Message in a Bottle

Oh, lordy.

I lack the words.

I have a bubbling, upswelling desire to update this blog, and yet I find my verbal capacity positively anile.

I had grand plans for this evening, my first Thursday off in three weeks. Unfortunately, my plans were all subject to the ol' Robert Burns treatment and have ganged agley.
(That's from To a Mouse. Look it up if you are unfamiliar. Or don't. None of this literary tosh matters anymore, anyway. Facts are so goddamn disposable. They call this The Information Age, and information has never been more worthless. People need not remember anything, because its all right there in front of them, at their fingertips, on the internet. Phone numbers are saved on cellular telephones. Our memories are failing. Remember Fahrenheit 451? Probably not. No one remembers anything. But the old men at the end? Who serve as repositories of great literary works by memorizing them word-for-word? Well no one will be able to do that soon. But, beyond the increased access to information, and even more frightening -to a trivia slut suh as m'self - is that nobody fucking cares! No one is excited by new information and titlating factiods. Which means I am all but useless.)
Anyway, my plans have fallen through.
But, the lack of viable plans allowed for a pleasant dinner. I briefly considered having an early dinner at Osaka, but decided instead to buy supplies at a grocer's and cook my own meal. For one, it costs less. Secondly, I can be there to oversee more stages of its preparation. And most importantly, I wouldn't look like a lonely fool eating by myself with nothing but a glass of sake and graphic novel for company.
So roasted fresh Brussels sprouts and a perfect medium rare Ribeye the size of a wire-bound notebook, accompanied by a Rioja I had in the past been favorably been impressed with. The wine has failed to live up to my memory of it, however. I remember it grabbing me by the balls with a blood-red, full-bodied Spanish sneer, like Michele Rodriguez in a bottle. Now it seems flat and thin and completely unremarkable.
I had assumed the wine would stir me on to heights of creative fury, but such is, alas, not the case. All I got was a mild sort of listless loneliness.
But this leads me at a sad-eyed slump, like Eeyore, to my first topic: I am lonely.
I long for female companionship. My feelings are nauseously mixed. Part of me, as a heterosexual human male in modern American society, longs for the closeness of a soft, pleasant-smelling companion, for obvious reasons. But beyond this, I long for a relationship. I'm not saying I'd turn down a one-night-stand at this time, but . . . I would. I broke up with my last girlfriend because I wanted to fuck other people, but, more deeply, because I wanted to know other people. I want to wake up after a romantic night, give and receive a morning-breath kiss, shower together, and then go out for breakfast. I want to meet new sets of parents, and serve as the token arm-adornment at little-cousins' fourth birthday parties. I want to spend a day-off in pajamas, with intermittent, lazy, half-clothed sex and order Chinese take-out.
But, beyond even that, is an astoundingly conceited notion that people are missing out on having me as a boyfriend. I am a damn good boyfriend. I have never spent any serious time as a young bachelor, out-on-the-town, picking up a different girl every night. I have, however, had a good many years experience as half of a couple, and at this I excell. I feel like there are girls out there feeling sad and lonely and unappreciated and it is madness that I am not in their lives to bring them flowers at work or surprise them by having dinner ready when they come home or give them a foot massage while we watch a romantic comedy. And I even go so far as to blame these hypothetical girls for not being my girlfriend.
"Can't you see what you're missing out on?" I say to these ethereal girls I have yet to meet.

And I am starved for reader response on this blog. I am lonely as a web diarist. I know people read this ridiculous exploration of my neuroses and prejudices. I know several people read it, in fact. I just have no idea who reads it. I think my precocious younger cousin reads it, as my readership has been tracked to Europe, where she is currently studying. Beyond that I have no clue. Coy requests for comments have illicted no response. Now I am not fishing for comments here, like an insecure teenage girl fish for compliments by moaning about how fat she looks in her prom dress. I would actually be mildly upset if people were to actually respond to this. But still, I just launch these posts off into cyberspace, like a shipwrecked sailor sending messages in bottles, and wait around for a Red Cross vessel to save me.

Oh well.

Listen. I have so much I want to discuss with you -- ha! Discuss! As if you'll actually participate - but I am sleepy. Perhaps I shall update with something of substance soon.
Until then, I'm off to bed.

In Vino Veritas

Well look at me, updating my blog twice in one week. Barely.
I must have too much time on my hands.
I suppose I have cut back on my masturbating. Shirking my wanking, as it were.
I am currently fueled by several glasses of a subtle yet respectable Cabernet. A bit sweeter than it has right to be, but with occasional pops of cedar which I find appealingly incongruous.
Goddamn, but I do sound like a wine snob.
Perhaps I rely too heavily on alcohol for impetus in this endeavor. Then again, I am making an attempt at being a writer. Alcoholism and the pen often go hand-in-hand.
Faulkner, famously, when confronted by writers' block would lock himself in a closet-sized room with nothing but a typewriter and a bottle of whiskey. So my practices are not entirely without precedent.
In addition, I have much to write about as of late. I don't know why this should be. There is hardly any more going on in my life than before, but my mechanism for abstract thought seems to be functioning on all four cylinders.
Where to begin, though? There's the rub.
Speaking of the bard, I must grudgingly consign myself to the Hamlet category, as far as Shakespearean archetypes go. You know how they differentiate themselves. You've got your lovers, Romeo -- ardent and awe-struck, and Othello -- jealous and volatile. You've got long lists of jesters and madmen and cowards and kings. As far as leading men go, the two main divisions could be men of action and men of thought. Macbeth, for all his "cat-i'-the-adage" reluctance, is a warrior. He boldly takes what he wants (or what his wife wants).
Hamlet is much more of a Nervous Nelly, completely unwilling to commit any action for fear of an unwanted outcome.
And this is me. So I will continue shuffling along, "to-be-or-not-to-be"ing, until I pluck up the courage to stab Claudius and get it over with.
(For all of my non-Shakespearean-aware readers who are somewhat flummoxed by this tangent, shame on you. Read a book. I attempt to tightrope walk between snobbery and sophistication, but really. The man is the greatest writer of this language. Pick up a book.)
While on the subject of literary archetypes:
I was re-reading a book lately and, as one does, finding myself relating to a certain character. We do this, to make the read more engrossing and, perhaps moreso, to feel we are a part of something. Or, more accurately, to affirm our identity. We overlay ourselves on these characters to show that we have relevance and an acknowledged, existing place in the world.
(On a side-note, in many works I find myself more closely identifying with villains and outcasts. I find something endearing in people who aren't routed for; who will ultimately lose. But beyond that, even more disparangingly, I was watching a show recently in which a wounded female villain is attempting an escape. She flags down a passing car, exaggerating her injury and distress. When the hapless chap pulls up and asks, all chivalrous concern, if she's okay, she shoots him point-blank in the face. That's me, I thought. If life were an action film I'd love to be the hero or, at least, the comic relief side-kick, but more probable is that I'd be the doltish Good Samaritan who, offering aid, serves only to make the villain or monster more hateable.)
(Side-note: That show was ALIAS, by the way. I had professed admiration for it in a past post. Unfortunately, now on season four, I must amend my review. Like all of J.J. Abrams's work, it starts off promising but spirals ever more out of control with wild loose-ends and abandoned plot points. The show might as well be called "Everyone's a Spy. It seems that at least 75% of the characters in the program are agents, sleeper agents, recruited to be spies, or spies-in-training.)
Where the fuck was I?
Oh, archetypes!
Well, in this book I was re-reading, I had no sooner assigned myself to one character -- itself key, not the identifying with one, but the distinguishing from the others, in terms of self-definition -- when I realized, well, I'm actually a bit like this other character, too. And this one. And this one. And simultaneously unlike all of them. Which is true for all of us. We hinder and frustrate ourselves in an attempt to find a definitive two-dimensional identity. Were life two-dimensional it would be a good deal simpler. We are too damn complex.
All the perspective battles in my life are lost in shades of grey. If there were a bad-guy to fight or a damsel to save perhaps I would not hesitate so incessantly. But beyond concerns of whether or not I could -- itself enough of an unmanning obstacle -- is the question of whether or not I should.
I assume this is all pretty damn oblique to you cats. Apologies, but I daren't offer specifics.
Well, I've been at this for a while and haven't made much progress. There is much ground to cover.
Passion, though a bad regulator, is a powerful spring, as Emerson said.
And passion I have in abundance. I am veritably overflowing with unbridled creative energy, dear reader. And I fear you must cope with the result.
Not that one would recognise me as passionate were one to interact with me.
Of late I have seemed, though internally surging with emotion, listless and depressed, even.
Last night at work I was very much what I would call "on my game." I performed my culinary duties swiftly and efficiently, spoke more or less eloquently, and responded to conversational forays with wit and aplomb. I orchestrated an elaborate staff meal -- a jentacular feast -- which was met with smiles and thanks from my assembled colleagues. (I still interpret, distrustful as I am regarding praise, any compliments as condescension. Growing up my father, out of love for me and perhaps out of familial pride, would lavish lauds upon me for the most mundane of accomplishments. This taught me early on to have little respect for any kind words people gave me, and parse even smiles as the grossest patronizing. I feel this way also regarding any female attention. To fully appreciate my state of mind if a girl expresses any interest in me, I suggest you give a listen to I Don't Believe You by the Magnetic Fields.
I had a dream and you were in it.
The blue of your eyes was infinite.
You seemed to be
In love with me
Which isn't very realistic.)

Anyway, effortless cool though I might have exuded, I also conveyed, I'm sure, a bleary, weary, depression. Internally this was manifest as a sort of Zen-like detatchment -- a minimalist acceptance of life and all its disappointments. Still, I no doubt seemed like a dreadful mope.
How could I be overwhelmed with creative fire and lulled by soporific geniality at the same time?
Y'got me. Hurray for dichotomies.
I felt this split most keenly Saturday evening, when I asked a female co-worker out for a drink.
I assumed, first of all, that she'd say "no." And, secondly, that she'd assent only in the platonic. So, coarsened as a fellow with my luck with women would be, I expected her to decline the offer. When she "yes" instantly I was buoyed by an irrational thrill every decent man experiences when an attractive woman agrees to a private chat accompanied by social lubricants.
So off we went to a nearby watering hole, where I sat and sipped my whiskey-and while being captivated by her silvery laughter and the lovely white crescent of her bottom teeth and inviting pink tongue.
And my thoughts strayed, as a man's do, to the possibility of sexual interraction.
At some point I realized she would not be interested in the above, and resigned myself to gallantly paying for her drink and bidding her good evening.
Afterwards I tried to deconstruct the whole scene, as one who overthinks everything as much I do would do, in an attempt to figure out exactly when she decided not to pursue any physical interaction with me. I often, well, always, do this with women.
What was the exact moment when she switched from possible lover to definite friend? What was it that I did to ensure this? I was hoping for some lightning strike realization about my mistake.
Eventually I was struck by a different realization:  She never considered physical interraction. It was all delusion.
This was at once a relief and an irritation.

The word jentacular, mentioned above, means "breakfast related."
You're welcome.

I have heard of the exchange of knowledge as being without loss to either side. What I mean by this is, if I have five dollars and I give you those five dollars, you are five dollars richer while I am five dollars poorer. However, if I know something, and I share this with you, you now know it and I still know it. So there is no loss.
This is a bit of a fallacy, however.
A better analogy would be if I have five dollars and I Xerox it and then give you the copy. I still have five dollars, and you have five dollars, but now it has depreciated as currency. I am torn by a desire to share my knowledge -- partly to show off how smart I think I am -- and a covetous tenacity to hold onto my knowledge so that I'm the only one who knows it.

Halloween has just passed.
It is my favorite holiday. It combines, I feel, the hedonism of New Years' and St. Patrick's Day without any real compulsion to reform oneself or prove one's Irish heritage through drinking, with the free license to dress and act like someone completely different from your everyday self.
Call me immature, but I never got over the childhood desire to make-believe.
On Facebook I initiated a costume challenge for myself. I would post a new profile photo every day for the 13 days leading up to and including Halloween, all different costumes.
I failed in this, as I do most things.
But there were a few highlights along the way.
In response to a suggestion of "pig-in-a-blanket" by a female co-worker I rather outdid myself by stripping down to my orange underwear (sport briefs, by the way. My favorite style of male skivvies, and the only one I wear), draping a brown blanket over my shoulders, strapping a garsih pig nose to my face, and dripping ketchup over my abs.
I admit that it was a rushed and ill-conceived photo. It was hazy and disturbing and evoked a Buffalo-Bill-in-Silence-of-the-Lambs type of nauseous unease.
I was alarmed to find that my employer found his way to the photo.
He called me aside during work to question me about it, not in a directly forbidding manner, but in a sort of bemused outrage and concern.
It gave me a considerable blow to my self-confidence. I thought to myself, "Rich, you are really taking this thing way too far. You will scare and alienate people."
I was in terror of viewing any comments my photo might have garnered when I returned home that evening.
And yet . . .
My friends liked it.
People were impressed. They made reassuring jokes, expressed approval.
This served to bolster my self-image and assauge the needling doubts my boss had burdened me with. I realized it wasn't a legitimate opinion but just the narrow-minded, knee-jerk reaction of someone without any whimsy left in him.

The above suggestion came, as I say, from a female co-worker, and I'll admit, I posed as I did for the picture as a way of flirting with her. This is something I have been doing with varying intensity since I started working at the restaurant, and with increased fervor of late, due, I think, to her pregnancy.
Now, do not misunderstand me. I am not someone who fantasizes about intercourse with pregnant women. That is, in fact, one form of human sexuality and pornography I cannot support. But I do realize that her hormones are currently in a frothing frenzy, and she is aware of herself as a sexual being. It would be impolite not to respond in kind. I am of two minds when it comes to this particular state of affairs. I cannot reconcile my co-worker, and all women in her glorious condition, as both a mother, a bringer of life, and as a sexual being. I want to show respect for her as the conduit of our very existence, and I want to recognize her as a woman, with all the associated parts and desires. 

I am currently undergoing what might be termed a crisis of faith. I have long since abandoned my Catholic identity, even my Christian one. I have been considering a kind of neo-Paganism, Nature worship sort of thing, which, by its vague boundaries makes itself arbitrary. I gave up meat and caffeine, for instance, from the Autumnal Equinox until the Samhain. However, if I could chose which religion I would prefer, of all the beliefs that have been around since our species emerged from the jungles, I would chose worship of the Divine Feminine. I assume, based on its very nautre that this is one of the oldest belief systems. I have the utmost respect of and even adoration for the layered feminine identity, which is at once mother and lover. It is a simultaneous reality which is difficult to wrap one's head around.


Pet Peeves:

I am always upset by peers -- people my age or younger -- complaining about aging.
Now I am very aware of how fast time passes -- exponentially so -- as one ages. And perhaps I am biased, having been chubby and awkward for most of my childhood and teenage years, and currently, though still chubby and awkward, in the best shape of my life. Still, every time someone of my age bracket whines about how they are not as strong or flexible or durable as they were in their teens I bridle with rage. We are in the prime of our lives! The gains made by young atheletes between 10 and 19 are astronmonical. However, once one reaches that pinnacle at 19, the atheletic ability of of a person remains more or less the same from 19 to 60, at least in terms of speed and stamina. I have been beaten in trail races by people twice my age.
Women do not reach sexual maturity until thirty. Which is why I find women who are older than me, and especially older than thirty, so sexy; they are comfortable with their bodies. They realize that men, at least decent men, men like me, find every inch of them appealing, and get over their body-image hang-ups.
My peers need to save any griping about aging until such a time as it is justified.

Words I Like:

I haven't fixated on anything recently. But I have learned a new definition, based on a series of debates I've been following on YouTube.

Eschatology: any doctrine concering the end of things, specifically Armegeddeon.

More on that later.

I will leave you with some poetry by Sappho, famed lesbian lyric poet of ancient Greece. Yes, it was written from one woman to another, but I find it universally applicable. I use it to apply to a certain girl. One whom Yeats would say had beauty like a tightened bow string.

He seems to me equal to gods, that man
Whoever he is,
Opposite you,
That sits and listens close to your sweet speaking
And lovely laughing.
Oh it puts the heart in my chest on wings.
For when I look at you,
Even for a moment,
No speaking is left in me.

From Ann Carson's translation of Fragment 31.

Titillating treats

I discussed this blog recently with someone and we agreed that it does tend to wallow in two rather primitive aspects of humantity: sex and alcohol.
I said that I would earnestly attempt to move beyond these topics.
Let's see how it goes . . .

Perhaps the most dangerous effect of alcohol is its ability to make moderately unattainable goals seem within reach. You imbibe a bottle or two of wine and all of a sudden you find yourself thinking, "Oh, of course. I'll just ------, and then everything will work out fine." You spend all your waking hours - and some of your dreaming ones - fantasizing about something that you know on a rational level is completely unrealistic. Add some booze into the mix and - your cheeks flushed and chest burning - you cannot imagine what all the fuss was about. You'll just go out and do it right now. It is comparable to the feeling of earest invincibility one achieves only through an adrenaline rush, but without the fevered urgency.
My humblest apologies for being so cryptic, but I fear absolute transperancy is denied me in this forum.

Of late I've been giving some thought to the nature of human sexuality, in all its nuanced incarnations.

I was watching the TODAY show recently, God only knows why, and was mildly nauseated to bear witness to a discussion on whether or not men and women can really be friends. Now, setting aside the obvious assaults on logic, i.e. the fact that they're even having this debate, in a shrill, chirping forced manner, on what I thought was a nationally respected NEWS show, for Christ's sake, and that they've assmbled a panel of four primped and pinched middle-age women and one sagging and desperately funny man, rather than a diverse dais, evenly balanced gender-wise, let me give my thoughts on the matter.
Can a man and a woman ever be "just friends?"
No. No they cannot.
And I know whereof I speak.
I have tried in the past to maintain friendships with women, all to no avail.
There are some women of my aquaintance with whom I can be friendly, but I would not say that we're friends. Why are we friendly? Because I recognize certain qualities about them I appreciate or admire, and because I realize we will never, ever have sex. The complete apparent lack of desire on their part feeds a lack of desire on my part. (A topic I'll have to go into at another time is how much being found attractive by another makes said other attractive in turn, and of course, the opposite is also true.)
And even with the derth of desire there remains a hint, a potential -- unavoidable, given the sheer physiology of it -- of sexual congress.
I say "friendly" rather than "friends" because I know only enough about them to allow for mild amiability. If I knew them more deeply, more fully, knew their faults and foibles and quirks and dreams, I would find them more attractive as a result, and any friendship would be incinerated by lust and longing ere it was fully developed.
I have been close with women. An outside observer would call us "friends." But if I am truly honest with myself, all the while I chatted with them in a parked car or strolled beside them through the woods or sat next to them on a couch watching a movie, I jealously clutched a hope that the friendship would blossom into something -- I hesistate to say "more," -- different. That she would lean over, place a hand on my thigh, lock eyes with me and dip her head for a breathless first kiss.
I have explored this dynamic from all angles: I have had chaste friendships with girls; friendships which dissolved into physical exhanges -- fooling around, to use the vernacular -- and then solidified back into standard practice. I made a disasterous attempt to maintain a friendship with my ex-girlfriend.
In all of the above situations, the lingering phantom of fucking insinuated itself into my thoughts. I perhaps think too highly of myself by imagining that it entered the ladies' thoughts as well.
There is a dull and expected trope in modern fiction, something we all believe possible because we've seen it so many times on screen and in print, of a person having a close, dependable, beloved friend of the opposite sex with whom they share a platonic bond. The notion appeals to us ferllas, as it may to you gals. We all wish we had a special female friend we could drink a glass of wine with after a long day. Or bounce ideas off of when writing a paper or a novel, or planning a heist. Someone we could turn to for insight regarding the opposing camp. "What do girls really think about this . . .?"
We would go to the gym together, push each other physically, wind up panting and sweating, sipping from the same water bottle and grinning, recalling the highlights of the workout.
We would boisterously bump shoulders at pool party, dance with each other at the wedding of some mutual friend, all with the shared knowledge that we were really the best of friends -- like brother and sister really.
Yes, men long to have such a girl in their lives. And think. "wouldn't it be great if we could do all that and fuck, too?"

I don't know how girls feel on the topic of friendship with guys, not being a girl myself. I have received opposing advice on girls recently.
Reading an interview with Bill Maher in Rolling Stone, I stumbled upon the notion that the key to understanding women is realizing that they are a lot more like men than we realize. Treat them as you would want to be treated and things will work out fine.
Now, Maher has never struck me as a ladies' man, his stellar work in Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death not withstanding. And though I appreciate the man's apparent earnestness and the bare-bones of his liberal beliefs, his personality is like oiled sandpaper to me. Still, this was a view I had long held: that men and women are mostly alike, divided by the constraints of society more than anything else.
Now, I also heard from a far more reputable source -- me own sweet mum -- that I must never think of a woman as being psychologically or emotionally the same as me. Such would be a grave error. Women and men are eternally different.
And, indeed, science rather backs her up.
Womens' brains, you see, develop differently than do mens'. The two hemispheres stay merged longer.
It is my belief, therefore, that women like the idea of a male friend, but for an entirely different -- and I might say sinister -- set of reasons.
Women like, first and foremost, the notion of being close to a man without having to have sex with him. This is why the concept of a gay best friend is so popular with women. (How often have you heard of men having a lesbian best friend?) For most women do not pursue sex itself as men do. There are a few who harbor appetites as ravenous as that of the male, but they are a glorious and select minority.
Secondly, women, self-conscious bitches that they are -- and ladies I say this with a twinkle in my eye, and hardly any real misogyny -- enjoy the notion that there is some poor dolt close by yearning to have intimate physical contact with them. They look at male friends as an ego boost.

This said, I just took a break from spewing this nonsense to ask out that auburn-haired barista mentioned in a past post. She said she had a boyfriend, but that we could go out as friends. I had to supress an outburst of, "What the fuck is that?" after she spoke these words. How naive, I thought, of her. or, perhaps, how dissolute and worldly. Either she thinks we can just be friends -- how childish -- or she is debauched enough to be on the look-out for perspective boys-on-the-side. Or, as I always think when a girl shows the slightest interest in me or acknowledgement of my existence, she's just being kind.

Then again, she could -- I was about to say, be lying, like most women, but I will be more even-handed and say -- be, like most people, dissembling.
Maybe she doesn't have a boyfriend, but says she does so she can keep potential suitors at arms' length.

This is the problem with over-thinking things -- one of the problems: I do not narrow down possibilites, or just simply take things as they are, so much as I explore every possible meaning to the point of pointlessness. It's like Cold-War-era escalation, each possibility being amped up as I devote thought to it, but none being eliminated.

Bah!
I like this post!
I feel the old upsurging vehemence of my past blogging days.
My skills are returning.
Long-winded, offensive, vividly addled prose!
It must be the blend of alcohol and caffeine currently tango-ing through my bloodstream.

We find ourselves now in the tail-end of Autumn's majesty. The penultimate stage of The Season of Mists and Mellow Fruitfulness.
I had planned a lengthy discourse on how Autmumn is a disappointing tease of a season; how the qualities people really love about it are only manifest for about two weeks, and the rest is either a weak-willed assault on burly Summer, with Fall never really asserting itself until Summer gets tired and moves on, or an equally weak-willed surrender to Winter, with Fall cravenly throwing in the towel at the merest suggestion of the Old Man's wrath.
Spring is likewise a teasing season.
Summer and Winter, absolute brutes that they are, are the only true seasons.
Anyway, most of what I wanted to say on the subject has already been said to my one reader.
She says I over-think things.
Yes, Precious, I overthink things. That's what I do. Overthink trivial matters. Buy people gratuitous gifts which make them uncomfortable in an attempt to garner affection and "be liked." Fritter away time yearning for things and never working up the guts to get them. Vacilate between self-loathing and self-agrandizement. These are the things that I do.

There is one respect in which Autumn trumps all other seasons, however: Clothing.
Thick, woolknit sweater. Long coats. Thin gloves. Boots.
Don't get me wrong, I love Summer fashion as much as the next red-blooded, sartorially enlightened American male. The vibrant hued sheer summer dresses clinging lewdly to feminine curves. The playful flip-flop sandals, which though I recognize are murder on a gal's posture, still illicit tinglings of desire -- the gaily painted toes and the delicate veins on the tapered ankles. Gentle, floral perfume and the sweet, sour tang of sweat -- a scent both soft and sharp, like a velvet blade.
Nonetheless, autumn is the season which really stirs desire for me. Dark, muted tones. Fluffed scarves like comfy, woolen pythons coiled about ladies' necks. The ineffable whiffs of nutmeg and cinnamon. The spiced, crumpled-leaves, old-book smell of fall. And the boots. Tall, leather, no-nonsense. They necessitate long, purposeful strides. They speak of daring adventure in times past: swashbuckling on the heaving deck of a frigate in the Caribbean; galloping full tilt astride a froth-lipped steed; dashing, revolver in hand, down a foggy cobblestone street; grappling, gritted-teeth, hair a-swirl, on the catwalk atop a Zeppelin.
Flip flops are revealing, no doubt, and convey girlish sun-soaked innocence, but boots are where it's at.

Listen to me, prattling on about footwear like an addled fetishist.
Which, arguably, I am.

People would label me as such, surely.

But what a strange term. One fellow shows zealous desire for breasts, say, and he is normal. Another acknowledges the erotic potential of toes and all of a sudden he's a depraved pervert.
Neither body part is inherently more sexual than the other.
No, I simply wish to express my reverence for every inch of the female form.
I have my favorite spots, surely.
The outer edge of the hip, which slopes downward on either side toward fertile valley-land. The dimpled extreme border of the lower back as it thrusts out into the gluteals. The delicate, birdcage structure of the ribs as they meet the latissimus dorsi when a girl's hands are stretched above her head. The fine, elegant curvature of the throat joining flawlessly with the firm, angled clavicle. The wrists, delicate yet eternally strong. Filled with a tautened cable-rigidity and a green, nubile grace are a woman's wrists. That oft-traversed, criminally over-looked unadorned expanse between navel and pubis.
Oh, I could waste hours rhapsodizing.
Suffice to say, I bow in thanks to Whomever - Intelligent Designer or Indifferent Natural Selector - is responsible for the female body.

And girls get finnicky over the attention to usually disdained body parts. (I even appreciated the soft, indescribably tender axial region. Much to my ex's squirming distress.) Get over yourself, ladies! Men like you. Every bit of you.
A girl of my acquaintance recently ended a relationship with a fella after he expressed interest in her feet.
"I have ugly fucking feet!" she shrilled in response.
I once had occasion to give her an extended foot massage and can attest that they are nothing of the sort. Certainly not model-caliber, but nothing to sniff at, if you'll forgive the expression.
And this same girl, on our first meeting, confided in me that she enjoyed having her anus licked. (La feuille de rose, as the French call it, which translates literally to "the pink leaf." Gotta love the French.) How can she be so at home with the one part of her anatomy and so alienated by the other?
I was originally disgusted by her dismissal of a prospective beau due to his professed enchantment with a certain body part, but, upon further refelection, I feel I might be able to commiserate. Back in high school, my own psyche was so riddled and rent with body-image hang-ups that I found myself disliking my girlfriend because she found me attractive. How fucked up is that, huh? I thought, "I know I'm an unfuckable troll, so what the hell is wrong with her that she feels anything other than loathing and revulsion towards me?"

I have only recently realized what I'm sure others have always known, vis that the build-up to an event is always, always better than event itself.
The human mind is so complexly, convolutedly, intricate that the stimulated imagination is capable of infinite wonders, all of which surpass what dull reality serves up. It's an unfair comparission, to be fair to reality, for within the human consciousness there are endless variations and possibilities. When reality manifests it can take but one form, which, no matter how glorious, cannot hope to surpass all forms existing at once.
Withheld fulfillment is key in sexual interaction, as well.
I remember my favorite teasing moments in bed with my ex, hovering above her, muscles bunched in my stiff, extended arms, just tracing the engorged head of my cock over her moistened lips, parting them with such slow, intolerable deliberation -- brushing softly against her greedily alert clit. And even after insertion, our faces close, but me pulling away slightly, mouth hot and eager just out of reach of hers, making her rise to touch her lips to mine.
Likewise, on a very special birthday of mine we spent at a swank hotel in Boston, my ex gave me a protracted spanking while I lay facedown on the bed. The best part for me was not the actual slaps, nor the thrilling intermittent bits in which she drew her fingernails across my stinging cheeks or gently licked my buns, but the wait. The expectant, agnozing moments when I waited for a slap.
So you see, the action, the event is a let-down. The expectation is key.
Above reverence to physical human form aside, mentally we are fucked from the get-go: disappointment is practically hard-wired into our psyches.

I am sore.
After hitting the weights all week, working, and yoga I feel like one of the sides of beef Stallone pummelled in Rocky. It's a good feeling. I enjoy muscle soreness.
During yoga I forced myself into the warrior pose, and was pleasantly reminded of fencing: heel alighnment, toes forward with one foot, toes to the side with the other, bent knees, straight spine, chin out, eyes up, arm extended from the shoulder. I want to start fencing again.  

Some of the success of my past blogs was due, I feel, to their division into sections. Boundaries, as the teacher on Daria said, can parodoxically provide us with freedom. It gave me structure. Let me know what I have to do.
And so I will begin initiation sections into this blog.
The first:

Pet Peeves:

To start with, the term "pet peeves." It's a whiny, sophomoric-sounding phrase. I will instead use "Things that Fuckin' Bug Me."

So . . .

Things that Fuckin' Bug Me:

Gym Edition.

I dislike people who grunt and curse at the gym. Planet Fitness's fascistic No Judgement policy upsets me, but it's on the right track. No lunks, as they say. Coarse, bestial snorting and growling rather puts me off my pump. Show some stoic resolve, people.
Also:
People who don't shower at the gym.
I am no Mr. Universe, but I'm comfortable enough in my skin to be naked in a Mens' Locker room. Get over yourself and clean up, you skittish jerks, I feel. Why walk away all chafing and sweaty? One of the best parts of working out at a gym is the shower after and the change into clean clothes.
However, I likewise dislike people who shower sans sandals.
Are you nuts? Show some concern for your feet, guys. This isn't your shower at home. I shudder to think of what's blossoming in the gaps between the tiles.
Further locker room annoyances:
Guys who put shirts on first when changing. Or take them off last. There is something inherently repellent to me about a guy wearing a shirt but naked from the waist down. Shirtless, but with pants, a man looks ready for action or hard labor. He might be getting into an underground bare-knuckle fight or building a barn. Fully naked, of course, has its own evocations. But pantless and wearing a shirt? It indicates complete inability for any determined physical exertion -- you can't get in a brawl or demolish a building with no pants on. The only option for that clothing combo is unwilling sex. It is a sickening blend of violent male sexual potential, and complete vulnerability. I understand if you're changing into formal evening wear and do not wish to crinkle your slacks. Then, by all means, shirt first. That's just sound thinking. But otherwise, c'mon, fellas, jeans first. Then t-shirt.
I dislike when there is a variety of open treadmills, with wide open spaces between them, and someone -- usually and older person, usually a man -- picks the treadmill right next to me. Gimme some room, bro, I say.
Still, I have picked the treadmill next to attractive girls on occasion, when space is limited. I like the implied competition involved with adjacent machines.

Next segment:

Film:

I saw Night of the Living Dead on the big screen recently. It was playing at South Hadley's Tower Theaters last Thursday night (and is playing again on Halloween night at 9.)
It was awful.
Colorized, and in 3D, it lost its original noirish charm.
Speaking of black and white, has anyone ever made a big deal out of the fact that NotLD (that's Night of the Living Dead, not Not ell dee) was made in '68 and has a sympathetic and admirable black protagonist?
Anyway, it was awful.
Far too slow and bogged down in concrete-block dialogue scenes.
The zombies are rarely threatening, often hilarious. And they use tools!
Still, it's a visionary, seminal work and none of the far superior zombie films that followed would have been possible without it.


I saw the film with my brother, the one person capable of driving me insane with rage or paralyzed with honest laughter in a few moments.
Goddamnit, I love him.

I love the English language. Nonsensical rules and all. It's a mutt language, half Romatic, half Germanic, borrowing foreign phrases when it suits. It might not sound as rhythmic as Spanish or as silkily suave as French (sidenote, I am rendered nearly catatonic with passion when I hear a woman speaking French with a passable accent. it's oddly even more effective when I know she's not a native speaker. More impressive, I suppose) nor as delicately beautiful as, say, Japanese. Still, in terms of expression . . .. It has about four times as many words as the Frencg language. There are so many layers of meaning, nuances, hues and tones and textures. Anyway . . .. Next section:

Words I Like:

Just one has been playing in my mind of late.

Cunt.

I happen to love this word. It has an authoritative definitiveness to it.
Many people shy away from this word, perhaps because they don't know the facts of its etymology.
Its origin is heavily disputed, but it either arises from the practical meanings, "stem, wedge," to the more abstract, but appropriate, "to create or become."
It shares the same ancestors as "country," "kin," and "kind."
Women especially shy away from it, because it has been used in negative contexts by ignorant mysogynists, but more so, I think, because it is so stern and harsh and, I suppose, masculine.
I find it sexy. Part of my appreciation is due to its muddled but impressive history and its mystical evocations.
My go-to sexy word for male genitalia is "cock," and, though I would use "pussy" for the female equivilant, I feel "cunt" is more accurate. Cunt, cock.

I committed some masculine acts today. Like baking a lemon cheesecake . . ..
No, not really. Though I did.

For starters, I spent much of the day disassembling the patio at Food 101. It is an endeavor I sometimes undertake with Ed, the manager. I also enjoy doin' it solo. It can be a one-man task. I blasted my new work-out mix (some Sinead O'Connor in there, don't laugh) and hauled the wrought-iron furniture below decks. Jamming out to Ready, Steady, Go and striding manfully through the honeycomb catacombs below the Commons, I felt like I was a slick espionage thriller.
Afterwards I asked a girl out (see above).
Then I jogged to the summit of Mount Holyoke, in the storm, shirtless.
I feel a particular primitive energy when running un-incumbered through the forest. I would love to run through the forest naked. I know my Reader has dealt with naked hikers in the past, and so do not want to appear pathologically lascivious. Still, it would be a uniquely liberating experience.
I would love even more to run naked through through the woods with someone.
Someone female.
Someone who likes the outdoors . . ..
Fuck, I'm drunk.
There was a pleasant dichotomy available to me, with the torrential, blustering, nebulous Sky Father and the warm embrace of the Earth Mother.
The vistas were murky, all billowing grey haze. The Connecticut became a duak river system, water below, fog above. But it was a wild ride, nonetheless.

Back to sexuality if we could por uno minuto.
I am host to a plethora of sexual kinks.
Now, I am not one of those poor souls who are unable to attain full arousal without being bludgeoned by a naked G.I. Joe. Some of the best sex I've ever had has been vanilla in nature, missionary-position, gazing into each others' eyes, soft pink light courtesy of a college-era spherical disco lamp, and trance-inducing pop music.
Still, I enjoy many variations on the theme, so to speak, and am open to many more.
Fetishes, they are called, mainstream.
It derives from a term for a treasured object embodied with non-intrinsic properties.
You got questions, delve into my past posts. Not from this blog. Nor the last. Nor the livejournal (remember that?). I mean the original.
Or comment with questions.
Or ask me in person and I'll give a live demonstration.
Anyway . . .
I believe kinks to be a good indication of an elaborate intellect. An abscence of kinks is a sign of an unadorned mind.
I know plenty of smart folks who are vanilla all the way (or so it seems, what's hiding in your closet). Kinkiness does not guarantee intelligence, but a lack of it does seem to hint at a lack of creativity and open-mindedness.
Were I to discover a girl with comparable sexual predilictions I would be hearilty entranced. It would be the unique and secret bliss of finding a kindred spirit in a world of strangers. Deep calling to deep, so to speak, as when people who have committed murder shake hands, or fans of obscure musicians meet. It's like being members of an exclusive club.
More people should be so open-minded. I mean, we as humans are gifted with such a stock of possibilities. We have phyical and psychological triggers. Our entire past comes into play. There is such a vast sea of styles and modes. Let's experiment, shall we?
And being halfway depraved as I am, I can appreciate more extreme fetishes. I am not enrapt by them, but I am not repulsed, either. I want to participate in a wide range of sexual exploits, but I would be willing to engage in an even wider range.
Which is funny.

You see, much of what I like to do is dependent on my partner liking it as well. If she's just doing it for my sake, it detracts from the pure, nasty pleasure of it.
However, I would be willing to do things based solely on the whims of my partner, and would be turned-on simply by her being turned on, and expect her to appreciate that.
However, if she were to do the same for me, it would diminish my enjoyment.
Weird, huh?
But, yeah, you wanna know specifics, lemme know. This blog is starved for comments . . ..

(Sidenote: Along the same lines as above hang-ups, if I am flirting with a girl, I get a giddy little thrill from disclosing details of my sexual exploits. If a girl does the same, it is an instant turn off. It might only be if she's discussing current, ongoing partners. Maybe it has to do with the narrow-minded societal perception of promiscuous men as conquerors and promiscuous women as sluts. But I thought I beyond that  . . ..)


Speaking societal constraints: I was watching an episode of Soul Train recently. The Five Stairsteps were playing, doing a rendition of "O-o-h Child," one of their signature hits.
I was amazed by the weary, soulful beauty of Alohe, the eldest sister and lead singer, and saddened by the costumes the brothers had to wear. Why should they be forced to parade about in such gawdy nonsense? And they were all so skinny! I felt an almost maternal concern for them. I wanted to force food on them.
Still, without a doubt an awesome song.


All right.

There are a few topics left in my bag 'o' tricks, but I'll save them for another time.
The hour grows late and the tag team of Cannibus and Cabernet worked have worked their usual hay-maker on my consciousness.
I will leave you with a thought:

Human beings know themselves better than anyone else. We solicit opinions on our mental state, our strengths and weaknesses, our role, in the grand scheme of things, which archetypes we personify.
All psycho-analysis, even unprofessional attempts, comes not as a shock, but a reaffirmation.
We know who we are. When we seek outside opinions it is not because we are in the dark, but because we know and want our knowledge confirmed.

There.

Now I'm going to bed.

.

Brand Spanking New

In the sterile room, I lay as still as possible and stared at the halogen lamp on the ceiling.
The vinyl of the table was cool against my bare skin.
I tried to take deep, measured breaths; tried to calm myself.
There was no countdown, no warning. There was simply a flash of intense pain at my right shoulder. A curl of smoke trailed lazily into the air in front of my eyes. The room filled with the bitter scent of burning. The pain was of the sort that one usually experiences in a brief jolt. the reaction to such stimuli would under most circumstances be to pull away cursing and shaking. Instead, I remained perfectly still. The pain did not diminish, but it did become familiar. It was like an annoying co-worker: unpleasant, but, by necessity, tolerable.
Nor was the smell unpleasant. I had heard of cooking human flesh described as manifesting a sweet, savory scent, like roasted pork. And, indeed, when seasoned and slow-cooked in an oven, it might do so.
My flesh, however, when subjected to the saudering iron, produced a smell akin to bread left in the toaster too long.
Perhaps I have been starved of intimate contact for too long, but when the woman wielding the metal stylus, glowing hazard neon orange, leaned eagerly over my bare chest, resting her arm on my stomach, I felt overcome by a powerful emotion. It was not purely sexual arousal. Masochist though I may be, and tough guy thought I may aspire to be, the searing (literally searing) pain twisting its way across my shoulder prevented full tumescence, but there were elements of the sexual. Instead, it was a feeling of- for lack of a better word- comfort. It was similar, if comparisons must be offered, to the feeling not of desire for sex, but the tranquil glow which settles over one immediately following sex.
But the pain was ever present.
Have you ever held your hand on an oven, or over an open flame, for an extended period of time? Just to test your tolerance. Well, I have. I assume most people have. At some point the combination of the physical discomfort and the knowledge that such discomfort is entirely unnecessary, makes one pull away. In this case, the pain continued. And continued. And continued. As I say, it didn't decrease. It did not in any real sense change. Sure there were some nuances, due to how deep she was probing or where exactly she was -closest to the bone was the most sensitive. I could appreciated the subtlties. Oddly enough, it seemed to hurt more when I looked directly at it.
She was done far sooner than I imagined he would have been.
I glanced at her handiwork: the tool had gouged its way across my right deltoid, piercing several dermal layers. A set of three arrows, bent into an equilateral triangle, was etched into my skin.


Attraction is a mercurial devil, is it not?
There are so many tiny contributing factors - a baroque, clockwork array of shifting gears and triggers.
This body modification artist I went to see, por ejemplo. She was tattooed, pierced, and studded into unrecognizability. her youthful demeanor did much to mask the fact that she had stepped into early middle age, even distracting one from the grey strands in her crow's-feather-black hair. Her severe appearance did not entice instant desire. However, her professional attitude and the fact that she caressed me repeatedly before laying me shirtless on a table and incising my skin with a white-hot knife did much to stir fantansies.
I could not imagine myself kissing her, but a pleasing image of being strapped to the aforementioned table and beaten by her danced through my sub-conscious.
I must admit that even now, shoulder bandanged and gnawing at me with a nagging, radiating sting, I can see how body modification addictions arise. I would love to get another one. The pain opened the door to a peculiar level of intimacy between self and tormentor. And it made me aware in a primal way of my physical existence.
Pain in a sexual context is more manifoldly complex. I appreciate it for the above reasons, but also because it implies a power disparity. It is not the pain itself I desire, but the knowledge that someone has the power over me to cause me pain if they see fit.

Where was I?

Attraction.

You may remember that in a past post that I commented on a girl in my botany class. I was attracted until I saw how young she was and, soon after, how dizzy and naive she was. Well, I found myself walkng beside her on our way to class one morning, both of us a little late. I held the door for her and as she passed me into the stairwell I caught, along with the over-arching sweetness of her perfume, a playful, piquant whiff of marijuana. She had been smoking before school. This explained her vacant gaze during lecture. The rebelliousness this scent implied brought me 'round again, one-eighty. I found her definitively attractive again, and sorry I had overlooked her hidden depths.
Also that day I caught sight of a woman walking by in some sort of uniform. Not Camp Po. It was simple black fatigues, but the demeanor of assured authority set my heart a'racing.
Women, so I'm told, love a man in uniform. Some have speculated that this is because women, far-sighted and forever practical, love a man with a job. I believe it is for the original reason. Women crave authority. I do not wish to be sexist here. From what I know of the sex they are a mess of layered dominance and submissiveness. Men are, I believe, one or the other.
Also at HCC: I was in the library recently. While browsing the mythology section I noticed a lanky female trot up the stairs and enter the stacks. While soaked with what is termed geek-chic, she was still not quite my cup of meat. However, when I saw her notice and make a bee-line for a graphic novel interpretation of George R.R. Martin's Game of Thrones I nearly creamed my jeans then and there.
Likewise, I have noticed of late a bevvy of broads who, though physically appetizing, displayed something about their demeanor which indicated haughtiness, or callousness, or lack of depth and made me instantly repulsed.

Of late, I have been imagining myself, in my leisure moments, in the company of various girls (now, I realize that they are women both by legal definition and maturity of manner, but might prefer, for divers reasons, to be called "girls") of my acquaintance. I'll be reclining, supine, on my bed, stripped to my skivvies, and will let my thoughts wander to fantasies of them straddling me lustily, or playfully tickling the sole of one foot on their way into the other room. Anyway . . . with most of them, the fantasy soon shrivels up and dies after that, owing to the fact that I cannot see it progressing much further than the obligatory intercourse. One girl, though . . .
You know, in the Renaissance, artists would often insert people they knew into the backgrounds. The Disciples ate The Last Supper, for instance, might have all been acquaintances of Leonardo.
Well, if you have a crush on someone, I feel the same event occurs, but unintentionally. Your thoughts dwell on someone, for instance. Every other thought. All day. It becomes rather incessant. Anyway . . . you are thinking about an adored person. You hear a song. Ache for You, for instance, by Ben Lee. Why, this song is about us, you think. In fact, every song you hear seems to be about this person. Every apt character in every book. But, is this infatuation? Is your subconscious simply inserting a known quantity into these archetypes? Or is it something deeper?
And it has a snowball effect.
You're thinking about them. You hear a song. You project them onto this. It makes you think of them more. You hear another song . . .

Ugh. Attraction.

What a day. Up early. Photo shoot for my Costume-a-thon at the restaurant. Gym. House hunt frivolities. Class. Branding. Purchasing show tickets. Gym. Yoga. Home.
A bottle of wine and several helpings of frittata later and I am nearly concussed with alcohol and fatigue.
Yoga was intense this evening.
I attempted to show off to the instructrix - as futile an endeavor as trying to out-run Usain Bolt - and am now racked with muscle aches. Were I to engage in coitus at this moment (and I grant you that is an astronomically remote eventuality) it would be confined to cow-girl, or reverse cow-girl - a position my ex was not keen on, sadly. I think I would have enjoyed it. There's a naughty anonymity to the procedure. I can picture myself now, slipping a saliva-lubricated thumb into her anus  . . . something I only attempted once. Slipping a tongue into her anus, now that's another matter . . ..
Or lazy doggy-style. Oddly enough, my second-favortie position. Think missionary, but with the receiving partner on their stomach. I appreciate the raunchiness of doggy-style, with the added intimacy of your bodies pressed against each other, the ability to kiss her neck or nibble her ear . . .

I am deeply in my cups at this stage and need to focus. . .


I have recently started watching ALIAS, J.J. Abrams's second effort in television. It is thus far superior to LOST both in narrative cohesion and character depth.
It is difficult to watch, however, because it was the favorite show of an dear ex-friend and I cannot watch an instant of it without thinking of her.
There is a moment in the first season when the heroine, weak from physical and emotional trauma, kisses a friend of hers. This friend, played by Bradley Cooper, has feelings for her. I know that we're supposed to feel empathy for the heroine, Sydney (Jennifer Garner). But the jaded male in me can only watch it and think, "You bitch." You know he loves you. Don't entice him. The poor bastard winds up by the end of the season beaten and tortured, in the hands of the enemy, all due to his devotion to Sydney.
And the fact that my relationship with the friend who used to watch this show ended when I poored my heart out to her only to have it picked up and discared like a used Kleenex, forever stunting my emotional involvement with others all hits rather close to home.

 . . .

Damn. I need to get to bed.
Parents' Weekend kicks off tomorrow.
Wish me luck, of Best Beloveds.
'Night, night.

Complex Inferiority

So here I am, friends, two glasses of Malbec to the wind. Panty-waist that I am, I could now be described as "being in my cups" at this point.
Sidenote: Not sure where the term panty-waist comes from, but I must admit I get a giddy little thrill from wearing women's underwear.
Anyway, here I sit. Wedged in a corner of the Thirsty Mind, sipping my wine and listening to the SB Powers Band chirp Bill Withers's Lean on Me. The SB Powers Band is comprised of several teenage girls of moderate musical ability, but one cannot fault them for their choice of song.
Thursdays are open microphone nights at The Thirsty. They are also my one more-or-less guaranteed free night each week. As such, I am making it a habit of coming here, listening to the well-meaning Open Mikers and guzzling mediocre wine. Every so often I haul my lazy hands atop the key-pad and manage to update this rattle-trap blog.
I have made two attempts this week to follow-up my last prosey post with some original fiction, but to no avail. I have decided that in the interests of keeping this peace train a'rollin', it is better to just trot out some gratuitous observations and detail the last few weeks of my humdrum existence. Quantity over quality, for now.

I was driving down the highway a few days ago and I was saddened to observe a dead fox in the break-down lane. The creature was not visibly damaged; its back was too me, but its fiery coat was clean and unmarred and the corpus seemed intact. I was singing aloud at the time -- sans musical accompaniment, for, alas, my car radio is on the blink, and has been for quite some time -- and the sight of this tragedy halted the song in my throat, replacing it with a startled curse. It occured to me that there are far too many people in the world, and far too few foxes.

Of late, I have been watching some of George Carlin's stand-up on Netflix. Hard to believe that the old man's been gone for four years now.
I was never his biggest fan; I found his material either needlessly complicated, as in his dissection of the English language ("She told me to get on the plane. Screw you, bitch, I'm getting in the plane!), or needlessly crude, or needlessly pessimistic. I thought he was an violent, virulent, over-appreciated cynic. I was right about everything save his being over-appreciated. If anything, he gets nowhere near the credit he deserves. Dark and angry though he may have been, he was a necessary voice in the world, and a comedic genius. He drew no lines. Nothing was off-limits or above criticism. He meted out tirades in his gravelly voice, eyes bulging like a Maori war chief, on every subject imaginable. He was anti-theistic and politically non-partisan.
What upsets me somewhat, looking back on his HBO specials, was his audience. I would expect a legion of scowling, black-clad hipsters, cheering raucously at every invective he launched against the establishment. Instead, his audience looks to be comprised of exactly the slack-jawed, overweight, over-privileged dopes he skewers so ruthlessly in his shows. The audience members do not look cool enough to appreciate Carlin.
Then again, in his shows he lambasted the very groups I mention as being his ideal audience. The self-righteous and painfully hip.
By his death, he had become a force, a symbol, to shake people out of their apathy, to make them look around and question the paradigm. He stood for no group in such broad terms, but could be the template for the angry everyman. Each lone howler banging his or her head against mores and customs and blind acceptance.
I got off lucky, never caring enough about him while he lived to be upset at his death, and now coming to appreciate him in hindsight, having already come to terms with his passing.

I started classes today. I am excited for the Fall semester and the Fall in general. It was a decent summer, at least in terms of the weather. We were robbed of both the tail-end of Autumn and the peak of Winter last year. I have such hopes that 2012 will be more archetypically, primally New England.
My first class is a botanical lab science covering the plants native to the Northeast. The professor, Erica Bergquist (which seems a good name for an academic . . . it just came to me why I appreciate that name. There is a journalist in the Dragon Tattoo series of novels by Steig Larsson named Erica Berger. Her lover, and co-protagonist of the series is named Mikhail Blomqvist) is a Department chair. This is her only class for the semester, and it is also her pet project at HCC, something she's been trying to get off the ground for decades. She is obviously excited as all get-out to be teaching it, and this adds a great deal to the experience for me. We had our first field lab today, spent hiking the substantial woodlands which abut the campus, identifying local flora. Very informative, and I found myself thinking of plants by their Latin names on my walk back to the car.

In the classroom today, I was seated next to two young girls. I was unobtrusively oogling one girl's delicate ankles, which peeked from above her low-top, bubblebum pink Chuck Taylors, and did not notice her face.
When I finally looked up as she declared herself present for roll-call, I was astonished to see how young she looked -- seemingly barely into her teens. (I have no doubt, based on her subsequent questions and comments, that she was at least eighteen. There is no way that that brain-trust skipped any grades.) But, in addition to making me feel old, it drained all the slowly amassing blood from my weiner. I could not imagine a greater turn-off. I suppose the qualities I look for in a girl come mainly from years spent on this planet: confidence, self-awareness, sense of humor, acceptance of forces greater than oneself. I did not care to imagine her giggling about the newest Jonas Brothers CD or her favorite color of Abercrombie nail polish.

The Holyoke Community campus is cause for much angry divisiveness amongst the faculty, students, and staff.
Built in the 1970's, it is a sterling example of a school of archictecture known as "brutalism." This evolved from modernism, and initially was used for low-cost housing and efficient government buildings, but designers saw some stark beauty in the right angles and exposed, textured concrete and its use expanded. Now, this is not for everyone, and I myself must admit that when used for one, free-standing structure, brutalism is a bit of an obnoxious bore. However, in the HCC campus, the five main buildings are all interconnected by a series of underground tunnels and airy sky-bridges. Indeed, it is possible to get from any building on campus to any other without setting foot outside. The numerous courtyards and tiered walkways create a sense of fluidity to the otherwise blocky layout. (It is also a common complaint that there are far too many sets of stairs. I'll agree, the campus has more steps than an M.C. Escher painting, but I enjoy the tiered structure.)
In short, the complex possesses the sturdy, fortress-like presence of brutalism, but manages a modicum of grace and intricacy.
The whole effect is akin to that of a '70's sci-fi vision of a Utopian society. All tinted glass and beige concrete. Peering out of the floor-to-ceiling windows in the sky bridges down at the shifting masses of brightly garbed youths, walking in pairs or loitering in small groups, one cannot help but feel transported to some (from a 1975 viewpoint) far-off year, like 2012 . . .
It's like I'm going to school in Logan's Run . . . or A Clockwork Orange, depending on my mood.

I found out recently that my ex-girlfriend and forever friend/beloved Rebecca is seeing someone new. He's a goofy-looking individual, but no more so than me, I guess. And he's a strapping lad. She won't tower over him when wearing heels, at least, as she did with me.
Now, I had hoped that she would be the first to enter into a new relationship post-break-up. And so she has. So, despite the fact that I was the initiating party in the termination of our arrangement (read: dumper), I find myself struck by pangs of jealousy and -- completely without merit -- injustice.
(Based on what I've seen on Facebook -- not stalking, mind you. I only reflect on what is plastered across my unavoidable Newsfeed -- they have gone hiking at a State Park I took her too, and visited a historical museum on one of the Boston Harbor Islands that she took me too. Granted, they live in the Boston-Metro area, and the aforementioned destinations are by no means uncommon, but still . . . unoriginal much? What's next, Mike's Corn Maze in Sunderland? can either of you come up with a date plan that she and I haven't explored already? The sheer egotistical part of my addled mind thinks that she has been planning these outings and posting photos of them to needle me.)
(I know this sounds small and frightfully petty, and it is. After the break-up I found myself beset by completely -- blashemously so -- feelings of animosity towards her. As if, though my higher-brain wanted desperately for her to get over me as soon as possible (even before I got over her, which I'm still not sure I am), my lizard brain was outraged that she could continue her existence without me.)
I have a half-suspiscion that she reads this blog (and, true to humanity's fatally, nonsensically paradoxical psychology, would be disappointed to find out that she didn't read it). And as such, I get a masochistic little tingle thinking that she might be reading this now, and will know how she still affects me.
Good for you, babe, if you are reading this.


So there's this barista at The Thirsty Mind who I rather fancy. I have had several flirtatious exchanges with her, but never worked up the courage -- or found the right moment -- to ask her out. I am hindered in my romantic machinations due to the shifting schedule of the coffee-maestros at this cafe. I have only a vague sense of when she will be working. I came here tonight because she had had this shift in the past. While she was not this night engaged in dishing-up espressos, she was in attendance, as a member of the clientele. We said hello, and she joked about having taken my spot in a nook near the door.
I thought Fate had given me this opportunity, the two of us, meeting on neutral ground, without the awkward barrier of the counter, so that I could finally make my proposition. Unsurprisingly, Fate allowed me to sit and watch her -- with an uncluttered view -- meet a fellow in a blazer and proceed to go out to dinner.
Now! I know some of you, imagined audience, are thinking, "poor, Richard." I thank you for your sympathy, but give me a goddamn minute to finish!
I was hesitant to ask this strumpet out because I thought she was currently involved with someone. And when I saw this horse-faced bounder enter the cafe and escort her out, after laughing way to loud at her jokes, my first thought was, "I was right, she is in a committed relationship."
However, my normally non-existent powers of deduction made a rare appearance, allowing me to notice several key factors of their dialogue.
One, they were both dressed way too nicely for anything other than a first date or an anniversary. Based on their lack of displayed affection and their general unease around one another, it was the former. Backing this up were the bounder's obviously faked laughing at her minor jokes, and their stilted banter. The lady remarked to her co-worker as she left that this marked the first time she'd been out in a month.
I left shortly after them to look for my headphones in my car, and noticed as they walked away that they did not hold hands, nor rub elbows, and maintained a thick bubble of no-man's-space betwixt them, despite sharing an umbrella (out of necessity, due to rain).
Now my practice around other males is usually avoidance. I step out of the way if another fella makes a move on a girl I like. I divide most other men in my age group into several categories: unknown quantities, equals, or superiors. Equals, people I know well enough to have a grasp of their strengths and weaknesses, are mostly friends of mine. Unknowns are men whom my short-bus-riding perception denies me adequate details to shift into the other two columns, and superiors are men who in three human qualifiers (physical, mental, emo-spiritual) are recognizably better than me. I remain quiet around the three aforementioned groups either due to natural submission or a desire to avoid confrontation (even if I'm sure I'd emerge triumphant -- recall several posts ago, my mention of garnering the attention of a contested female, only to stop short of consumation due to apathy.)
Anyway, there is a rare fourth category: Inferiors.
You'd think that for someone as narcissitic as m'self, this would be the biggest category. But, recall, gentle, imaginary reader, that I am the most unobservant person I know. There might very well be a greater population of males I consider inferior, but I am too dimwitted to recognize them.
What I'm driving at is, this fellow who took the barista out to dinner was that rarest of males: an inferior. It takes someone special to make me feel like a suave he-man, and this bloke did so in spades.
(I often feel like a supporting character in my own life, but this guy made me feel like a leading man).

(I know, that all this analysis makes me sound crazy and obsessive, and maybe I am, but keep in mind how fast the human mind -- at least my human mind -- operates. All the above nonsense, which took you minutes to read and me a quarter of an hour to write, occurred in seconds.)

I was able to further discern from the barista's dialogue with her co-worker that her next shift will be Saturday morning.

Now, recall the last post. A certain lady I was courting was . . . shall we say, entertaining other offers on the side. At first this came as a shock to me, so unfamiliar with the dating scene as I am. But now I am glad my eyes were opened. It made me see how insubstantial a mere "date" is to the majority of my generation, God bless their attention-deficient, morally-lacking souls.

In the past, this revelation of Barista's involvement with another guy would have queered my pursuit and sent me into a minor depressive state of binge-eating and Netflix-induced stupidity. On the contrary, this time. It has only served to strengthen my resolve. I will continue with my current fitness regimen and on Saturday will make my intentions known!

Stay tuned for further details.

Preux Chevalier

He thrilled to the rush and rumble of the motorcycle's engine as they sped - man and machine - along the winding counrty road. To his left, the sun was slowly setting. Intermittent flashes of golden light as the sun flashed through the trees captured his silhouette on his right. His shadow was long and lean and intrepid, astride the bike and leaning ever forward. He wised he were as heroic looking as that shadow. After a time, the steady hum of the motor and the shush of the wind through his helmet lulled him and left him in a meditative mood. He turned his thoughts to a certain night, weeks past, and his mouth tightened in a small, rueful smile.

After rushing through his nightly duties, scrubbing and scouring and sweeping the kitchen, he had changed out of his soiled chef's attire and managed to join her at the bar. Her petite frame - small, but womanly - was hugged by a sheer lavendar summer dress, low-cut to emphasize her impressive breasts. The dress stopped daringly short around mid-thigh, and her bare legs drew his attention; shapely calves glowed in the dim light of the bar, tapered to thin ankles, pretty toes wiggled in white thong sandals. He took the bar stool next to hers and furiously racked his brain for something charming to say.

Forced conversation led to a few scattered opportunities to make her giggle with substanceless jokes. Eventually it was decided that the staff would attempt a rare company social outing - drinks at a notorious dive bar the next town over. After some prodding, she agreed to ride with him.

Silence held sway on the ride over. He had given hours of thought over to exactly what to say and how to say it, but found himself unable to utter the words now that the moment had arrived.
"I really like hanging out with you," he could almost hear himself saying. "I've had a great time on our two dates. I just feel that we're at an awkward stage right now, a limbo kinda. We just need to make one little jump to get more comfortable." He couldn't imagine how, but at this point he planned to slide an arm around her waist and draw her close. His hand would gently cup the side of her face as he leaned in to press his lips to hers. As it was, they chatted aimlessly about work and the weather, or watched the quiet, night-time town roll past the car window.

He parked up the street from the bar and they made their way under streetlights, past crumbling brick tenaments, to the raucous alehouse. Abruptly, she halted. She rubbed at her face.
"Okay, we need to talk."
Good, he thought dumbly. I'm glad she broached the topic.
"I'm so chicken shit when it comes to saying this kinda thing . . ." she began, looking everywhere but in his eyes.
Go on, he thought. Maybe she'll end up saying it all for me.
"I think you want more from this than I do," she said at last.
That wasn't what I was expecting . . . he thought.
"I'm happy just hanging out and being friends."
In retrospect, it's a good thing I was so gutless. If I'd have spoken I would have made an ass of myself.
He nodded, numb, a vapid smile fixed on his face.
"I hope that's okay with you." She smiled nervously and tottered a bit, succumbing to the alcohol.
Okay with me? Nice of you to say, but what choice do I have other than acceptance, short of rape? It had damned well better be okay with me. Women . . .. Just don't say that you understand. You always say "I understand," or "Oh, understandable," when faced with rejection. You slur it, too, and sound like an idiot.
"Oh, I understand," he said, kicking himself.
"Are you sure?" she frowned.
He was nearly overcome by a desire to force her against the damp, red brick wall, look fiercely into her eyes, and tell her "No."
No, I'm not sure. I want you. I was convinced you wanted me. We're young, we're fit, let's not let these bodies go to waste. Let's not allow thought to get in the way of this.
He pictured slowly sliding a hand up between her smooth, inviting thighs, pushing the lavendar dress aside like a stage curtain and feeling the warm moist spot between her legs. He envisioned cupping her breast in his other hand, not roughly, but firmly. Assertive in every way he was not. He would kiss her face, the gentle curve where her jaw met her throat, her pink ear a slowly blossoming rose, and continue to kiss down her neck. He could almost taste her skin, sweet and salty, and hot as sun-warmed stone at dusk, feel the pusling in her cartoid artery. He would linger on her perfectly formed clavicle. She would arch her back and bite his ear lobe, grasping at his hair with eager little fingers, pulling him closer, whispering breathy pleas . . .
"Of course I'm sure," he said, tipping out of his reverie. "Shall we?" he indicated the pool of sallow light beneath the bar's chipped sign.
She smiled again, relieved, and stumbled off the sidewalk.
He extented an arm, which she took, and they crossed the street.

He had indulged himself with a gin and tonic, feeling like a bit of nancy for ordering such a drink in front of the beer-swilling clientele. Even she had gotten a Bud Light . . ..
She was watching the Red Sox on the bar flat-screen with a glazed intensity, chatting with a tag-along customer from the restaurant. He ordered a soda water, excused himself and made his way outside.

The summer evening air was sweltering. The bass thrum of the bar's juke was not so evident out here, amongst the picnic tables and paper lanterns (some of which still worked). The sounds of distant sirens, reggae and Carribean beats, and domestic squabbles served as a backdrop to the din of drunken conversation.

He found his friends seated around a far table and leaning against the wall of the bar, chatting lazily.
"There he is," announced Ed, the restaurant manager, looking a good deal less formal than he had that evening, now clad in a wrinkled white tee and holding a beer bottle. Ed wrapped a solicitous arm around his shoulders and pulled him into a boisterous half-hug. "And where's your lady love?" Ed inquired.
"Ah, she found the game more riveting than my conversation, I guess. I needed some air."
"Plenty of that out here," the manager claimed, and drew two lungfulls. He burst into a coughing fit. "Canal mist, oil fumes, cigarette smoke. Enjoy."
He smiled genuinely for the first time that evening.

Sometime later, someone asked after her.
"Inside, watching the game," he intoned.
"Is she alone?" one of the waitresses wanted to know.
"There are other people at the bar . . ." he ventured.
They began to fuss, so he pried himself off the wall and stumbled back inside.
She was already gone by the time he got to her spot, but had left her purse. He scooped it off the bar, casting suspiscious looks left and right, ordered a water, and returned to his friends. He found her chatting amiably to someone a few tables over, her hand on his chest. Pretending to ignore this, he resumed his perch near Ed and somehow the two of them became embroiled in a discussion of the French monarchy.
"Phillip II was the Crusader King," he insisted. "He was on the Third Crusade with Richard I and Frederick the Barbarosa."
"Saint Louis, Louis IX was the Crusader King," Ed argued. "He's my namesake."
"Well, what family was he from? Was he a Capetian or a Carolingian? Did they repeat names in separate dynasties, or retire them like jersey numbers?"
The assembled company groaned.
Let them groan, he thought. I won't bed any of them, I don't care if I impress them with charm or wit. Let them at least think I'm smart.
"You guys are too much," Jackie complained. "Stop talking about history or philosophy or whatever . . ."
"Jackie, men are talking," he said, to further hoots of indignation from the women.
He did not notice her return until she was directly in front of him.
"Thanks for getting my purse," she said, and spun slowly, presenting her back to him. She plucked her beer off the table and leaned against him. "What are you guys up to?"
"Rich and Ed were discussing history and stuff," Jess said dismissively.
She giggled.
Conversation slowly turned to work, sports, and weekend plans. He took a back seat.
She reached her arm back and her hand traced up his cheek. It settled on the back of his neck, limp and affectionate as a tired puppy. her other hand alternately groped for her beer and reached behind her to hook a few fingers in his belt loop.
He unobtrusively switched her beer out for the water he'd ordered for her from the bar and watched her drink a few sips. He finished her beer.

Eventually, she decided it was time to go, and began to lead him away by the hand.
"Have fun, you two," called Erin, smirking.
Good, he thought.  I won't fuck her tonight, or ever, but they might think I did. He was by no means opposed to rumors spreading, feeling both desperate for the respect of his kitchen co-workers, and a trifle vindictive.
They made their way back to the car. He held her door open and helped her in.
They drove back more or less in silence.
"I had too much to drink," she declared.
"We all do, from time to time." He kept his eyes on the road and not on the way her dress was sliding up her thighs as she slouched in the passenger seat.
"Oh no, George . . ." she said.
What now, he thought. Some other guy?
"My car," she went on.
"You named your car 'George'? Isn't it customary for ships and other modes of conveyance to be feminine?"
"Fuck that. Everyone says that to me. All my guy friends, anyway. I'm giving my car a boy's name."
"Fair enough," he conceded.
"I left it in the parking lot at work."
She was quiet a moment.
"I'll just have to walk there tomorrow morning and get it. I have to be at my other job at nine a.m.."
He said nothing to that.
They arrived at her condo. Not soon enough, as far as he was concerned. He helped her to the door.
Immediately upon entering she stumbled into the bathroom. He wandered into the kitchen, poured her a glass of water, and cursed himself for a pervert at the little thrill he got from the sound of her urinating.
Christ, what's wrong with me?
She exited the w.c. and leaned awkwardly against the wall.
"Time for bed?" he asked.
She nodded weakly.
A few steps up the staircase she collapsed in a limp, warm bundle.
"Or dear," she muttered.
'Oh dear'? She might be the most adorable drunk I've ever seen.
He hoisted her to her feet and, her arm around his shoulders, helped her up the stairs to her room.
He gave her a few more sips of water and laid her down on the bed. She had kicked off her sandals at the first landing on the stairs. He briefly considered stripping her out of her dress to make her more comfortable, but shook himself out of that line of thought. Leaving the phone and water by her bedside, he began to back out of the room.
"Don't go," she said, plaintive, and half into her pillow.
He stopped, sighed, began to unlace his boots.
Other than regarding footwear, he remained completely clothed. He gingerly stepped around piles of dirty clothes, throw pillows, and odd shoes and clambered onto the bed beside her. He assumed the Big Spoon position, as was his preogative as the male half of the sketch, and caressed her bare arm with a tentative, calloused hand.
Her breaths were deep and slow, and he took her to be dozing, when quite out of nowhere, she began to sob.
Great, a crying drunk. That's all I need.
"Hey, now," he whispered, "what's wrong?"
"I'm sorry," she managed, breathless. "I'm sorry.
"It's okay, jeez. Don't be sorry."
"No, I'm sorry," she sniffed. "I'm a terrible person."
"That's not true."
"I'm a terrible person," she insisted.
"Listen to me," he said, completely at a loss as to the cause of this outburst, but experienced enough with crying women to not be too caught off guard. "You are a funny, interesting, intelligent, beautiful person. It's okay. It's okay."
"It's not okay! Stop telling me it's going to be okay."
He was quiet. He found himself strangely calm and unaffected. Here he was, curled up next to a weeping co-worker, the two of them drunk. His friends had seen him leave with her, there were sure to be rumors. This was about as intense at the drama was likely to get in a small bistro in a sleepy hamlet. And yet he was utterly serene. He had no vested interest in the way this turned out. Now that a relationship with the girl was off the table, he could sit back and watch this trainwreck unfold. Still, he didn't want her to cry. Like all men worth a damn he was sorely affected by the tears of the fairer sex. And he was more sensitive and caring than most.
He resumed massaging her arm.
"No I will not. It is okay. It will be okay. You're an awesome person."
"You're too good to me . . ."
He had heard this before. Many times. From all the women he remained a loving friend too but would never become physically intimate with.
"No, no I'm --"
"And I'm horrible to you."
He chuckled.
"How are you horrible?"
Sure, he had taken her on two nice dates, spending his hard-earned cash and not receiving so much as a peck on the cheek, but that could hardly be considered an atrocity. Where was this coming fro--
"I slept with someone. While we were dating. Last Saturday, after that party."
Well, that came as a shock.
He had perceived her as a timid, almost prudish girl. He had had trouble describing to her two ice louges sculpted in the shape of certain anatomical parts. Looking back now he realized she probably assumed he was the prudish one, tip-toeing around sexual language. He recalled the jibes his co-workers had launched at him the Saturday in question.
"She hasn't returned your call because she was having trouble talking with two cocks in her mouth," Jake had said, smiling.
At the time, still thinking her a goody-goody, he had laughed it off, like all rude kitchen banter. He smiled ruefully now realizing how near the mark Jake had been.
"I'm a slut," she said.
Even now he found himself tranquil.
"You are not a slut," he said forcibly. "You were just having fun. You were doing what you wanted to do. There's no shame in that. It's not like we were going steady."
She sniffed.
"You're too good to me . . ."
I might be, at that.
"Hey, I get something out of this, too" he said. "I get to spend the night curled up next to a gorgeous girl. That's fair compensation."
She giggled.
"I'm just sad you never got to see my six pack," he muttered drunkenly.
"We'll see . . ."
They lapsed into silence.
"It's hot up here," she said, at last.
"Yeah, it is."
"I wanna go to the basement."
"You . . . do you have a bed in your basement?"
She laughed again. "I do have a bed in my basement. I'll show it to you."
He got up from the bed and helped her to her feet. She grabbed her purse -- something she wouldn't remember doing and he didn't notice at the time, which would come back to haunt them the next day. She was unsteady on her feet and slumped back on the bed with an exasperated sigh.
He sighed himself. This was becoming absurd, but one was either preux chevalier, or one was not. He Scooped her up into his arms and carried her out of her bedroom and down the two flights of stairs to the basement.


There was indeed a bed in the basement. It was dark and cool. He got her another glass of water and curled up behind her atop the covers. They dozed for a time, her arm curled around again, rubbing the back of his neck. He moved on from rubbing her arm to rubbing her side, her flat stomach, her hip. After a while he realized, alarmed, that her dress had ridden up well past her waist and he was caressing bare skin. His rough fingertips were stroking the silky curve where thigh joined hip joined body - one of his favorite spots on the female body. He was massaging the smooth front of her thigh, felt the thin taut line of her thong, ran his hand over the warm, creamy roundness of her ass cheek, and then stopped himself.
Preux chevalier!
She wouldn't sleep with him. She would never be his, never hold his face in hers and kiss him in public. Never smile, her eyes alight with secrets when she saw him. All he had was his dignity, his honor. Such a stupid, antiquated notion. That was all he could salvage from this.
He smoothed her dress back down and rested his hand on her shoulder.
I wonder how she'd react if I slowly rolled her onto her back, slid her dress back up and her panties down and ran my tonque between her nether-lips. Alternating slow, broad strokes covering every sweet inch of her nectar-dripping flower with shorter, more vigorous flicks centered on the sensitive pearl between the petals. Her hand around my neck, her plea for me not to leave. Perhaps she'd be pleasantly surprised . . .
No! She's not in her right mind. She's well under the influence now. Any intimacy under the circumstances would be as good as forced.
"I feel sick," she said.
Preux chevalier . . ..


He carried her back up the steps and through the living room and down the hallway to the bathroom. Positioning her carefully in front of the bowl, he sat down to wait, loath to leave her lest she have need of having her hair held back.
"Oh dear," she muttered.
Her nicely formed limbs were all in a tangle, one arm across the seat and her head resting on that arm. Her eyes were closed. He was surprised at how pretty she looked under the circumstances, and told her so.
She giggled.
"Don't . . . don't tell Ed about this," she said. "I don't want him to know how drunk I was . . .."
"You're not that drunk," he lied.
"Does he already know? Will he be mad?"
"He doesn't know."
Shows how little she knows the staff at work. This escapade might make her rise in their estimation.
"We all get drunk from time to time," he assured her. "I made a royal ass of myself at two company Christmas parties in a row."
"Really? You got drunk?"
"Sloshed. I propositioned a different member of the waitstaff at each party. Neither went for it . . ."
When he recalled this episode, glossing over most of the details, to his friend at work, he was chided for not taking advantage of it.
"She was all bent over the toilet, man. Ready to go," Jake had said.
"She was drunk and like to be sick."
"Pity you missed it. There's nothing quite like fucking a a girl while she wretches. The way her stomach contracts, gives you a marvelous little squeeze down there . . ."
After a while, when it was clear that she wasn't going to be sick, he carried her back into the living room.
"You can leave me here . . ." she said, and waved a languid hand at the futon.
He set her down as gently as if she'd been made of crystal, and started to walk away.
"You're leaving me?"
He sat down on the floor, his back to the couch seat.
"Where'd you go?" she asked, sounding surprisingly worried.
"I'm right here. I didn't go anywhere."
He tipped his head back so that it rested in her lap, took her hand, and draped in over his chest so that she'd know where he was.
They stayed like that until she fell asleep.


He got groggily to his feet, stretching his sore neck. He scouted around for her keys, having made up his mind on what he had to do.


Back outside at his car, having locked her door behind him, he stripped down to his briefs, hoping no neighbors were up and about at three of the clock. He grabbed his gym bag from the trunk and slid on his shorts, laced his sneakers, and clipped on his iPod.
Stuffing her keys in his pocket, he chose the Playlist that featured a lecture on Ancient Greek Tragedy and set off toward the restaurant. Preux chevalier . . ..

The cool, damp night air kissed his skin as he built up speed. His feet flicked lightly over the asphalt. His arms pumped. His chest heaved. He breathed deep the scents of fresh-cut grass and night-blooming flowers.
He thought back to the girl, curled up on the futon in her living room, breathing quietly.
He thought of her body, poorly concealed under the thin dress.
He wondered what his friends would have done in his place.
What would Ed have done? That horndog misogynist. Would he have pushed aside her flacid arms and entered her while she half-dozed? He thought that sounded more than likely.
Does that make me weak? Did I do the wrong thing.
If only she had had a little bit less to drink. She might have been loose enough to appreciate some physcical connection, but not so completely out of it to make it nearly date rape.

Panting and sore, he touched up outside George three miles and twenty minutes later.
His body glistened with sweat. His nipples were hard. His head was clear. The alcohol had burned away with the run, leaving him awake and aware.
He slid into George, chuckled at how tight the fit was, and adjusted the seat.
I also get to drive a new Beetle. Hurrah for new experiences. The night's not a total loss.

He parked her car in her spot and placed her keys on the end table near her head. He considered leaving a note, but decided a surprise might be a better.
He cast one last look at her, arms folded up under her breasts, nearly spilling them from her dress. Legs gently splayed. Bare feet resting on a throw pillow.
What if I were to kneel at the opposite end of the couch and gently suck her toes? Would she wake up and smile slyly at me? Would she even remember?
Enough! Jeez, you hapless, hopeless pervert! Just leave!


He returned the next morning to find her freshly showered. Her hair wet and clinging to her bare shoulders.
"Coffee?" he asked, handing her the cup he'd bought her at the convenience store down the road.
He'd wanted to make sure she didn't miss work. It had been he, after all, who left her far from phone and alarm clock.
"I really don't remember anything about last night," she said.
Was she being truthful, or was she giving them both an easy out, avoiding an awkward discussion.
"Yeah, we were both pretty worn out."
"Uh . . . sure, worn out. Well, I guess our friendship has gone to a new level . . .."
She spread her arms for a hug.
No! Not a hug. The lamest concilation prize to be had from a girl. Show her you don't need her touch. You're beyond physical contact. No false sentiment. Chilled steel!
Still, that might hurt her feelings  . . .
He went along with the hug.

Have a Glass of Whine

Good evening.
I have positioned myself at a tiny pink desk in my cluttered room, directly in front of a dusty mirror. This is more strategic than you might think. The slightly claustrophobic effect the princess desk amidst the labyrinth of boxes and hampers and books and weights seems to almost force the words out of me like a wine-press. The mirror provides me with a focus point and a subject of inspiration. I am particularly vain, you see. For the most part, I dislike myself. I possess the same degree of self-loathing as most humans. I am constantly surrounded by images of unattainable beauty which I cannot hope to attain. My mind is abuzz with a broiling mass of possibilities -- accomplishments and windfalls -- which I will never see through or be lucky enough to experience. I stammer and stutter and shy from confrontation. I am surrounded, at work and in my day-to-day activities by some of the most beautiful, intelligent, fascinating girl (women, I should say) I have ever met, and I skitter away from interaction with them like a cockroach from a kitchen light. I feel I'm wasting my potential.
But that, I suppose, is the key. Potential.
For I have as much misanthropy as I do self-loathing. I recognize that I do not get recognition and have not, from most standpoints, achieved success, but I despise most aspects of humanity and society, and so theorize that my situation is due as much to the world as to myself.
Wow. This has become a lot more free-range and maudlin than I originally anticipated. I blame the wine.
I have been more or less dry -- in solidarity with my lovably alcoholic brother -- for a few months now, outside of a shift rink here or there at work, and decided after a satisfying workout this evening, to relax and update my blog with a glass or four of wine. It's a dark, earthy red. Savory, almost. A Spanish Mouverdre. I had tried a French Mouvedre before, and found it jammy and perky. This is more smooth and subtle and agrarian. Didn't even know they grew this grape in Spain.
I've been a fan of blends as of late; no purist am I.
(Sidenote: My ex-girlfriend's favorite punctuation mark was a semi-colon and I loved her for it. I loved her for the fact that she even had a favorite punctuation mark.)
Anyway, the wine has loosened my fingers and thoughts, with the result that I am a shade expansive.
Wine was real big, as you might guess, in ancient Greece. I am listening to a series of lectures on the progression of Western Thought, the current cycle deals with the Hebrews and the Greeks. I listen to this partly out of curiosity and desire to improve my mind, but more so that I can sound uber-intellectual when people axe me what I am listening to. The followers of Bacchus were advocates of the lubricative properties of wine when used in philosophical discussions. I can see why.
Anyway! Fact is, I am constantly dissatisfied by my appearance, and yet not wholly repelled by it. I am, rather, attracted to it. I ham it up for the mirror, twirling my impressive new moustache and cocking alternating eyebrows. I simultaneously like and dislike the way I look, if that makes any sense. And the newly trimmed moustache is suh-weet.
A friend of mine recently deleted her Facebook profile, much to my chagrin, for I did so love stalking her profile for picture of her in belly-dancing costume. But I admire her decision. I hate Facebook. It irks me considerably to provide Zuckerberg with revenue. However, I cannot do without skimming through photos of myself, so captivated am I with my image. (I figure someone has to be.) Also, the tantalizing fact remains that I may get a message or a comment from a "Friend" at any point, no matter how remote the eventuality.


The air is redolent with the smell of oncoming rain. It is a deep, wild, promissory scent, and it invokes a feminine image in my mind. Granted, it's been a while since I've been able to appreciate any intimate womanly aroma, but the charged, pungent trace of wet grass and grey, water-laden clouds calls to mind that now far-off valley I can but recall through distant memory.
Christ I miss eating pussy.
There. I went all blunt and low-brow for those that I had left behind.
I was going to slip into a restless early-summer sleep but have decided to persevere and complete this blog entry.



I recently completed a little fourteen-miler trail race. It was in Stafford Springs, Connecticut, at the Reddington Rock Riding Club and the Shenipsit State Forest. The race is the home base of the Shenipsit Striders, the most represent running club in the circuit I run.
I had attempted it twice before and hadn't finished. The first time was when I was fat and lazy and I simply gave up. The second time I made a go I turned my ankle over twice and had to stop. I waited in a clearing at the half-way mark and chatted with a big, white-bearded Norwegian who was living in the Haite-Ashbury district of San Francisco in the Sixties and Seventies.
This time, though, I ran a decent race, trading spots with a brace of spandex-clad foxes and maintaining a respectable pace for most of the distance. The last two miles proved a challenge, but I was able to sprint the last hundred yards to the finish line. More importantly, I tired myself out. At some races I fail to push myself enough and finish with some fuel in the tanks, making the whole endeavor something a waste.
I do love these trail races -- the camaraderie and the warm wishes, the bursting, bulging riot of green all around, the chatting and joking with one's fellow runners. Then the trotting shuffle over the starting line. My favorite part of the race occurs when you cease to make glib remarks to those around you, tuck your head down, and gallop forward. All you're aware of is the soft scrape of shifting shale beneath your feet and the deep, heaving breaths, yours and your fellow runners.
I want to maintain a benevolent caring attitude towards my fellow runners, but a deep, primal, survivalist side of myself secretly thrills when I pass someone who has succumbed to cramps or shortness of breath. I take a malicious pleasure running by someone and knowing that they will not retake their position.
Wolves will kill deer not with their teeth but by running it across the tundra until its heart explodes. I think about doing that as I pursue the participants ahead of me.



I worry sometimes -- to return to the subject of missed opportunities -- that people will pass out of my life forever and I will not have experienced all that I could with them. Perhaps I didn't hang out with this fella, or ask this girl out. But then I think back on how my relationships have burned, flickered, and eventually re-lit.
A few years ago at the restaurant we hired a dude I had been best friends with in elementary school. Back then Rob was a fail asthmatic who liked doodling and ska music. Ten years later he's a burly, bearded snowboarder who listens to gangster rap, starts bar fights, and does every drug you can imagine. And our friendship rekindled in a week or so.
Years ago I met a college friend of my brother's, a curvaceous blonde with a wacky perspective on life and developed a crush on her. At the time I would never had guessed that she was friends with my future co-worker's future girlfriend and I would spend a pleasant night after a concert giving her a full-body massage, attempting to conceal a throbbing erection as I deftly manipulated her toes.
(Sidenote: Three of us went to the concert: me, my friend, and his friend. On the return trip, the friend's friend drunkenly bragged about how he would romance and bed this curvaceous blonde. I stayed quiet. When we got home he remained sullen in the corner while I straddled said blonde and kneaded her buttocks. I suppose I could have "closed" that evening, but one of my major failings -- and I have many -- is that if I discover I can achieve something I no longer care about it. It's enough to me that it is a solid possibility. Attainment is unnecessary. I am a perfectionist, but not the kind that will exhaustively finish every minute detail of a project. You know that saying, "if it's worth doing, it's worth doing right"? Well, I feel "if something can't be done right, it's not worth doing." Thus, if there's a chance I can't do something the best I can, I don't do it. Also, if I attempt something and realize I can do well at it, it no longer interests me. Not healthy, I know, but it's the way it is.)
And my ex-girlfriend and I first met on a student ambassadorial trip to Oceania (Australia and New Zealand). We were simply friends at the time, and I was too chubby and awkward to pursue anything. I would not have believed, had you told me at the time, that just seven years later we'd both be naked, me on my knees, gently tonguing her perineum, with her fingers in my hair.
So you never know when people will leave your life, but don't discount the possibility that they'll slide right back into it.
This follows along with my life-philosophy of one's best days always being ahead.
I feel the best day of your life has yet to happen. I feel this mostly because the alternative is suicide inducing. Of course the flip-side of this coin is that the worst day of your life has yet to come.
I suppose the best attitude to take is that every day has the potential to be the best day of your life, so try to live it to the fullest. But that thought makes me tired, trying every day to live life to the fullest. Plus, if you mess up one day, maybe that was supposed to be the day. Now it's gone. Plus, I find the best situations come spontaneously. You can't plan for things to work out. Just trust in your stars and go with the flow.





There is much more I wish to say, but my bottle is nearly empty and I would rather post than put this entry on hold on the off chance that I'll come back to it and finish some thoughts.
I want to touch on films I've seen and movies I've watched. I want to expound on, triggered by the comments of a friend who refused to consider the Tough Mudder because it'd be uncomfortable, on the transcendent properties of pain and fatigue. I want to try out a little fiction on y'alls.
Sadly, I haven't the time, nor the mental capacity after three glasses of wine (man, I'm a pantie-waste).
And so I bid you goodnight.
I am looking forward to the weekend very much. Workouts, work, and rubbing elbows with some of the loveliest waitstaff the restaurant has to offer.
I will type to you again soon.