Questions made it that much more

I can't stop thinking about last night. It was scary, wonderful, embarrassing, passionate, and completely unforgettable. 

To know of another person that has an equal understanding of the mind and body is a rare phenomenon. I am usually the dare devil in such situations. I bring the requests, the knowledge, and the attack but not anymore. 

I love the questions. The questions are what made the night. It was not the way the questions were asked or the content of the questions that aroused my senses. It was the assumption that questions should be asked during such an occasion which made the night that much more enjoyable.

If I close my eyes and think hard enough about the night, I swear I can still hear the questions being asked, how the questions made my mind race, and how my body trembled at the end of each sentence.

I wish and hope to engage in this extraordinary experience again. Maybe it will happen again tomorrow, in a week, in a month or two... I just hope that this was not the last.

Failure

I guess things never work out like you want them to. I hope for a lot of things over the past few months. But nothing came from my wanting, hard work, and devotion. All except the tears of disappointment, grief, and heartache.

I can say that I really tried this time. I can also say that maybe, just maybe, the failure was not entirely my fault. Well, that is just me and my wishful thinking. In a utopian society nothing would be a consequence of our own demise. We would be without consequence and could then fail at everything without judgement or repercussions. 

I feel like a failure though. I failed at home for wanting to leave my family and begin a new life for myself. I feel like I failed my mentor for not being a top notch published ass talker. Even thought these two are family and career driven the final failure is what burns the most... I feel like I have failed at love. I am never one to search for it, to desire it, or to welcome it when it approaches. I usually stop all glimpses of attraction, desire, and future romantic interludes in their tracks before they reach me. I am safer this way. But this time I decided to give it a chance because I thought I found a nice guy.

I cannot believe I actually thought that it might work. I even slipped into some of my old habits that I promised myself I would never do for a man. I actually drank alcohol, acted like I knew what baseball was all about, and conformed to society's image of attractiveness. I really tried but maybe all that trying freaked him out. 

But I was freaked out too. I could not stand his sarcasm and mood swings. One minute he would be nice and the next minute he would be rude and mean all while blaming it on his sarcasm. I have never been good with sarcasm and probably will never be good at reading it or delivering it. I guess that is one strike against me in his book. I still remember him saying he believes in a two strike and you are out policy. I guess the lack of emotion I have received from him over he past few weeks means that my second strike has occured and now I am out of the ballgame. 

I guess I should be glad that I did not get too attached. I was really starting to like him when he started to become distant. I thought it was me and my lack of dating experience. But the more I think about it, he was very dense when it comes to courting a woman. I remember flowers use to be a thing a man brought a woman when he picked her up. I remember affection in public was appropriate too. But now, there are no flowers and now no hand holding in public. When did hand holding become too much PDA. WTF? Am I getting to old for this shit or am I just a hopeless romantic that yearns for a Prince Charming to come and sweep me off my feet. Or do I have too high of expectations for the men of 2013. It is not like I was dating a nieve boy, he was a grown man for god sake. He is in his forties and he said he was engaged at one time, so I would expect that he would know how to treat a woman... Or was that disengagement a sign for me to pick up on.... Damn. 

Yes, I am assuming that most of what went wrong had to do with him. I would love to live in that utopian society but unfortunately I don't. So maybe I pestered him too much. Maybe we went out on too many dates to soon. Or maybe he just did not find my personality or physical appearance attractive. 

I do know but i do know I did try. I was the first one who ask for his number, to initiate the hand holding, and lean in for the kiss. 

But that was all for nothing and I doubt I will put myself out there again. There is nothing but heartache, embarrassment, and tears for this woman and I hate all three.

Friends

Friend. I often wonder what this term really means. People fall in and out of friendships all the time. I know I have. I have had best friends, close friends, boy friends and girl friends. Some of these friendships have lasted for years while other were over with a blink of an eye. 

Let us look at one of my close friends. This friend has been in my life for many years but the friendship has grown apart. We have grown apart. This friend has hurt my feelings, slept with one of my past partners, and still comes to me during times of need. This friend does not sound like a close friend from this description. However, the longevity of the friendship is what keeps the friendship going. That is all. I no longer confide my deepest feelings nor do I disclose my romantic feelings about others. I guess I have trust issues that stem back to the earlier tiffs in our friendship. But I still feel compelled to talk to her when she is around and in ask her to any social gatherings I set up. It seems to be the decent thing to do.

On the other hand, I have a friend that I often hope would be more than a friend. The more we hang out, the more my friendship fades into a pool of desire for physical contact and emotional belonging. I hope with each new friendly outing we would eventually become more than friends... but I now know that we will never be more than friends. I have to push away and ignore any future feelings just so that we can still be friends. It is not an easy thing to do. I feel a stong attachment to my friend. I get jealous when I hear about thier escapades with others. I never usually get jealous of such things but this friend has caught me, hook line and sinker, but does not realize it.

Strange to think that I have more of an emotional attachment with my friend versus my close friend. Who would have thought that as a close friendship disintegrates another one festers and boils over.  

Safe undesirable solitude

Are we creatures of solitude or partnership? Most of the time I feel like a life of solitude would be perfect. No pain, no struggles, no need to worry about anyone but myself. But a glimps of the alternative peeks through the curtain. I am intrigued by the notion of caring for another. With this caring comes sharing and I give it whole heartily without judgement or worry. I free fall into the dream of a partnership and hope I never hit bottom. 

Then I see the bottom. It looks scary. I am not sure how far away the bottom is or how fast I am falling. I begin to wonder if I will bounce, go splat, or wake up upon impact.

I feel like I am in a dream. Not a good dream or nightmare but something inbetween. I start off scared. Unsure of what is happening and how I will begin. I am searching through a crowd for a familiar face. Then I hear my name and turn to find a hand that welcomes my hand into his. I feel a hand and a tug on the small of my back that pulls me in closer. A sweet gentle kiss is placed on my cheek and then on my lips. Then my body runs cold. The familiar face turns away and my hand is released with a violent shake.

I turn my head and begin my search for the once familiar face but every face in the crowd is cold and distant. I have no sense of direction. No idea where I am. The room is going dark. I begin to push aside the shadowy bodies in the crowd. It is getting harder to push aside the bodies. I feel like I am never going to find my way out. The air becomes thin and I begin gasping for breath. I fall to the ground but continue to fall through the floor. Nothing breaks. Nothing shattered. I just start falling when my body collapsed. There is a shimmering light source below me. It is getting closer, closer, closer....

I am then standing in front of a door. I have a key in my hand and place the key into the locked door. I turn the key. The door opens and there is the familiar face. I feel safe again. I walk through the door. I then wake up and try to recall what the familiar face looks like.

My natural comfortable feelings towards solitude are gone. They are no longer natural. I yearn for the other. I desire the other. I want the physical and the emotional attachments of partnership. My heart aches for it and I feel suffocated by the desires and emotions for another.

Yet, it never works out. While in the real world, I offer my hand, my lips, and my heart to the familiar faces in the crowd. I find a single face to share my yearnings with but nothing transpires. I feel the pressing of lips onto mine. I even feel the tug at my back to draw me in and close. My heart beats so hard I am afraid the face will see the pounding my chest. My body begins to warm and a sexual desire builds inside me. Then there is no response. My emotions are ignored and the once familiar face walks away with no response to my desires.

My heart breaks and I begin to cry. "Why did I let his happen to myself? Why did I think this would work?" The desire for solitude blankets my bruised emotional heart. I start to fight back the tears until I will the tears to stop falling. I take a deep breath. I breath again... and again. I then pull down back the curtain and walk in. I am once again alone. Solitude is safe. Noone can hurt me here.

I (don't) miss you.

I miss you.

Your face, your smile, your sweet embrace.

I miss you.

I miss the sound of your voice,

But not the choices you once took from me.

Not the words you yelled at me.

Not the nights of vulgarities you once whispered in my ear.

I don't miss you.

You once said I was your love and you would be there to protect me... I miss you.

But not the fists to the walls and the kicking to my heart... I don't miss you.

I don't miss your interrogations after I asked to hang with my friends,

But I miss your thoughtful gifts you gave me to make my bruise face smile.

And your sweet words, "I'm sorry, my love. It will never happen again."

And the mornings you nursed me back to health.

I miss you.

Wait a minute...

I don't miss you.

Your hard looks, your conniving grin, your folded arms and clenched fists.

I don't miss you.

Desire

Desire. What a concept. It is word with multiple meanings and a variety of explanations for why and how we could obtain it in our lives. We all communicate desire in different ways. But what drives us to the point where we feel compelled to act on our desires? Do such actions bring us closer to fulfilling our desires?

I believe there are two aspects of desire, the emotional and the physical that help explain why we act on such desires. I am not quoting a particular definition here. I choose to use my own experiences to support my case since it is hard to separate the emotional and physical element of desire in my own life. The emotional and physical feed off each other which makes both interdependent with one another and thus, making our communicative practices of desire that much more convoluted.

My list of desires is quite long. I desire both metaphorical and tangible elements of love, companionship, power, security, happiness, family, strength, success, among others that help me obtain a "perfect life." I relate my metaphorical elements to the emotional connections I have to my desires. Love and power each have their own set of performances that help me convey my emotions to others. Holding hands, a kiss on the cheek, a smile, a laugh, all communicate elements of love. I feel enjoyment, heart ache, fustrastion, confusion, and happiness during each of these loving moments in my life. Yet, power can be communicated in the same way by taking a deeper look at the performance. Who initiated the hand holding, leaned in first for the kiss, or told the first joke could potentially be seen as the more dominating, more in control, and aggressive person in the performance. I know notions of power could be complicated further but that is not the main goal of this post.

The tangible is already apparent since the hand holding and kissing would assume another person is part of the performance. I guess I could kiss myself on the hand or hold my own hand but that would not give me the same enjoyment and feelings of love that I would get from a partner. I  am now hearing the song "I touch myself" by Divinyls in the back of my mind which brings about a whole new realm of performative possibilities for personal love and the physical enjoyment that would follow. 

Back to the point, the physical could also be the material possessions that help communicate love. A box of chocolates, a bouquet of flowers, paying for dinner, anniversary gifts are the material items we consume to communicate our love to another in a partnership. I often feel special, happy, honored, and gidty after receiving such items from a significant other. After receiving such material love, I would give back and reinforce the love with a hug, kiss, or a smile and a thank you. The passing back and forth of these physical trinkets of affection invoke the emotional desires I hope for with love. That is how my desire for love would be sustained and reinforced until I discovered a new level of love to desire. You can call me materialistic but I call it satisfaction. I would not be the only receiver of such reinforcements either. I would equally contribute and partake in gift giving to showcase my love to my partner. 

Regardless of the event, the physical elements of desire help to bring about, reinforce, and sustain my emotional desire. The same could be said for my emotional desires too. If I did not desire love along with the heart fluttering whimsicle emotions then, it would be safe to say that, I would not obtain the same type of physical support to sustain my desire for love. I don't mean to get mushy and use only love as my medium for discussing desire. Each desire would bring about a new performative dynamic between the emotional and physical aspects of a particular desire. In this case I just used the notion of love because it is a desire that most of my friends and I have and discuss at great length while drinking cups of caffeine at our local coffee shop.

These desires we have need some form of action to help solidify why we yearn for and how we would obtain/sustain such desires. It is the specific desire that drives us to act out in particular ways to fulfill the desire in our life.

Desire, what a complicated performative concept. Yet, we I cannot live with our it.

Finding company

It has been a very very very long time since I have ventured out into the world. Don't get me wrong. I have been outside of my home. I have gone out to the movies by myself, hung out with my childhood girl friends at the mall, and socialized with local dog enthusiasts. BUT, I have steered clear, far left and around, from the dating scene. It has been my choice to purposely avoid finding company with a person that may lead towards a romantic interlude.

I chose this path for a variety of reasons: to avoid getting hurt, to avoid the embarrassment of rejection, to keep what little shred of self-esteem I still had intact after a horrible break up, and the list of reasons (or excuses as my girlfriends call it) can go on and on.

However, there has only been one reason for why I broke free from this path... I met a guy. I was not looking for him, I did not find him on an online dating site, or while out at a bar with my friends. I found him (or he found me) while I was doing what I do best, avoiding the dating scene by going to the movies.

I love watching movies and don't mind going to the movies by myself. I decided to attend a marathon event at my local theater and offered to be the one person in my group who would wait in line for good seats. I arrived to the theater, fiddled with the automated machine and retrieved my tickets, propped open my folding chair in the movie line, and sat patiently for the theater doors to open. I normally do not pay attention to others in line but for some reason I noticed the guy sitting in front of me. He was sitting against the wall reading a book. I could not tell you the name of the book or what the guy looked like. Even to this day, I cannot remember what he was wearing. But one things stood out... he was THAT guy in line who was reading a book while waiting to see the same movie I was there to see.

A few minutes passed and the line began moving into the theater earlier than I expected. I followed the guy reading the book, and everyone else, into the the theater to collect our 3D glasses and find our seats. As I grabbed my glasses, I quickly walked to the theater while shoving my folding chair into its bag. I got into the theater and the entire room was pitch black. I was hitting people left and right with my fold up chair which was sliding off my shoulder due to the fact that my turtle hump of a backpack was packed to the seams with candy, snacks, and movie related items for 10 people.

My goal was to save seats in the front row of the middle section. I needed four seats and I began following the dim cell phone lights traveling down the front row. I quickly passed all of the lights and found one empty seat at the end of the row. Then I proceeded to do something I usually do not do, I announced myself to the darkness asking if there were any seats left in the first row. I did not get a response. I set my chair down in the first seat and sat in the second seat. I then leaned over to the third seat and announced myself again to the darkness. No response. I took off my backpack and set it in the second seat and moved to the third. By this time I thought no one was in the fourth seat but I still wanted to asked just in case the people in the middle of the row were saving seats. I leaned over while announcing myself to the darkness. I immediately heard a voice respond, "Don't you have a light on your phone?" I immediately felt an arm on the armrest too. I jumped a bit because I did not know who this person was or if I screamed my inquiry into their face or ear.

I replied to the darkness: I had my hands full with my folding chair and was not able to pull out my phone in time to find seats.
Darkness: How many seats do you need?
I need one more to make four.
I can move over. 
Thanks!

I then moved into the fourth seat and began quickly searching for my phone in my backpack. I pulled out my phone and powered it on. Just as my phone turned on the theater lights flickered and lit up the entire room.

I turned to my right to see who was talking to me in the darkness... it was THAT guy in line who was reading the book.

Being in close quarters with other movie lovers leads to sharing of movie snacks and conversing about future movie events. One thing let to another and I was chopping it up with a couple seated directly behind me and the guy reading the book. We all quickly became friends and talked about meeting up in two weeks for another film. I thought it would be cool to see all of them again, even the guy reading the book.

Skip ahead two weeks and we all met up at the movies again. We sat around and played a board game while in line. We all sat together in the theater too. And guess who sat right next to me again... the guy reading the book.  I admit I wanted him to sit next to me but I never divulged that information to him.

So while I was avoiding finding company, I actually found a person to keep me company. The guy reading the book and I have been on a few dates since our two encounters at the theater. So far, so good. Lets just hope our meaning of "keeping company" is the same.