Rick F*cking Perry

I’ve never been one to write anything. Political, that is. I’ve never been one to write anything political. I’m not too into politics. Half the time it seems hopeless, and the other half of the time you find someone and/or something that gives you some hope, and you realize just how powerless that one person and/or idea is to actually do anything. Watching Rick Perry’s campaign video titled “Strong” pissed me off, though. Enough to actually sit down and write something. Offending line (portion):

“There is something wrong with our country when gays can openly serve in the military”

And then he goes on to talk about how he’ll end Obama’s attack on religion, and how faith is what made this country great. Typical GOP-type blabber, nothing new.

I’m probably not typical as a gay man because I can accept when someone says they think homosexuality is a sin. If through whatever causal chain that results in humans having principles and beliefs that’s what they’ve arrived at, I’ll accept it. I would never expect to change his or her mind with words any more than someone would expect to change my mind about the existence of God.

But if this is what makes you vote for someone, if this issue is really what pushes your buttons and gives you enough energy to cram yourself into a booth and push a button next to Rick Perry’s name, I have a question for you.

What’s your deal?

Observe this chart of national issues that I’ve prepared:

Actual Problems	Rick Perry’s Problem
Stagnating growth in GDP	GAYS IN MILITARY
National Debt Surpassing 100% of GDP
8.6% unemployment
Global Warming
Natural Disasters at Home and Abroad
Income Inequality
The Cost of Higher Education
Health Coverage (through whatever means) for Everyone
Underfunded scientific research institutions
A Waning Space Program
Natural Resource Depletion
Waste Disposal
Impending Fresh Water Shortages
International Trade Imbalance
Allies and Friends in Europe in Trouble
Inappropriate handling of China’s rise by the US Government
People that think it’s okay to shorten words to like “are” to one  letter…..OK, personal problem.

I know, right? And it’s not like that would be the entire focus of his presidency (knock on wood) but still…. you’d rather make it the focus of your campaign to smear the desire and willingness of LGBT people to serve openly in the military than address any of those other issues? You suck. And I rarely say that about politicians.

I recognize that the actual issues I listed have real solutions given by members of both parties. No matter what they are, I respect them putting forth an actual problem, and an actual solution. Not pulling something out of their ass that we all know is going to be a non-issue in 100 years (50 years?).

So please, be smart when you vote. And remember, Presidents don’t write laws. Congress does. Don’t forget to make an informed voting choice for your state senators and house representatives. 

Title III

"I suddenly had a desire for something of my own, of my own doing; my own creation that I could grasp, hold, and cling to. Something that I could hold on to because I had made it, me alone and no one else. It would be the product of my own choices and my own resources, and it would be mine."

Stomach Lump

1. Chicken Tortilla Soup II
2. Burberry Cologne
3. Starbucks
4. Burning Leaves
5. The thought of winter
6. The Meijer Parking Lot
7. Suburban Silence
8. Swan Diving
9. The Smell of Fresh Laundry
10. Nebraska

Winding Road

Being back at work is better.

People like me, and the phrase "Sam can do it" is widespread. I try to make myself irreplaceable. I think at work it works, it just never has in relationships.

I am down to 15mg of temazepam a night with an end in sight to another dependence I don't need. I'd rather sleep less.

Gnocchi, sauteed in butter till crisp, with Pesto Rosso is delicious in all countries.

I work 50-70 hours a week. And then when I come home I work some more. I love it.

I am making friends.

Life is good, and I can stick this out.

What's In a Name?

I don't think I've ever been more fascinated by names than I have been since moving to China. While there's more often than not a distinction between what is a "name" in English and what is a "word", in Chinese, at least from an outside perspective, there is much less of a difference. In English a name usually doesn't have a direct meaning, primarily because it was derived from a language other than English. Obviously exceptions exist, most notably those among us lucky enough to have been named after a virtue (Chastity? Verity? Patience? all women, of course). Generally, though, we are able to distinguish and we look at the text "Richard" and think "male person" and look at "queen" and think "royalty" (or "drag").

Rarely when we look at names do we think of meaning. I don't think of my own name "Samuel" and think "Oh, derived from Shemu'el, Hebrew for 'name of God' or 'God has heard'". However much I may appreciate the meaning of my name or the situation that called my Mom to choose it for me, it's not the first thing that comes to mind.

My Chinese name, on the other hand,  is a different story. I have a two-character name (most surnames are a single character and given names are one or two characters). It was given to me by my Chinese professor at North Central. We were given the option of an artfully transliterated name that sounded like our English name, or a new name entirely. I thought of the process like a birth, and opted for a new name entirely.

My name is 林風 (Lin Feng)，translated directly the first character means "woods", and the second character means "wind". Overall it comes off as something akin to "the wind going through the woods". When I see my name written, I see "woods", and I see "wind", and the name has meaning to me, and a meaning that I like, at that.

The names of my coworkers are no different. There's 刘天明 (Liu Tian Ming), for example, who sits behind me. Her last name Liu means "to see", a fairly common last name. Her first name Tian Ming (literally "heaven/sky and bright put together) means daybreak, or dawn. I can't help but wonder if their name is just a name to them, or if this meaning is embedded into it since all three of those characters appear frequently in what's read on a daily basis.

What's even more interesting to me is the names that Chinese people often choose for themselves in English. More often than not they pick a common name (Jessie, Jack, Eileen, John, James) that they like the sound of and go with it. Sometimes, they choose a name they like the meaning of. The coworker I mentioned earlier's English name is Ivy, chosen particularly for the plant. Another consultant who works here chose Apple as her name. Perhaps my favorite, though, is the consultant who sits across from me, Seven. I think I might actually have to name my first child after a number. Five or Six if it's a boy. Seven if it's a girl.

So, in short, go look up your name. It might mean something fun.

Time to Think

This is my living room. In the last week I've had off (for the national holiday) I've had quite a lot of time to stare at it, sit in it, rearrange it, and photograph it. 

"Sometimes I think Sam could convince God of anything" - Mary S., a therapist I had my freshman year of high school.

Well that might not be true (and may actually be blasphemous, especially coming from a Christian counselor) it is true that I can convince myself of just about anything. I'm good at fabricating a reality based on some idea I've had too much time to think about. Those realities have taken a number of forms: I need to major in something different, I need to take up a certain hobby, I'm in love with such and such person....I could go on and on.

I can't possibly convey the negative effect of having an empty week in which to ponder and "fabricate" has had, and now the reality I've created seems to be one that's screaming what am I doing here?

It's a fairly typical Sam reaction to a situation: take an offer for an internship, get offered a job based on that internship, tentatively accept the job in reaction to some semblance of security that it offers....

....and then scrutinize the hell out of it. 

Maybe the grass is just greener on the other side of the Pacific (in fact, I'm pretty sure it is greener), maybe I miss Amy, and Lauren, and Jayme, and Jaysin, and the jobs that I had where I knew what I was doing and took comfort in the fact that the lack of any chance for advancement meant that I was already on top and there was nothing else I had to learn. 

Someone once said I was negative, or more of a "glass half-empty" type of person. It hurt to hear it, but I have to acknowledge the truth in it. I just wish for once I could be a little more positive, a little more upbeat. I really hate facing that I'm just not that happy of a person, and I probably won't ever be, and there are a lot of things I would never have learned if I were an optimistic person. 

So, I'll eat the bitterness, and see what happens at work on Monday. 

I am ***. Or at least I was.

Last week was the company off-site trip to 千岛湖 (Thousand Island Lake), where I learned the Chinese version of Truth or Dare with my coworkers. The game starts as a card game of anyone's choosing (in this case, black jack). The loser has to choose either truth or challenge (dare). I lost once (because I'm no good gambler) and of course picked truth, being wary of what the Chinese version of a dare could possibly be.

The Question: "How many girlfriends have you had?"
My Answer: "One. When I was in 7th grade. We dated for three weeks".
Seven's (a consultant) response: "Hmm......do you have a secret?" Literally: "好像林风有个秘密!"

Well, yes and no. It's not a secret. But is it a secret by omission of details I normally would put forward immediately? Am I lying? I quite purposefully put "President of NCC LGBT Student Association" on my resume so who I was would be quite clear to any potential employer. If it's an employer that has a problem with it, I don't want the job.

These people haven't seen my resume. They have no reason to believe I'm gay, so far, and I have no idea if I can tell them or not. This is 8th grade all over again, and I really don't feel like coming out of the closet all over again.

Quotes of the Week

"It's called 水土病，you know, water and umm...dirt...sickness."

"You feel better? You look better! You're the correct color today."

Jessie: "Want to go to the adidas sales meeting with us tomorrow?"
Me: "Sure. Will I have to say much or prepare anything?"
J: "No, we just need your face."

James: "Lunch?? We're doing DiShuiDong again."
Me: "No, I'm skipping today. I'm going to go to Costa and get coffee."
James: "So you're not Chinese after all."

Me: "I'm in charge of it? I was under the impression I was just assisting you."
J: "You ARE assisting me. I'm putting you in charge of it. "

Me: "There's no SIM card slot on this phone I just bought. Can you not use one?"
E: "Let me see....Sam this isn't a phone."
Me: "....shit."

Me: "I would say my biggest problem is needing to know everything. Like, in a friendship or relationship I have a compulsive need to know exactly what's going on. I've learned to let go a little, though."
Mike: "That's your flaw? Fine. Here you go. I had a wonderful time. I would consider this a date, and a good one at that. I will be calling you again soon to hang out, and most likely texting you tomorrow. Anything else you want to know?"*

*After seeing my first movie theater movie in China, ever! Chinese people don't laugh at the same parts of Source Code as I do, nor did they appreciate my, or Mike's, commentary on the Chicago skyline.

晚安

Walked through People's Square, through the lights of the Nanjing Pedestrian Mall, under lane after lane of elevated highway across a deserted intersection, and into my bed to sleep. 

It's a beautiful night in Shanghai.

Dreams

1. I was driving into Naperville with David. Jayme called, and then put me on hold for hours. Then he finally picked up and kept asking "where have you been? I've been waiting for you." I got into the post office we were going into, and the entire class of 2011 came streaming in, and there was someone at the counter I didn't expected to see, who just stared at me, and looked older than he should have.

2. I kept walking by Zazu over and over again. I don't know why I wasn't in Naperville. And Zazu wasn't a hair salon, it was a video store. Jayme came out kept asking what was taking me so long.

My Mom told me one about how emotionally frustrated she was when we initially moved to Singapore, since all of her dreams were still in the US. She got a huge sense of relief when she finally had a dream about Singapore. Maybe that's what's happening. Or I need to lay off the temazepam.

Reflections at Two Weeks

It's been two weeks of work, and one week of being alone up in some high rise in downtown Shanghai. Observations thus far:

-It's not an art gallery. But it is. Every job seems to be more or less the same thing. There are tasks A, B, and C. You don't know how to do A, and B, but you can do C quickly and learn how to do A, B in enough time to make it look like you knew how to do them anyways. Then you repeat the next day, until you've worked your way through the entire alphabet of tasks and you're doing the same thing over and over again. Well, I can only assume that's what ends up happening. Maybe that's what people are talking about when they refer to a boring, horrible 9 to 5 to life. 

-On the other hand, it's not boring at all. And in any given job there's an endless amount to learn whether you're looking at A) the distribution channels of handbags through an Asian distribution center B) Dealer management software being sold to auto OEMs in China or C) Dealing with your coworkers that have begun whispering upon learning just how much of their Chinese you can understand. 

-I feel more comfortable living in a high rise than I do on the ground floor.

-I think I walk faster than everyone in this entire country. 

-I think I was meant to dress for work and not for play.

-I forgot how many random people you meet here.  Coffee on the river front with a Croatian who came originally to work a booth at the Expo, went on a hair product mission with a cool coworker, went to two really weird gay clubs and picked up random people along the way (featuring drag queens performing to Lady Gaga, good to know she's everywhere), and more. 

-Ke$ha sounds good in every country. 

-Supply chain analysis, market strategy, distribution, and logistics are probably not my favorite things in the world. But, they're a welcome diversion. 

City lights don't keep me up at night

For a bedroom view, I could do worse.

上海

两天，十二个小时。

海内存知己，天涯若比邻。

A dear friend across an ocean makes the ends of the earth seem near.

mood

On days like today I feel joy welling up from my bones and a tingle on my skin.

And I wouldn't trade who I am for anything.

I'm going to put you in a place where I'll never find you again.

Judah

"如果我学到了一丝一毫的好脾气，如果我学到了一点点待人​接物的和气，如果我能宽恕人，体浪人，我都得感谢我的慈​母."
"If I learned a little bit of good temper, if I learned a little bit about how to receive guests and deal with situations with good nature, if I’m able to forgive, excuse, and show understanding to others, I owe gratitude to my kind mother."

Yalom

"Are you satisfied with the world you have created? This is what you do to others, to others' opinions of you, and to your opinion of yourself--are you satisfied with your actions?"

"There is another source of anxiety in responsibility. If you become aware that you are responsible for your current life predicaments, you also veer close to appreciating the extent to which you have been responsible for the course of your past lives as well. For many this awareness incurs considerable pain: as one looks back on the wreckage of one's life, upon all one's unfulfilled potential, all of the possibilities never examined or taken, then one becomes flooded with guilt--not guilt in the traditional sense, which is related to what you have done to others, but guilt from an existential sense, which refers to what you have done to your own life."

There is no need to relay the troubles in your previous relationships to your next partner. There is no need to expound on all of your past lovers' misdeeds and why the relationship had to come to an end. Eventually you will revert to your own pathologies and your own maladaptive behaviors that had their own part in causing the relationship to end in the first place. That will be explanation enough in and of itself.

Breath

I still lose my breath and my heart still pounds sometimes with those certain triggers, and I can't explain how it can possibly still have that effect on me but it does. In any case I put the patch on and refocus on where I am now and move on because there isn't any direction left to go but forward.

Psychiatry

"I'm depressed."
Mirtazapine, 30mg daily at bedtime.
"I'm good. I'm just a little more agitated then normal."
Risperidone, 1mg daily.
"I'm anxious. My thoughts are racing."
Alprazolam, 4mg extended release daily.
"I can't sleep."
Temazepam, 30mg daily at bedtime.
"I have horrible mood swings. I feel unstable."
Oxcarbazepine, 500mg three times daily.
"I can't wake up in the morning."
Modafinil, 200mg daily upon waking.
"I can't focus."
Atomoxetine, 50mg daily.

"I'm fine".
Leave.

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The Door

He looked at the doorway. It was shut, and the frame had held sturdy despite the poor condition of the door itself. Cracks ran up and down the solid wood where an axe had been taken to a material, but the door showed no signs of giving way under the force he had applied to it over the last two months.

He recalled being inside the room behind the door. He knew the smells and the tastes and the sounds, he knew and remembered the unpleasant things found behind the door clearly, sometimes more clearly than the things that gave him joy to think about. But over time the memories of the good and the bad had become garbled and mixed into a muck of something bittersweet, something that if you dared put to your lips must taste like remorse and regret, something you could only keep in your mouth momentarily before you either had to spit it out our swallow it whole. Every night he ate of the muck and spit out or swallowed as he could, depending on the day. What was swallowed was washed down with tears.

Every so often he found himself able to walk away from the door. Each night he lay in a corner not too far off from where it was, took as he was told from two jars and lay down to sleep, being able to think of other doors and other memories or nothing at all for a short while. He often dreamt of the door and what was behind it, and then woke up in a haze, feeling called back to stand and stare at it.

No amount of pounding, screaming, or begging, or crying would open the door. A hurtful and powerful axe could not even crack through the wood of the door to the other side where the room was found. Small notes slipped under it did nothing, and he wondered if he had perhaps written them incorrectly, or if perhaps his other attempts involving more force had undermined his more meek and apologetic attempts. He became confused, and would have moments of regretting everything and giving up, leaving the door for a time.

He missed what was behind that worn out door, but didn't even understand what he wanted from the door being opened again. Something had changed, something had broken, something had been left unresolved by the shutting of the door. Some amount of insanity was found outside the door where he was all by himself and alone. He turned to problems, inadequacies, and worries for comfort and solace.

Instead of looking away from the door he found himself only able to look inward for the items he had left in the room behind the door, or any other rooms behind many other doors. He found nothing.

He knew his life would go on and would soon be farther from the door physically, but wondered how often he would think of it, how often it would trouble his heart, knowing that the shut door existed somewhere. He wondered how often he would remember who shut the door.

He had shut it. He had slammed it repeatedly until the frame could not bear the pressure anymore. The person inside the door saw this and quickly allowed the door to be shut. And kept it shut.

It might not be a mystery why the door is shut to any other person who wanders upon him, standing in front of the doorway. But it remains a mystery to him, himself.

He decided to at least not be angry and to just stand by the door. To make some sort of good gesture, even though he feared all of his misaligned strategies from the previous months would be remembered with clarity.

Every so often, with his ear pressed against the wood, faint noises were heard. Not loud enough to understand or interpret, the noises gave only anger instead of comfort. With each whisper heard behind the door he was torn between running or staying and pounding even louder than before.

He wanted to slip another small note under the door, reading something like "I'll be waiting".
He wanted to just knock on the door, but he is afraid.

He is afraid, and still hurt, and still tries not to be angry, though unsuccessfully. He still is these things, and he still takes as he's told from the two jars, and he is still waiting.

Waiting in front of the door.

Break

Option 1
Consider that the event did not take place and treat it as faulty occurrence in memory, a mistaken dream/nightmare. This works fairly well, as the nature of the "memory", given the mental state, bears a striking resemblance to a dream. The event itself, having only occurred on a screen, has a built-in separation from what is currently accepted as reality. One should ignore all evidence of the event's grounding in reality and make no attempt to re-crystallize the event. This option concedes a break with reality, but minimizes trauma.

Option 2
Consider that the event took place in currently accepted reality.

Subroute A
Deny the event's relevance to the self. Insist that the event has no bearing on one's own experience or trajectory in life. Further minimizes trauma if executed successfully. Expect difficulties.

Subroute B
Accept full existence and relevance of the event to the self, and choose to affirm the event's reflective nature of the self and its worth. Potentially maximizes trauma.


Option 2: Subroute B is the least successful course of action though often the easiest. Should it be pursued, one should be cautious. If the self finds itself unable to adapt to the implications (whether true or invented) of the event, it may find itself more prone to panic, paranoia, and depression.

Dirty Western Men and Tattered Tan Paper

I was standing in a hallway in Goldspohn, upstairs. The walls were stucco, and the building was done like a Spanish mission. A dirty, angry, foul-mouthed man out of an old Western movie stood next to me, roaming the hallway, guarding me. He was missing teeth, his face was covered in mud. He hobbled on a gimp leg and dressed all in black. Hair was missing from his scalp and he attempted to cover it up with a hat. He was emaciated, weak, and angry.

I heard you approaching by your boots. The boots I'll always remember. I heard you clomping down the hallway and I turned the corner I was leaning against and quickly jerked my head back when I saw your face, avoiding eye contact like I had been for the last month.

The dirty, foul-mouthed man that was full of hate came and stood next to me, holding his body right at my side, touching my shoulder. He blocked your path down the hallway and something you were carrying got caught in him.

"Please don't...you'll rip it. I don't want you to rip it. It's a project; it's important to me," you said as what you were carrying got caught in his arms and legs.

You stopped after he moved aside, as if you had something to say to me. Tears started falling from your eyes; you couldn't stop.

I pulled you into a nearby stairwell and before I could ask you what was wrong you embraced me, held on to me, and cried into my shoulder. Your tears were staining and soaking the shoulder of my shirt. I kept holding on, trying to ask you what was wrong.

You released me, faced me, and gave me what you had been carrying, the object that the man with me was trying to ruin. It was everything. It was a diagram, a model, a poster, a card, a letter. It was everything that I loved and valued. It was all of me and everything that I was and wanted to be, everything that I tried to be for everyone, every expectation and goal for myself that I could never live up to. It was all of this on a piece of crumpled tan paper that the man had tried to ruin when you got caught in him in the hallway. You had somehow made it for me, and you were going to give it to me. It was going to be a gift.

The man was gone. He hadn't followed us into the stairwell and it was so much easier to not be angry when he wasn't there. It was so much easier to not feel hateful when he wasn't there guarding me, roaming around me, covered in dirt and screaming obscenities at the injustices he had faced over the years.

When I woke up, it was harder to be angry. In losing that anger, I fear I'll lose any protection, any shield, any defense that I might have gained. That anger and that vile tongue has always been my defense. It has always been roaming around me and attempting to protect me.

My Mother

That was probably the best letter I've gotten in a while; it was touching, really, on a lot of levels. My mom and I are more or less the same person but a world apart. She had written me a letter after I spoke with her very briefly about a relationship that ended back in December and my current feelings about what had happened. In the letter, she detailed almost the exact same situation that she had been through, and it was so wonderfully put that I needed to put it up here.


"Well, that sent me into a deep nosedive. I absolutely plummeted into despair and discouragement. It was one thing to end the relationship and to lose him in general. I must have had some fantasy that he would change and become a Christian and we’d get married. What a laugh. But it was another thing altogether to lose that fantasy and to have to starkly face the reality that this was really, really over, and this guy was going to get married and have children, and I was alone. He had chosen someone else, not me.

I can’t tell you how much I hated him. I had never hated anyone like that before, and never since. I felt used, shriveled, worthless, not good enough, and like I was just dying and wasting away. I have poetry from that time (well, maybe I threw it away at some point – I don’t really know) that I actually got college credit for. I felt lost and alone – robbed and beaten and left bleeding. I didn’t feel like the person I was, was even me. I felt like my personhood had been totally given away to this man, and now I was left with nothing. Empty.

Part of the awfulness was that I still felt such strong emotions of love for ed – crazy as that probably sounds. So to try to get over that, I focused all my energy on just hating him for all I was worth. I told myself things that were hateful about him in order to try to push out any feelings of love and desire for him.

Meanwhile, I’m still trying to pursue my relationship with God, which for me (as you know!) often comes in the form of books. So I went to this Christian bookstore, the mustard seed, kind of close to my house, and searched around for something that might help me feel better. I found a book called “healing life’s hurts” by matthew and dennis linn – two catholic priests (or maybe Episcopalian?). I thought, well, maybe that will help me, cuz I am hurt like crazy.

The bottom line of the book was that we need to forgive in order to be healed from all the things that have hurt us. Of course with lots of explanation about how and why! So I realized that this was what I needed to do – that holding on to hate was not going to help me accept the situation and move forward. And the hating thing wasn’t really working for me ….

I don’t remember all of the process I went thru, but I do very specifically remember one day, standing in my bedroom which had a big window overlooking the parking lot (this was in my Wrightwood apartment just west of Clark St.), looking outside, and telling God that I knew I had to, but I just couldn’t forgive Ed because I knew enough about forgiveness from what I’d read and how I’d been brought up, that a person has to hold a certain amount of love for someone in order to forgive. I knew that God forgave me out of great love – and only because of his great love. I knew that forgiveness could not be born out of intense hatred. So I told God, “I can’t forgive him because if I let myself love Ed, I will do something really stupid – I don’t trust myself to love him or like him at all.” And I heard God speak to me in one of the clearest ways I’ve ever heard him, and he said “You will not be loving him out of your own heart, but you will love him through me. It’s not your own love, but my love.” "

-Glenna Ganster

I don't know if i'm there yet. There are days when it's okay and then there are days when I just want what's best for him and then there are days that I hate him and dread to walk by him. It doesn't make much sense, seeing as it was a relatively short term thing. I wish I could write the pages upon pages it would take to describe why it was hurtful, or why Zachary was hurtful. Maybe some day I will write those pages and learn something from them. And I hope that those pages include my own part, in each of these stories that exist, because we all played our parts. We are fools, even the most well intentioned loving, caring, genuine people.

Until then, I will remain somewhat a mess, and allow Jayme into that mess. And hopefully he allows me in to his.

[Title III]

1. He wore Burberry. I recognized the smell.
2. He talked a lot.
3. He was more nervous than I was.
4. Over-sharing: I think I'm okay with it 50% of the time.
5. We know all the same people, for some reason.

All the shit's on the table. Let's go.
I have been having the most ridiculous weekends.

DSPS

REM Latency: Significantly above normal.
REM Duration: Reduced at 8% of total sleep.
Stage N2 and N3 sleep increased.

Diagnosis: Dysfunctions associated with sleep stages; circadian rhythm disorder.

On the upside, it's nice to discover one of those artists you'll enjoy forever.

[Title]

Do you ever wonder how abusive parents/spouses/lovers feel when and if they find out what they are and what they do?

Exchanges

"What a terrible mistake to let go of something wonderful for something real."
-Miranda July, "No One Belongs Here More Than You"

This is so often interpreted as being about letting go of something that you deserve, settling for something less than what you could have.

It's not a mistake; it's growing up. To let go of something wonderful for something real implies what you had that was wonderful wasn't even real, no matter how bad you wanted it to be. You can search for something wonderful your whole life, and you won't find it. You only have to look in front of you to find something real.

On May 1st, 2011, I will acknowledge that this is my real life. It is not always wonderful, and the people in it are not perfect. I'm going to live it.
___________________________________

"Thank you for your honesty."

You're very welcome, sir.

20/20

I see things a little more clearly every day as being better and feeling peaceful and at rest returns, slowly. I see the things that I did wrong, and I see the things I could have done differently. I re-read poems, and they mean a little more to me; I see how I distorted meaning and twisted what I was doing, but I don't really know what to do about that now. There's no conversation to have about it except for the one that I have with myself on a daily basis, the one that I let spill over onto this blog. It's already done, and there's really no apology to make.

There are apologies, though, and not the ones you would think. I'm sorry I knew things that I shouldn't have and violated your privacy to find them out, but I'm sorry that you hid them. Not in an angry way, more so in a I-wish-you-didn't-have-to-hide-those-things-because-I-should-have-been-the-kind-of-friend-that-you-could-talk-to-about-those-things type of way.

I think of new things to apologize for every day. I'm good at finding fault in myself and apologizing...after the fact. That's always been a problem of mine: I learn too late.

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This is really public. It's a good thing no one reads it.

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