[DAY 22] 30-Day Song Challenge

Hi. Have I yet told you that I’ll be MIA soon? I’m going on vacation for nearly three weeks in October. Several years overdue, this vacation, and I’m fucking stoked. It’s all I can seem to think about at present. But I will be absent for a bit, starting October 1st. I will be back this time, though. And maybe I’ll be able to type something, anything, that doesn’t require a challenge to motivate me. This has been working wonders, though.

Oh. I didn’t get the Chicago job. I didn’t even tell you about that one, because I didn’t think I’d get it. I only interviewed for the experience of interviewing for a giant, big-city firm. The interview actually went extremely well and most of my experience lined up perfectly. They had concerns that I’ve only worked with small firms and didn’t have quite enough experience with working with developers. They had someone else they were chatting with whose experience lined up more closely with their needs. I’m not upset about it. I don’t actually want to live in Chicago, but the experience of the interview was valuable to me.

I do have a very promising shot at the one I interviewed for last week, the mostly local one. I’ve already signed an offer letter for contract work between now and when she needs a full-time person. So, we’ll see how that goes.

Anydoodles. Day 22 presents a challenge, I think. Let’s see if I can tackle it, and how.

Day 22: A Song That Moves You Forward

I’m sincerely stuck and have been prowling YouTube and Google for at least ten minutes now. I’m stuck. Fuck. Lemme think.

How about “Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor? Best I can do, but I’d say it’s pretty damn fitting.

Please send help. I need more songs that fit this theme, and I’m drawing a blank.

[DAY 20] 30-Day Song Challenge

Have I yet mentioned how redundant some of the prompts are? Some of the prompts are redundant. There, now I definitely have. Today’s feels like one of those, as though it’s something I’ve already covered, just under a slightly different prompt. I have no idea what to even select here. None. I’m coming in blind. (That’s what she said?) So let’s see what happens.

Day 20: A Song That Has Many Meanings To You

This first one came to mind and probably seems a bizarre selection at first glance. “You Are My Sunshine” is a bright, happy, positive love song. Right? Yes. But it’s also a song about fear. The fear of loss. The fear of darkness. The fear of abandonment. This is Christina Perri’s version of the oft-covered classic.

The next one is “Hurt”, and I actually prefer Johnny Cash’s cover. That’s no shade to the original NIN version, which I also love. There’s just something particularly powerful about the Johnny Cash cover. This song definitely has multiple personal meanings for me. Listen to the lyrics and see which path it takes you down.

I’ll throw one more at ya. “Tearing at the Seams” by Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats. Y’all, I really love them. And this particular album? I’ve listened to on repeat so much that I know the lyrics to every song. As with a few others of theirs, this song has more than one meaning for me.

What songs have multiple meanings for you?

[DAY 18] 30-Day Song Challenge

I made it back home. The whirlwind trip to Alabama was fun, exhausting, and educational. Educational in that I learned that Alabama is perhaps the most intense state in the country when it comes to college football. I lost count of how many vehicles (standard cars, sports cars, mini-vans, campers, RVs, etc.) that were in full football regalia. I’m talking logos, slogans, you name it…plastered all over their vehicles. I’ve never seen anything like it. I’m guessing there was a game this weekend, because fucking hell were they everywhere. I haven’t visited every state yet, but I’ve been to most (I realize living there would bring things into sharper relief.). Living in Oregon, I quickly learned that they have not only a lot of college football fans but an intense homestate college football rivalry. But even being from Louisiana, where LSU love runs deep (with football fans) and judgment is swift and severe for anti-LSUers or anti-football fans (ask me how I know), I’ve never seen fanboys fanboying to this extent. (To be fair, I’ve never been to Baton Rouge on a game day.) It was mind-boggling. And, to be honest, I just don’t get it. But that’s a post for another day. I made it there and back in once piece, and the only football I had to endure was flying past their fans on the interstate.

So. Day 18 is gonna be an easy one. Let’s get to it.

Day 18: A Song from the Year You were Born

Okay, it’ll be easy with a quick google search of songs from 1980. I’m gonna pick some random selections from the Billboard Year-End Hot 100 singles of 1980. Here’s what I dug up:

There was Blondie’s #1, “Call Me”, though I confess I like her more than I like her music.

For a completely different feel, Commodores came in at #23 with their beautiful “Still”.

I have a special love for Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band, and they put on a hell of a live show. In 1980, “Against the Wind” was #51.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers made it to #64 with “Don’t Do Me Like That”, and I’m sad to say that I never got to see them live. (He also had “Refugee” bringing up the rear at #100). They’re another personal favorite.

There’s Billy Joel’s #75, “You May Be Right”, which far outshines his #9, “It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me”. As for him, I like his music more than I like him.

Pat Benatar came in at #83 with “Heartbreaker”. Love this woman and her energy.

That’s enough. There were some other appearances, but I tried to mix it up a bit with the sounds/genres.

What about your birth year? What are some of the top songs the year you were born, whether you liked them or not!?

Oh, hi. Fancy meeting you here.

I. Dunno what to say. But I have been endlessly hassled to get my (wordless) ass back here and write. Something. Anything. So here. Here’s something. A nothing kind of something, but something, nonetheless. We’ll see how it goes.

In the meantime, I shall leave you with this:

The moon will never lie to anyone. Be like the moon. No one hates the moon or wants to kill it. The moon does not take antidepressants and never gets sent to prison. The moon never shot a guy in the face and ran away. The moon has been around a long time and has never tried to rip anyone off. The moon does not care who you want to touch or what color you are. The moon treats everyone the same. The moon never tries to get in on the guest list or use your name to impress others. Be like the moon. When others insult or belittle in an attempt to elevate themselves, the moon sits passively and watches, never lowering itself to anything that weak. The moon is beautiful and bright. It needs no makeup to look beautiful. The moon never shoves clouds out of its way so it can be seen. The moon needs not fame or money to be powerful. The moon never asks you to go to war to defend it. Be like the moon. ~ Henry Rollins

That’ll do.

Parking Lot People

I like to leave the office for my lunch break. I used to have a bad tendency to simply never take a lunch, in jobs past. Now, I make it a point to. I’m not getting paid for that hour, and damnit, I need to be kind to myself. Take the hour. Ingest some fresh air. Get off my ass. De-stress myself as much as possible.

Thing is, my office is in a weird little spot. There are no parks nearby, and it’s not close enough to downtown to go for a stroll. We’re right on a highway, so it’s pretty much either: have lunch at your desk (and continue working, because you won’t be left alone), take your lunch break in your vehicle in the parking lot (weird and awkward), take your lunch to the picnic table out back (and not be left alone), go out to eat (and go broke), or take your lunch to some other random parking lot.

The last option on that list is the one most people in this vicinity seem to gravitate to. I spend nearly every one of my lunch breaks sitting in my vehicle, parked in the parking lot of a local grocery store. And anywhere from five to two dozen other folks are doing the same thing.

All parked in the grocery store parking lot. Eating lunch. Alone. But together. Some listening to music. Some chatting on their phones. Some texting. Some playing games. Some smoking. Some napping. Some exiting their vehicles and sitting on the asphalt, just to be that much closer to fresh air and sunshine.

We exchange occasional nods of acknowledgement when we accidentally make eye contact with fellow Parking Lot People.

Other than that, it’s a solo thing. For many. It’s weird and sad and uplifting all at the same time.

And I dunno why, but I just wanted to mention these Parking Lot People, of whom I’m one.

That is all.

 

Part 1: The Reason

Over a year ago now, I wrote about gingers, specifically the abundance of gingers in my foray into the Portland(ish) dating scene. I directly referenced a few, in particular. I ended up taking a chance on one of those gingers; I believe I referred to him as something like the “simple, but wild one.”

Why on earth would I saddle myself up to a “simple, but wild one”? I’ve asked myself that same question, as have some of my most important friends in the world. (Looking at you, Tomas and stupidityhole and Cheeky.)

One of the easiest conclusions that I’ve come to is this: Despite moving across the country, escaping my own personal hell that was Louisiana, to pursue a lifelong dream of the Pacific Northwest…I found myself soon fallen into the same patterns, the same rut: that of work, cheap fast food or no food at all, bingewatching some bullshit show, not being able to focus on reading…on words, and spending most of my time alone and moping, in bed. I knew a physical move wouldn’t fix anything other than the immediate surrounding stimuli that fucked me up on the daily in Louisiana. I knew it would take real effort. But I was failing at it.

So I started dating. I never felt comfortable doing so in Louisiana, partly because my better-part-of-5-year-separation took that long to culminate in a divorce, and partly because I’d have never been comfortable dating there. Running into my ex while out on a date, or even trying to date someone and get serious with someone in a place I knew I couldn’t stay. Couldn’t live. Couldn’t breathe.

So I started dating. Dating sites, of course. How else was a recluse going to meet anyone? I met some terrible people, but I met some damn good people, too. I had some fun. I had some prospects for serious. (I learned quickly that in modern dating, one has to openly profess they are monogamous if they have any hopes of landing someone who isn’t into “ethical non-monogamy.” Y’all. You do you, but that’s just not my jam. I’ve tried to be open to it, but it’s just not me. It’s so far out of my comfort zone that it can only end in misery.)

I also quickly learned that, while I wanted someone whom would date me exclusively while we decided whether or not we were compatible, I also wasn’t ready to plummet straight into some til-death-do-us-part thing. Another thing I learned is that I get bored easily. Very easily. I don’t want to sit on the couch, night after night, bingewatching tv. I don’t want to waste my life away watching other people live theirs. I don’t want to talk about politics, every single day, day in and day out. And no, I don’t want to rush into marriage and move into your parent’s farmhouse, for fuck’s sake.

I wanted…needed…craved…excitement, stimulation, new.

Enter the “simple, but wild one.” I’ll come up with something to call him at some point, but for now, that will do.

He was wild. He was unpredictable. He was untamed. He wasn’t interested in anything serious. He wanted to go out. He wanted to do things. And oh dear god, was he fun. The most fun I’d ever had with a boy I was seeing regularly. There was an edge of danger to it all, and it was fucking thrilling.

And so, I allowed myself to get carried away with it. Sucked into his insane fucking charisma and magnetism. I willfully turned a blind eye to the enormous red flags that anyone who’s ever known him can see (like his extreme levels of narcissism and sociopathy and alcoholism). I willfully entered into a thing that caused everyone I knew – including the few of his friends I was allowed to meet – to seriously inquire, “What the hell are you doing with him?” (That question got more and more searing as time went on, more and more pressing, more and more concerning from the asker, and more and more telling to me of just how obvious it was to absolutely everyone what a brutal fucking mistake I was making.)

But, son of a bitch, I was having fun. I was living life with reckless abandon, something most people get out of their systems in their teens. Something I’d never done.

That. Is the reason. Well. That is the surface reason. More reasons will be expressed in future chapters. Like the whole, I lived so much of my life in fear of winding up with a replica of my father. And I did. Not only did I “wind up” with him, I dove headlong into it.

This isn’t a tale I can tell in one sitting, hence the parsing of it into chapters. I don’t have the energy for it, nor do I have the desire to give it that much time and attention in one sitting.

But that. That is my version of a beginning for this. That is my reason for what came to pass.

Holy epiphany, Batman.

I just figured it out. Hit me like the proverbial ton of bricks. Why I’m craving to be social. Why I refuse to hide myself away anymore. Why it’s like a breath of fresh air, even in the otherwise oppressive city fumes.

It was him. That gingerfuck. I was cloistered, sequestered, denied, hidden for over a year.

And now that I’m free, motherfucker I’m free. And I’ll be damned if I hide anymore (corners, notwithstanding). And damnit, I’m loving every. fucking. minute. of it.

Don’t ya just love a good epiphany?

More to come.

Dichotomellaneous

It occurs to me that I’m living a plethora of dichotomies, all at once. And as I sit here, my mind is racing with unformed thoughts. So brace yourselves for a rambling mishmash of assorted mumbojumbo. Let’s start with a song to enjoy while you read this bullshit, mkay? Mkay.

With the music sorted, let’s start with… Oh. I know. Music. Duh.

Musichotomy

As I was listening to a song earlier, on the way back to work from the post office, it struck me as how different it was to my usual proclivities. I was listening to Jake Bugg’s Lightning Bolt. Now, here’s the thing, y’all. This Louisiana-born-and-raised chick loathes country music. Loathes. I’ve refused to date country-music-fan dudes, because music is too important to me to compromise that harshly. (Yeah. I said harshly.) I mean, super recently, too. Within the last couple months, I let a good dude pass me on by, because – while he shared my lust for live music – he was all and only about country. Major. Serious. Country. Everything else about him was cool as shit, but we just couldn’t hang, because he was always listening to some ear-bludgeoning nightmare – and proved equally unwilling to listen to my jams.

And yet. There I was. Jamming out to Lightning Bolt. Singing along, for fuck’s sake. Alarm bells went off in my head, and then I just said fuck it and went with it. Granted, dude is hardly country in the traditional sense (or even in the modern sense), but there’s a palpable country vibe to it. I tried to forgive myself because of his obviously overwhelming influence by Bob Dylan, one of my all-time favorites.

But yeah. One day, I’m listening to Fugazi’s brief discography. The next, I’m going all out on some Trombone Shorty and Keb Mo. Following that with Wax Taylor and Portishead. Then, I’m all up in some Pharcyde and Mos Def. Let’s not forget my love of the Peppers. How about Leon Bridges or Band of Horses? Fucking hell, if I could only stop listening to Clint Mansell and Damien Rice. Then, there’s my new little occasional metalbar haunt, and Church of the Cosmic Skull, for fuck’s sake! So, should I really be surprised by yet another style of music? No. And yet I am.

Lifestyle stuff and stuff

I’m also contemplating my sudden love of Downtown. The whole downtown scene appeals to me, on a visceral level, really. I love the sites and sounds, the absurd snippets of dialogue as random passersby, well, pass you by. I love the snatches of music, the invisible notes and melodies losing the chase as you stroll on down the sidewalk. The various aromas, at once arresting and enticing, alluring and repulsing. Thai spices and incense. Rose petals and cat food. Greek salad and craft beer. Gasoline and perfume. Sex and vomit.

But it’s so fucking weird to me. To like it, nay love it, the way I do. It pulls me, draws me, keeps me locked in when I give in to the call. And it makes no sense, because I’m a trees girl. I’m a sky girl. I’m a mountains and rivers and stars girl. I’m a birdsong and wind girl. I’m a bubble over with giggles and laughter at the sight of a tiny woodland creature girl.

I’m a fuck society girl.

So, no, I don’t get it. This sudden fascination, even obsession, with downtown. Or do I? I think it’s part of me coming into my own. My self. One of the many parts of me that I denied for all of my life: being social. Not hiding myself away from people and society and the sorts of experiences only exposure to a place like “downtown” can bring. And damnit, I’m loving every second of it. Even the ridiculous, frustrating, maddening, and absurd. I’m fucking loving it.

My favorite bar is a jazz club. They have live music all the time. All. The. Time. Jazz, funk, blues, soul. And I’m in fucking heaven, every single time. I sit at the bar, smiling, and clasping my hands in joy, and groovin’ to the music. I stand outside, on the sidewalk, and laugh and dance in the rain. It is so…freeing…and perfect.

I also strangely enjoy the metalbar. It doesn’t have live music, and it doesn’t necessarily have the kind of music I dig (generally speaking). But I appreciate it for precisely those reasons…it’s different; it’s new; it takes me out of my comfort zone (but not to an extreme level). It’s great for culture-learning/people-watching. And I really fucking like their pineapple cider.

Another little spot is a wine bar; a friend of a friend plays his trombone and keys, while we drink wine, snack on an appetizer, and talk about meaning and purpose and music and books and life and whatthefuckever. People meander on down the sidewalk, occasionally stopping to drop money into the tip bucket or chat with us or peruse a menu.

This amorphous entity that is downtown has me in its grip, and I love it.

It doesn’t stop me from going kayaking, checking out nature trails, spending an entire afternoon reading beside the lake. But there is less of that than I would have expected of myself. Not because I’m holed up, depressed in bed, but because I’d rather be downtown. (Then, there are those brewery crawls. A whole ‘nutha story!)

Fucking weird.

~

I’ve suddenly talked myself out. So I’m calling an abrupt end to this particular post.

But I’ll be back.

I will.

 

 

M is for That’s Like So Metal, Ohmygod Becky look at her butt, I mean blood

So I’m at this bar, right? I’m not actually in the bar; I’m standing outside, hiding in this little nook, waiting for someone. It’s cold. It’s fucking cold. I’m wearing two pair of socks in my docs, jeans, a cami, a t-shirt over the cami, a flannel over the t-shirt, a hoodie over the flannel, a beanie snugly perched atop my skull, and the hoodie pulled over that. As I said, fucking cold. (And apparently, that turns me into someone whom “looks like she’s standing in line for a Pearl Jam concert in 1994.”)

I’m near the East Coast now. Near. Definitely in the Eastern Time Zone (is that even what it’s called? I don’t fucking know.) Standing outside on a frigid October night. Downtown. Outside a metal bar. Yeah, you read that right. A metal bar. With this incongruous name. Like “Gilligan’s Island,” only that’s not the name, but it’s close enough to give you an idea of the incongruity.

This metal bar is a haven for disenfranchised twenty-somethings, who aren’t really disenfranchised. They just like a certain look and a certain style of music, and they think it makes them cool to pretend to be disenfranchised. It doesn’t, but they’ll figure that out in a few years. Or they won’t, and they’ll turn into the old fucker who wouldn’t leave me alone. “Why are you standing over here in the corner, looking all beautiful and alone? You’re so beautiful. You’re like an angel. Can I touch your face?” Please. Don’t. Thank you so much, but please. No. “But why are you over here in the corner? Why aren’t you out on the sidewalk with everyone else? Why aren’t you standing in the street?” (Yes, he was fucking hammered.) I’m standing here, because I’m hiding. I don’t want to be seen. I don’t want to be noticed. I’m waiting on someone, and this is where I’m comfortable waiting. “But but…” (you get the idea) So yeah. I hope they figure it out before they turn into that walking pile of sadness.

I end up trapped in my little corner (that’s what happens to corner-seekers, FYI), hemmed in by this pack of Goth Metal Grunge hybrids. Gretals? Yeah. Let’s call ’em Gretals. So the Gretals are initially three dudes. Bitching about their ex-girlfriends whom “just totally didn’t get metal, man. She like didn’t understand that there are genres within genres and shit.” (I think the word you’re looking for is “subgenre,” Gretal.)

Then their new girls show up. The ones who are “so metal, man. I’m so glad to finally have a metal bitch.” (Yeah.)  The following snippets are from the She-Gretals:

Oh my god, girl. (Restaurant X) would like ohmygod so totally hire her cuz she has dreads and everyone hires dreads like totally.”

Yeah. Their new girls are so metal, man. This was followed up by a serious conversation about how one can determine another chick’s “metalness” by the colors she dyes her hair.

And then there was this.

There are like no hot available men in (X City). And all the hot chicks are bitches, including my friends. I’m like attracted to two different types of people, so we just share each other. That’s living metal, baby.”

And.

I feel so spooky, and I love that you’re spooky. We should fuck.

Blood wrestling. I love blood wrestling. (What’s blood wrestling, inquires He-Gretal.) It’s like when, like, instead of mud, you cut yourselves and wrestle in blood. It’s so fucking hot. And metal. (Looks at the she-gretal she keeps drooling over.) We should totally finish our wine, then blood wrestle.

Most of that was said by the she-Gretal who kept showing off pictures of a scar that looked like a skull when she pulled the bandage off. “Isn’t that like totally the most metal thing you’ve ever seen? I’m so metal right now, I can’t even.” Yeah. Neither can I.

Now, here’s the thing. I’m not a metalhead. Never have been, and I don’t pretend to be. But I have a niggling suspicion, call me crazy, that NONE of that was metal. It was all I could do to keep from laughing out loud. I instead entertained myself by live-texting the ridiculousness to the person I was waiting for.

Once I was rescued, we fled the scene for a bit – so as to shake the proud robber of abandoned hurricane homes. Yeah, “you’re just like a little angel lighting up the corner” dude was from Louisiana. Bragged about robbing homes of the wealthy during hurricane evacuations. Real winner, that one. (He got all mopey and apologetic when I failed to be impressed and was instead saddened by his tales. But that’s hardly a credit to him.)

Anyway. So. Hi. It’s been a long fucking time. I’m in a different place now, physically, emotionally, spiritually. But I’m here. I’m okay. And I’m actually fucking happy.

So.

Hi.

And C is for suck it, Ezekiel. I finally wrote again. Now, piss off.

 

Gingers and Math Professors and Bhagavad Gita, Oh My.

Y’all. Something is up with Oregon. I mean aside from triple-decker man buns, obsessions with microbrews and whiskey, and wannabe hipster bro-boys. I’m talking about the ridiculously high ratio of gingers to the rest of the population. At least, I mean that’s at least a thing in the dating pool. Not that I’m complaining; some of these gingers are smokin’ fuckin’ hot. (Uhm. Maybe most of them. Which is weird, because as an aesthetic, I was never interested in gingers. I mean, I’ve always been a fan of ginger flavor – ginger beer, ginger snaps. But ginger boys? Too…pale. Oregon is changing my mind.)

If you stacked all of my dates up on a weirdass live human bar chart, the tallest bar would be gingers, by far. (This is not intentional.) At one point, I may or may not have been casually dating three gingers at once. One of them was pretty simple, but funny and wild as hell. Another of them was a super country libertarian boy (yeah, I passed pretty hard and fast on that one). The third was fucking brilliant – this weird dichotomy of former military and current anarcho-philosopher turned psychotherapist with a fucking PhD. Oh…was he yummy. Lemme tell ya… Too bad he was emotionally inaccessible and a bit of a sociopath.

Last night, I had a date with yet another ginger. A math professor. Yep. Another weilder of a PhD. (No, stop picturing a 65 year old in a tweed blazer with elbow patches. Fuck, I just planted that image, didn’t I? Stop picturing it!) Shy and awkward over text. Funny, witty, and deep in person. In between covertly checking him out (holy shit – since when do nerdy geek boys lift??) and getting coached on how to play pool, I was alternately laughing my ass off and diving off into deep conversations about math, the universe, string theory, self, other, the Bhagavad Gita, and Eastern Philosophy. With wild fucking abandon. Yeah, that’s the kind of thing that rocks my socks.

We did a bar crawl – my first ever, I think – and drank. A lot. Well, my a lot is just a little compared to seasoned drinkers. I don’t drink often. So, the two jumbo-sized ciders and the sangria had me in orbit. (Oregon makes sangria with wine AND tequila, y’all, at least at rooftop bars in college towns. My name is Stephanie, and I approve this message. (That fucker also came in an oversized, don’t think you can call that a pint glass anymore, pint glass.)) I wasn’t wasted – those three drinks were spread over about three hours – but boy, I got spirited and (only slightly) wobbly.

We walked it off, then looked at the stars. Man, there’s so much less light pollution in that little town than where I live. It was glorious. We listened to Irish folk music and Ravi Shankar and had the deepest conversation I’ve had in ages, punctuated with sass and smartassery, crude jokes, and ribald laughter.

It was incredible.

That charming, brilliant, Irish bastard.

And it’s almost a 100% certainty that I’ll never see him again.

Why? Because out of this abundance of gingers, only one of them has been interested in more than a single date (see simple but wild boy – and he’s not in it to win it, either). And it seems the smarter and more philosophically inclined they are – ginger or not, but especially the gingers – the less likely they are to be interested in anything even remotely serious.

Unfortunately, what dating is teaching me is that my interests border on the fucking unattainable. If the guy isn’t a deep thinker, I’m not interested. If the guy can’t banter, I’m not interested. If we can’t talk until 4 in the morning (yep, last night was a late one) about anything and everything, with no filter, I’m not interested. If we can’t enjoy comfortable silences, I’m not interested. If all conversation is all about him, I’m not interested. If all conversation is all about me, I’m not interested. If conversations are about things or people, I’m not interested. If conversations aren’t about ideas and thoughts and philosophies and weird little eccentricities of self and universe, I’m not interested. If I’m not laughing until I’m doubled over in pain, I’m not interested. If he isn’t a little….wild, rough around the edges, I’m not interested. And every. Single. Motherfucker. That I’ve met that has those qualities – the ones I AM interested in, are “ethically non-monogamous” or “polyamorous” (welcome to fucking Oregon) or strictly interested in an “FWB” or “NSA” situation (yeah, I’m learning a lot of fucking acronyms lately).

And it feels strangely like the longer this carries on, the less interested *I* am in something long-term and serious. Sometimes I think I’m *too* fucking adaptable, because I don’t want to compromise my personal convictions, the ones I have just for me. But at the same time, I don’t want to go back to being a complete and utter hermit, either, afraid of the opposite sex and what they do or don’t want from me.

Dating is nice. But it’s also terrible and unpredictable and scary. And I’m fucking sick of it. And also wish I had one tonight. (Oh wait, I did. But after the stellar night with the Jacked and Ginger Buddha, there’s no way I could meet this other guy. It would have been a soul-sucking exercise in tedium. So I canceled.)

See. If I don’t even know what the fuck I want, how can I expect others to know what they want? I mean. Every time someone does want something serious with me, I’m the one that’s not interested. I “don’t feel a connection,” or something on that laundry list of elusive but critical qualities is missing. I’ve totally ditched boys for lack of banter. And I just ditched one for lack of depth/connection. I don’t wanna talk about tv shows and YouTube political commentators all the damn time. I wanna talk about Plato and Buddhism and Experiencers/Enlightenment. Fuck those fucking gingers for dangling that fucking carrot and running off because they wanna be deep…with a shallow girl.

Fuck those fuckers for making me think it’s possible, because there’s no way in fuck I can settle now. I know what’s out there. I’ve known it for a long time, and I’m just getting it reinforced now and then. (Don’t get me wrong, most of the people I’ve been on dates with are horrible. I have some horror stories to share with you people! But sometimes…the veil is parted, and I get a glimpse of what could be. And I know…fucking. I know, I’m not digging too deep or searching for something imfuckingpossible.) So fuck those guys…and thank those guys.

Fucking gingers.