restarted) and finished a book by Carl Hiaasen. pretty good actually, although there was a couple of things about it i didn't like. there was an obvious plot device about a guy and his woman boss. i knew from the beginning where that was going. the kicker was that they were 19 years apart in age. gimme a break - not in the real world. actually had to put the thing down for a while. but he's adoringly curmudgeonly and she's young and sexy and ultimately they find each other. but it is fiction, after all.

hoped all weekend that B would think about the things i'd talked to her about on friday. tried not to obsess about her all weekend. watched sadly as yet another weekend passed without her even trying to call.

cross another week off the calendar. the future gets closer with every weekend and every evening that passes without hearing from her. it's only been almost two years since she'd try calling me on the weekend. think i'll figure it out soon?

time, life, reality marches on.

turning over a new leaf (number 381)

she's been begging and pushing me to move on with my life, which i've resisted, because i know what's at the end of that line. (-not- her, just me alone.)

anyway, one of my many (failed) resolutions has been to try to write about other things in my life than her. which is kinda like saying "oxygen isn't all that important to your life, why don't you write about, oh, argon instead".

as a future argon-based life form, what the heck. i'll give it a shot.

i hope my loyal readership isn't too disappointed....

(man, i crack myself up sometimes...)

grief and grieving

the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.

it is not, however, a one-way, straight forward progression.

i find myself going back and forth, constantly. spend some time in denial, then a little anger. then back to denial. repeat umpteen times. then maybe move a little along into bargaining. then back to anger, then bargaining, then back to square one and be firmly in denial.

again.

repeat. make a little progress. fall back to square one.

repeat.

depression is a pretty familiar place for me.

acceptance is really hard coming. after all, it means giving up. it means that all the hopes, dreams, plans ya might have had are basically gone. ok, not basically. -gone-.

it's hard to stay there for very long. although i have to admit, i can accept that eventually i have to be there all the time.

it's a little easier if i think of it as finally stopping interfering in her life and letting her get on with it, repair and rebuild her relationship and her life with him.

it just hurts so damn much. even after knowing (even though i didn't admit it to myself) for over two years.

fuck.

she deserves more than me, that's for sure.

i just didn't realize she'd found it ten years ago.

spooky

this song melody has been kinda floating around in my head for a couple of days. i haven't been able to place it as i only "hear" like 2 or 3 seconds of it.

this morning i heard that song! Rush, Free Will, if you're wondering. Don't ask why, coz i'm not a huge Rush fan, but they're okay.

of course, there's a somewhat haunting line in it:

If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.

my first thought was that it's what i'd say to her. but truthfully, i suppose it applies to me too.

every step a misstep

no matter what i do, i hurt her, somehow.

usually it's by a comment i make that seems innocent enough or objective enough, yet she always takes it as a knock or slap at her. they're always anything but that - something i would never do.

i've wondered ever since the second time she told me she wouldn't meet me and the first time she said it might be a possibility, why she hasn't chosen to, why i couldn't convince her to meet me, or to stop hiding from me.

todays' thought for the day:

if i made her feel good as often as i make her feel bad,
she'd have begged me to come see her by now.

so, as i suspected, it's me, my own doing, my own shortcomings.

but then, i never expected less.

No itinerary changes allowed

i'm going to the last city i worked in to see a friend this weekend.

why can't i be going to B's city to see my best friend instead?

oh, that's right. the "BF" travel agency doesn't allow itinerary changes.

and he's got a lock on the whole market.

WTC

as if anyone could forget, today's the 5th anniversary of the WTC attacks.

Do you remember where you were?

I do. I was working in this same city. we watched the second plane fly into the south side of the south tower and emerge from the north side, between floors 87-93, on the eastern half of the building.

Which is where i had an office when i worked in NYC from 85-90ish.

i was on the 87th floor of the WTC when the space shuttle Challenger exploded in 86.

kinda strange, ya know?

my heart goes out to all whose lives were touched.

All of my life
I've been waitin' in the rain
I've been waiting for a feeling
That never, ever came
It feels so close
But always disappears

(lyrics from Quarterflash)


almost true...

the feeling came, hard, absolute, with certainty. for me.

wrong time, wrong place, wrong me.

it's a date

she's finally agreed to meet me!!!!!

okay, it wasn't so much -agreed- as -gave in-. and it's a pretty safe thing too. it won't have any impact on her life or relationship, won't interfere with her life with him.

my calendar is marked for summer, 2016... lunch with B.

i should be ecstatic - i'll finally get to meet her.

i asked her if, ten years hence we haven't yet met, if she'll just do it and have lunch with me anyway. we talked about this and that, but she couldn't commit. i dropped it. the next day i had to tell her how much it bothered me that she couldn't even bring herself to meet me in ten years and then she said she would.

we've talked about the long term future before. it used to be about what -we'd- be like as a couple, how it'd be. but "we" isn't much of a topic anymore. to be honest, and i've told her this, i don't know that i can continue like this for ten more years. she's told me she wants me, wants to be with me, then gone home to him over a thousand times in a row. the words are what i want to hear, want to believe, but while i have her words, he has her.

i don't think i can do that another three thousand times.

so as i lay in bed last night i was thinking about our future meeting. will she remember we had a lunch date? would she even remember me in ten years? try to find me?

after losing her to him thousands of times and then finally losing her... i don't know that i could stand the pain of seeing her and then losing her again. all that lost love, lost opportunity rushing back, reminding me that it was him not i. all that is her rushing back into me, filling me up again, giving me just a brief moment of life, only to have to watch her walk away, back to him, one final time?

kharma? cosmic irony?

it's either kharma settling the score or a huge cosmic irony....

there's no other explanation really.

Consider the situation - a man, unhappy with his life and marriage, finds another to love and leaves his wife. it's not a terrible life, he's just bored and sure that there must be something more to life, there must be passion and desire out there yet to experience. being mid-life, the ticking of his "time-remaining" biological clock grows louder with every passing day.

and then he finds her. she too is unhappy with her relationship and her life. like him, it's not terrible; it's certainly more than comfortable enough. but there must be more, isn't there? she too seeks passion and ... more.

talking together they see glimmers of what each had been seeking, should they be together. they both want that. want to find it, experience it, live it.

and here's where the kharmic payback or cosmic irony steps in... he made his break, leaving for a better life. she however is much more principled. one of her most strongly held principles is that she'd never leave one relationship for another, ever. she won't ever fall for the "grass is greener" trap.

he made the break, gave up everything, changed his life. (ok, it wasn't so much of a -decision- as that's how it turned out, but still..).

but she can't and won't break her principle. so even though she claims unhappiness, she roots herself there more firmly than ever, determined not to do the horrible thing.

besides, why would she want a man who she already knows has left one relationship for another?

i have a problem.

well, not -a- problem, but several.

i have tried, repeatedly, to change the things that need changed. i can't even guess how many mornings i've come in -determined- to be different/better. sometimes i'm even successful - for a few hours.

the biggest problem: i still think i'm a possibility in her life, and i act accordingly. she even said recently "i'm stuck or just not ready". how much plainer could it be? so why do i still hear "..but will be soon"??? she's never implied, insinuated, inferred, said, promised or alluded to it being "soon" (or ever). so why do i continue to hear it?

wishing is a very strong emotion. as is desire. and love.

unfortunately, denial is also very strong. and i can deny the truth of our situation to myself very easily. in a way i don't blame me - the reality i want is so much more appealing than the reality i have.

in a physical relationship (not sexual, just 'in the real world') between two people, things like exchanging pictures, talking on the phone or sending letters or packages would be trivial, never even thought about much less discussed.

but ours is not physical ('in the real world'). and she's told me time and time again, from the very beginning, that she needs to protect herself, her privacy, her relationship and everything else in her life from even the -possibility- of me finding out and somehow harming her or her relationship. for three years she's kept almost everything about herself hidden. she's told me repeatedly that she can't and won't expose her life to any risk. but still i ask. i ask her to meet, to let me call her at work, to send me pictures of herself. and then i'm hurt and disappointed when she doesn't.

she's said she wants me in her life (as we are) and that she'd be unhappy if i wasn't. i believe her. but i wonder if she wouldn't be better off without me bringing so much upset or irritation to her world every day.

and as a perfect example of the topic of this post - i continue to think that if we were together that i'd somehow be able to make her world better.