Who Is Still Here?

 A quick show of hands.  Who is still following this blog?   (leave a comment)

I know it's a weird question since  the last time I posted was just over 5 years ago.  

Now that Facebook, Twitter and other social networks have taken over and people are not likely to get any notification when I do post here, I'm just wondering who actually swings buy here to check up?

Since I left Facebook in 2013 and stopped using Google+ a year before it was shutdown, I've been able to disappear in the consciousness of  the cyber-social world.  Also aided by the fact that this blog just won't show up in Internet searches without using very super specific search terms.   

 It's a dying platform anyway. 

I have no plans to deactivate or delete anything on here but I don't really have anything to say anymore.  This blog did serve its purpose as a place to find my voice, but I'm now content and comfortable with who I am and I don't feel any need to talk about my troubled past.  It's, well, in the past.  I don't think about it anymore.  It no longer haunts me.  It's just stuff that happened and no longer carries any emotional weight.  

I've gone back and read a few posts to see if my attitudes and opinions have changed.  And well, for the most part, they have not.  There are a few minor things I don't feel 100% comfortable about leaving up there but, I'm going to let it stand and I will just deal with the uncomfortable feelings and any blow back if it ever comes.  As for the rest of them, the emotions that were once very vivid and raw, have since faded into indifference.  

In any case, for those that are still here and are wondering how I've been and what I've been doing since my departure from social media, I will summarize with a timeline of significant events that happened since my last blog entry just over 5 years ago.  

2014 August - I never mentioned this in the blog but I bought a house that was closer to the ocean. Not water front, just closer.  I was able to get out of the crappy, leaky roof, mold infested, ant-invaded, shit hole rental and into a newly built house, twice the size and a million times nicer. All for the same I was paying in rent.  That is the reality of rent vs mortgage.

2016 October - My boyfriend quits his job, sells his house, and up ends his world in North Carolina to move in with me in BFE Virginia.  All the while starting up a new engineering business.

2017 August - My employer, trying to win the contract renewal, decided it was really important to move me to a sub-contractor. I got screwed over with a double insurance deductible and had to go off my med for a month until this new sub-contractor got a better insurance company.  (It sucked!) This energized me to suggest to my boyfriend that we should consider getting the fuck out of here.  Of course he would have to give up the beautiful house and the few minute drive to the ocean.  But he recognized the writing on the wall.

2018 December - Because of my boyfriend's parent's and older brother's declining health and his need to be much closer in order to assisted them when emergencies happen, coupled with the longest government shutdown ever, where the sub-contractor didn't have a contingency for paying us in the event of a shut down, we decide to actually start planning our escape from this place.  By this time, my boyfriend had been able to self employ to the point of paying off his debts and was continuing to build his business.

 2019 July - So, my former employer had ended up winning the contract and then suddenly loosing it a few months later when the government decided that the company's direct involvement with a former government employee's illegal activities who's wealthy white privileged ass prevented him from receiving jail time, was probably not a good thing so they awarded it to a different company.  The new company did not recognize the sub-contractor I was under so I had to switch employers again.  And this time I had to use COBRA (very expensive) to keep from completely loosing our insurance because of the new company's absolutely garbage health insurance and their prejudice of not allowing gay partnerships to be on the insurance together.  I started warning my bosses that these events have hasten my departure as COBRA doesn't last forever.  The idea was that I would be training someone.  Unfortunately they couldn't keep any new hires on for longer than a few months and more people were quitting.  Contract changes always cause people to leave because the new contractors won't offer people better wages and often times you can end up with a pay cut. Also many new folks leave because they don't realize what the work was like because they were misled as to what the job entails in the job interviews.  For instance, my official title is Software Engineer but I don't do anything related to that. I told my bosses several times to stop trying to hire software engineers.  This is not a software company!  But I digress.

2020 January - Sold the house within 8 days of it going on the market. (apparently the housing market changed drastically in the five years I was there.) Informed my employer that I've sold the house and I have to leave. (this was 1 month notice)  They offered me a huge raise if I would stay.  Despite the fact I already sold the house. I told them what an insult it was to be bribed like that. And asked them why it took an event like this to get a raise instead of the yearly requests I had been making to get one.  They were sort of apologetic. They cut a deal for me to do remote work full time with no raise and I accepted.  I was ready to quit and be supported by my boyfriend much the same way I supported him when he left his job and moved in with me.  But since it meant continued income and a MUCH more comfortable work environment, I packed up my desk and work computer they supplied me and I left for the new city.  15 years at a place with a vast and deep understanding and willingness to document everything made me too valuable to them.  I feel sorry for the saps that try to be secretive and don't share their knowledge thinking it contributes to job security only to be fired for being secretive and not share their knowledge. I've seen it happen a few times in this job.  

2020  February - loaded up the moving truck and we were gone.  Moved into a rental in North Carolina with the plan to buy a house within 12 months.  (Need to get that one year lease out of the way.)  It's been nearly 15 years since I've been able to safely drink tap water. No more bottled water. 15 years of only bottled water!  How much money am I going to save?  Probably not much.  The grocery stores out here are very high end and I have fancy tastes so that money saved in bottled water will just go to the fancy food now.  Oh well.

2020 April - COBRA ended and I was able to actually buy my own health insurance that wasn't tied to some god damn employer who would only offer garbage insurance that wasn't willing to cover my meds or was so fucked up that every god damn doctor and hospital with the a hundred mile radius of where I lived was considered OUT OF NETWORK. Thanks Obama! The ACA is a godsend.  Also the pandemic forced the state to shut everything down.  What a fucking mess.  Still, many people not taking it seriously including my boyfriends family much to our collected chagrin.  Also got word that my best friend in DC has died a month ago of pancreatic cancer.  We had plans to hook up again and we ran out of time.  Fucking cancer!

2020 September - Dragon Con went virtual and we were able to watch the celebrity panels on the ROKU.  It was weird.  And I missed seeing my friends in person.  Although the "Zoom" calls are actually a thing we can do now that we have real broadband Internet!  Something my home has been without for the last 15 years. (Needless to say I spent many late hours using the 1Gbit internet at work.)

2020 October - Also early voting because of pandemic.  Then in anticipation of not wanting to renew the rental, we started the formal search for a new house. This was so annoying.  House after house after house we found we didn't even get a chance.  Many of them were sold the day they went on the market. Site unseen for cash.  While we were standing in one house with our agent ready to make an offer, another agent drove up to the house and plopped a "sold" sign out front and drove off.  Apparently this pandemic and the new norm of working from home enabled many of the stinking wealthy from the the Northern states to permanently move to their vacation homes.

2020 December - Finally was able to get an offer in on a house that was accepted.   Also, I have been able to get a new and better treatment for my medical issues and I've been feeling absolutely amazing since.  Except for the worsening sleep apnea.  My current CPAP machine is maxed out at 20. I will probably have to get a different machine. 

2021 January - Closed on the house.  And got moved in. I hate moving. They say that two house moves equals a fire.  I've had two house moves with in 11 months.  I have a bit of PTSD about that now. Like wherever I move to will never feel permanent.  Also,  after several years of expensive vet visits with no answers as to why our cat is losing weight and has become excessively incontinent we finally found a vet that diagnosed it.  He has a hyperthyroid.  A treatable condition!  Even the cat was able to get better health care once we moved to the big city!  

2021 February - Almost settled. Still have to remove the remaining stuff from the rental house and clean it before the month is out.  The new house is nice.  Only two years old.  Still needs the have the radon issue fixed. But that has already been paid for and the contractors are just waiting for the weather to improve.

 TL;DR:  My fiance moved in with me, then we moved to a new city in North Carolina.  And we bought a house together.  I'm still working at the same shit job I've always had (going on 16 years now) but I'm doing it remotely thanks to the pandemic.  My heath has been greatly improving ever since moving, partly because of access to better health care and insurance, and no longer being exposed to polluted water.

Incidentally, somewhere in the last few years we have been referring to each other as fiance instead of boyfriend or partner.  As for when we will be getting married?  We haven't set a date.  We need to work some logistics with his family.  We don't want a wedding and don't want to spend money on all the receptions and parties and crap.  And we are trying to find out who should be notified, and the best way to notify them, also without spending any money. 

 Well, that's pretty much the best parts.   I couldn't help but rant about a few little things.  But don't expect me to continue with that again here.  My little rants about life's frustrations are actually not cathartic so I try to channel them elsewhere.

I can't promise I'll be back here right away.  Maybe in 5 years? I don't know.

Moving Along

It does go without saying that it has been a while since I've written anything on this blog.  My last post doesn't count because I was reposting something I originally wrote for Facebook.  But, it was something that should have been posted here.

Things in life have a way of changing.  I haven't been all that busy, but I have been remarkably lost in activities of distraction, which fed my writer's block.   Not that my writer's block was a problem per say, but that I was allowing my distractions to take over, not letting myself mediate on anything long enough to develop something to write about.  In essence, I've been coasting and not doing much with myself.  Letting my job any my living situation be an excuse for not participating in life, depressed mostly.  It's been like that pretty much since July.

The beginning of 2012 right up through June was intense and left me somewhat numb.  Aside from a few outings such as Dragon*Con, hurricane Sandy, which I chose to spend with a friend in North Carolina instead of suffering through the intense anxiety I went through with hurricane Irene the previous year, and a Christmas holiday in Seattle with some friends, I basically coasted on that numbness.   But all during that time, I noticed that I have been markedly feeling and thinking differently about things.  And I've been feeling the need to get back to writing as the dawning of this new year has given me a sense of allowance for renewal and awakening.

It's been a few weeks since MAL 2013 and yet I still find that I'm decompressing.  It was, as always, a remarkable experience for me as all socially intensive situations are.  And with that I've been able to measure how far I've come in the last few years as well and get a sense for how far I still have to go.  And the results are, I've come along way, and I've got a long way to go.  And with that, I would like to put this out there as a way to say thank you to the universe and the people involved, even though I've already thanked them in person.  

It's embarrassing to admit that I walk into these social situations with a tremendous amount of anxiety that paralyzes me and overwhelms my senses.  I'm quite often frozen, inhibited and shut off during these moments.  The social anxiety is often all consuming and takes away my ability to be engaging and cheerful.  It's all driven by my fear of judgment, rejection, and dismissal, for being imperfect and lacking in knowledge and experience, and unworthy of love.  And for the most part, I think I hide it pretty wall, except from the most astute observers.  But in the end, I just end up angry at myself for putting myself in social situations that creates more anxiety. I literally shut down emotionally from that anxiety leaving me in a state of mind that I was afraid of being in in the first place.    Last year at MAL that's pretty much how it went.  Even though I left there a changed person with some new found awareness about what it meant to be authentic, I was still stuck in not accepting that I deserved a place there.

This year at MAL, I had a very different type of experience that gave me some new and profound perspectives.  I learned some amazing things about myself and what it means to be a person of love, worth and value which is allowing me to feel much more gratitude than I ever have before.  I'm feeling a shift in my outlook and in my inward look, that is permissive of myself to be myself, whatever state that may look like, in whatever amount of stress I might be under, in whatever might be holding me back from expressing my wants and desires.

I'm allowing myself to be OK with the person I become when I don't know what to say, the person I become when I feel vulnerable and scared or when I'm calm and funny.  I'm allowing that person that I am at that time, and not judging him with expectations of what he should be doing or could be doing. I'm allowing myself to be what I am and only what I am in the moment and state that I am, which is now.

I can't say that I did all this on my own. Sure, it took a large amount of self awareness and willingness and book knowledge, but it took some education and wisdom that many wonderful friends have been able to give me, and some select moments of trust with some other friends at MAL as they literally, and figuratively, held my leash through the process without judgment, criticism and rejection, giving me the permission I needed to be who I am during all those states.  The simple act of going through the motions of all these states, practicing within a safe environment, which I have all the book knowledge of but I don't have the actual practical experience, in order to start that process of deprogramming decades of self doubt and self hatred.

What happened was a profound healing experience that lifted me to a higher plane of self love.

Sometimes, it really does take someone to help.  To literally be there with me and give me the permission, safety, and respect that I need for that healing experience to happen.  I've always been taught I can only do it on my own.  But I know now that's not true and in some cases, not possible.  I'm now more willing to not only ask for that help, but more importantly, allow myself to receive that help when it is offered.

But most importantly, I've learned that I can trust again.

Thank you all.  I hope that I can carry this with me as long as possible.

My New New Year

I originally posted this on Facebook on December 21, 2012. 

Happy Winter Solstice everyone.

Today marks the dawning of a new year.  For me, it's a time to re-evaluate what is important to me and work toward better awareness and alignment of what I believe vs. what I truly value.
Each day is a step in a direction.  Not necessarily forward, but a step nonetheless.  And when each step is taken, it is unknown the direction I have taken until well after the footprint has settled.

Looking back, it has been an excruciatingly difficult year.  I've had many profound experiences which have permanently and profoundly changed me.  For the good or bad?  That's not a judgement that can be made with much clarity any more, nor could it be.  When such things happen, they challenge and change beliefs and perspectives.  What once had been called good is now called bad, and what had been called bad is now called good.  Each item settling into a place where it best belongs.  And in the end, the labels of good and bad fade into meaninglessness until it all just exists as experience.  What I take from it is a new or expanded awareness.  And not to be too ironic in my dismissal of the labels of good and bad, awareness is a good thing. 

I may be remiss in not sharing the deeper parts of my life with people but, somewhere along the way, I had found that such openness wasn't always welcome.  So, out of a sense of self protection, I keep things to myself for the most part.  However, this is changing. To what extent, I can't say.  Future awareness might further level my caution.  Wait and see.  I'm just going to take it one day at a time. 

This year I look forward with anticipation, wonder, and unfortunately, a great deal of anxiety, to what is coming.  But with that, I'm working to not look forward so much that I miss what I'm doing right now.  One day at a time, one hour at a time, one minute at a time, one second at a time.

At the risk of sounding saccharine, I want to thank the many people in my life who have, over the past year, made a difference to me in profound and long lasting ways.  Some of you may not even realize it as we have never met in person, but your presence here and the things you've shared with me publicly and in private messages have meant a great deal to me.  Don't take my silence as lack of gratitude.  It's there; I just don't always express it.

Winter of 2012 Assateague Island, VA

The Thoughtless Police

Lots of discussion going around on Facebook, on blogs, amongst distant friends in distant cites and elsewhere, all talking about all the great people in their lives, all of the wonderful dates they have been on all the wonderful support and sex they have with their dates, partners and spouses.

The envy, the jealousy, is difficult.  I do not like being alone,  I do not like going months if not more, with no one to touch.  And what makes it all worse is that I have no idea when the next chance will come.   And for whatever reason, some of those people are drifting away.  And some are now starting to avoid me.   I respect their rule of not sticking their dick in crazy.  I'm sorry I'm crazy.  I don't mean to be. 

Every status I see, every post I see, every picture I see setting on the desk of a coworker where they are flaunting their heterosexually, every god damn moment my co-worker has to talk about his fucking girlfriend, is a moment I want to die.  

I would really like to be happy for them.  I would really love to feel the joy and happiness they have. I would love to be able to have it so that I could share it as well.  But then, would I share it?  Would I do that so that I would be an insufferable prick to someone else who is dealing with profound isolation and loneliness? Would I be so insensitive that I would thoughtlessly share my happiness with others in ways that taunt, and mock them?  

I probably would.  

 

It’s Not Over Until It’s Over

So, the Internet is all a buzz over the 9th Circuit Court ruling overturning Prop 8 in California.   So much is being written about its details and specifics that I don’t think I need to add anything to it. 

This is such a bittersweet moment.  I'm happy and I'm sad at the same time.

The talks, discussions, arguments and yes, even the insane, bigoted, demonizing rants from some active LDS members and other religious fundamentalists that I've witnessed, and had to endure, over the last few days on Facebook, all pretty much fit in with the predictable pattern of human behavior that is based on extreme religious fundamentalism such as Mormonism as they go through culture changes.  Even drawing from my own experience as an angry and raging ex-Mormon homosexual who has been continually wronged by the hateful domination of my religious peers, and speaking hateful like language on my own blog towards the religions they've committed their loyalty to, I'm not completely innocent in my own rants.   But what is setting me apart in this is that I’m now aware of my own reality. 

 I can understand where they are and I know what drives their fears,  and I’m not trying to prevent them from living their religion, even if I find it misguided and hateful.  I’m also aware that I used to be one of them.  But now I’ve seen and experienced both sides, and I know that their fear is unfounded.  But they only know the shadows on the cave wall, which now look even more threatening to them than ever before.

We may have won this little fight, but the backlash, bullying, and violence are going to swell because of this.  The twisted, fear-crazed, religious fundamentalists, which includes much of the active LDS membership, right along with other fundamentalist around the nation, most of them in the south and mid-west, are going to be expressing their fear, hate, and rage in ways we've never seen before.   I fully expect to see an acceleration of the continual upsurge of violence toward LGBT people as this so-called "culture war" escalates. 

I know I'm considered a pessimist in this but sadly, this is just the way it is; this is reality. 

It will be several decades before it's even close to being over.  Even if the Supreme Court granted full national marriage rights in 2014, there will always be several generations of hateful and dangerous bigots to contend with.

It's going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

What Have I Really Lost?

Over the past few weeks since my big friend fallout on Facebook, I've been thinking about what happened with the breakdown in communication.  Why did it break down?  And why did it break down so badly?

I had a lapse in good judgment, vented publicly some old hurts, didn't use the best choice of words, and managed to offend some, despite the fact that none of it had been directed at them or anyone in particular.  Sometimes I'm rational; sometimes I'm not.  That time I was not.  When others rant and vent about things, whether it's directed at me or not, I have an understanding about what is going on.  I know that they may be irrational, that what they are saying is not really about me.  I know not to take it personally.  That's why I allow others the space to vent.  But I had forgotten that not everyone has that same understanding and some things I said were taken personally.

There was no way I could help them see the error in what they were saying, believing, and assuming about my meanings or intentions.  But that didn't really matter; I didn't know what my intentions were at the time, which was why I was venting.   We were talking past each other.  So I just stopped talking all together and let the other person say what they needed to say and believe what they wanted to believe, about me.

All these years of progress, of letting go and moving on, trying to become a whole, self-defined individual, by reprogramming my thinking, vocabulary, humor, self-expression and identity; they all had no idea of who I was anymore, what I was about, why I felt the way I did.  And I was trying to explain it.  Albeit, poorly, but I was trying.  They just didn't understand; they also didn't really care.  They, for the most part, really wanted me to return to the way I used to be.  That wasn't possible. So in the end, I lost their friendship.  This was more than a stupid Facebook de-friending; this was the real deal.

But, was losing them as friends really what hurt so much?  No, what really hurt was the profound realization that when leaving the Mormon religion, letting go of god and all such religious belief, learning about a bigger picture of the world and how it worked, I had actually lost my ability to communicate with them.  I had lost my ability to see things through the eyes of Mormon politics, theology, culture and dogma.  I can still understand all these things, but I no longer understand them from the point of view of a believer.  But, when I was a believer, my understanding of them troubled me.  Could that have been because I was never a true believer? Or was I simply noticing things that others were not seeing?  And then getting frustrated and hurt as any attempt I made to describe or inquire about my observations were mocked and dismissed.

It reminds me of the story, Flatland by Edwin A. Abbot, a story that has had a subtle but profound impact on my life ever since I was introduced to it in 1986.  In that story there was a Square who lived in a two dimensional (2D) world who suddenly, albeit with much drama, found himself in a three dimensional (3D) world.  After that experience, no matter how hard he tried, he was never able to convince anyone in the 2D world about the 3D world.  That's what happened to me.  I could no longer see it only in 2D; I had the 3D version.  And the 3D language wouldn't translate to 2D without losing much of its information and meaning.

But, unlike the Square, who seemed perfectly content to live in 2D, until he was forced into the 3D, I was never satisfied by 2D.  It had stopped working for me. I saw too many contradictions and conflicts.  Many were essentially swept under the rug, and dismissed by those who claimed to have all the answers.  I needed something different, deeper, more meaningful and more applicable to now rather than only looking at that the imaginary future.  So I took a different path and learned things about my world that now make sense to me.  But they all seemed diametrically opposed to what everyone else believed.  At which point the communication gap went from a crack to canyon.  And all this time, I hadn't realized just how big that canyon had become.  And just like in the story, the misunderstandings across that divide would often elevate to frustrations, insults, and conflict.  Especially when I was reminded of the hurt I had felt while living in my old 2D world.

I can't force anyone to see things from my point of view.  All I can do is just say it and those who are looking will find it.  That's how it worked for me; I went looking for it.  But now that I've found it, I want to talk about it.  But, not everyone will like what I say.  I know it's not my problem even though they all may think it's my problem.  I have to let them believe what they wish, and if that means they want to believe I'm a bad person, then that is their right.

I'm not saying this to mean that I'm better than they are.  3D vs. 2D is not an "us" vs. "them" idea.  It's just that in one particular aspect of our lives we don't see things from the same perspective and understanding.  My thinking shifted perpendicular to theirs.  What they see as a circle, I can now see as a sphere or a cone, or a cylinder.  All they see is a circle.   But the huge irony of all this is that we both claim to have "the big picture". 

Throughout the story of Flatland, there are several events where a higher dimensional being is trying to communicate to a lower dimensional being about what they really are, and failing every time.  The only time it was successful was when one of those beings, the Square, was physically moved into the 3D space.  At which point it all became clear to him.  But by doing so, he crossed a line that could not be uncrossed.  And even though, in the end, he remained trapped in the 2D world forever, his thinking had permanently changed the way he viewed that world.

And like the Square, there just isn't any way I can go back to thinking in 2D.  3D is so much more engaging, enlightening and rewarding.  And there is a hell of a lot of stuff in 3D to learn and experience. I just can't spend a lot of time thinking in 2D anymore.  And yet, I must caution myself.  The Sphere in his arrogance, refused to accept the Square's suggestion that higher dimensions were thinkable.  And quickly showed that he was just as limited in his thinking in 3D as the Polygons were in 2D or the Line was in 1D.  Those worlds worked for them just fine and they saw no reason to look beyond them.

In my haste, I've found myself getting too attached to my new 3D world and assuming that it is a complete picture, and in my own arrogance have tried to force in on others who have no desire to know if it.  Also, my attachment has in the past closed me off from discovering 4D, 5D, 6D and so on, in other areas, until something drastic hits to knock me out of it.  The funny thing is it took a nervous breakdown to make that "leap of faith" in to the 3D realm for me.  I would hope that it doesn't always have to take such drama to gain new perspectives.  Many people seem to have done it without all the drama; it seems silly to keep doing it with all the drama.  But, I guess that's probably a bit optimistic to make such an assumption.  Whether that drama is internal or external, there is always going to be drama.  The Sphere was offended and chastised the Square for suggesting that 4D or 5D could be possible.  And the Square was imprisoned in 2D for attempting to talk of the 3D world, which had been made illegal.  At least it was better than execution, which was the other option.  And in all cases, the object in the higher dimension would arrogantly try to impress upon those in a lower dimension a differing view of the world.  Conflict ensued. Drama.

I guess the easy thing to do is just say nothing, keep it too myself and shut myself off from the world in order to avoid the pain of rejection and ridicule.  Or, say something, and just accept that all my old friends believe that I am their enemy.  Compartmentalize, perhaps?  I don't know.  I really hate it when people tell me that if my friends can't accept me now, then they never really were my friends.  Is that really true?  I just don't buy it.  Or, am I just stubbornly trying to hold on to the past?  I prefer to think that we can no longer have expression in friendships because we no longer speak the same language.  Or is that just being naive?  I would hope not.  I've had friendships suddenly "come back" to me the second I found myself in 3D.  When all that time I thought they had turned their backs on me, they were really there, just standing outside my range of vision, waiting for me to turn and face them.

How Not To Love

I have a complicated ego.  (Don't we all?)  It shields me from reality, keeping me lost in the sea of its preconceived notion of itself.  And then shields me from the crap that its preconceived notion emits by rationalizing it into something else. Ultimately, how I end up seeing myself is completely different from how others see me.   Who gets the correct view of whom I am?  Neither.  Both are pretty much fucked up.

When it comes to shit like that, friendships can be, and will get, utterly destroyed.  And my ego, in its attempt to take the moral high ground by attempting to not judge their responses, can't see what harm has been done to that other person.  Completely oblivious really.  It's so messed up.

What it ultimately comes down to is my ego butting heads with someone else's ego.  And my ego will not let me see that that is what I'm doing.  Yes, my battered and bruised ego, injured from decades of abuse, screams out acidic tirades in frustration, all the while telling me it's simply expressing a truth that other people need to understand.  No concept of whether it's appropriate or even relevant.  It's oblivious to that reality.  And then my ego has the audacity to be confused and offended, if that screaming is rejected, dismissed or challenged.

So what am I going on about?
Me shoving my Dirty Laundry into other people's faces.

No one likes that shit.  No one.  It's a lose-lose.  Always has been, always will be.

I would have imagined that in time I could open up to people.  Come out of the closet about this blog.  To remove the anonymity and let it stand as a connection to my past.  Show how I've worked through things, and come to learn who I am.  But now, I'm not so sure this blog should exist.  It may need to disappear completely and permanently off the Internet.  I may need to disappear completely and permanently off the Internet too.

All the plans I had, wiped out by my own arrogance and smug self-righteousness.  Oblivious I was.  Fucking oblivious.  Patting myself on the back for all the great work I've done only to find I've done nothing but make enemies where I had none before.  They had done NOTHING to me.  They had been patiently putting up with my bullshit for DECADES.  They had defended me and stood-up for me when I was at my most assholishness.  They didn't give a shit that I was gay.  They didn't give a shit I left the church.  And then, I turn around and spit on them to feed my little bruised ego.  What was I trying to gain from that?  A reason to say, "Oh poor me. Look, see, no one really likes me."   Self induced pity.   This entire blog has turned into a pity party for me.  What the fuck was I thinking?

I don't care if people think that they shouldn't have been offended by what I was doing.  That's no excuse.  Why? Because deep down I knew that what I was doing was going to offend.  I may not have known why, or how or who specifically, but I did know it would offend, on purpose.  I was trying to push buttons. 

I have written and spoken at times about how it is not my responsibility to protect other people's view of the world by compromising who I am.  I still mean it.  It's just that in this case, I crossed the line and compromised myself in an attempt to selfishly destroy someone else's view of the world.  That's a big difference!  When my view of the world changed, it wasn't because someone was shoveling it on me.  I did it on my own because I needed to do it.  But then I snapped.  Something had triggered my pain. I quickly forgot my experiences and selfishly expected that others needed their world view changed.  Even when it was working perfectly well for them, maybe even better than the one I was currently trying to shovel.  It was pure hypocrisy from a lapse of self-awareness.

I can say it like I see it but it doesn't matter if buttons are purposely pushed.  They will only create conflict and close hearts, hearts that have been so willing to work with me and let me be myself.  Hearts that put up with the button pushing until it became so toxic that they had to shut down to protect themselves from annihilation.  Pushing to that point is poison.  It's healthy to remove toxic people from your life.  But I didn't realize that I would be the toxin.  I lost my awareness of that.

But get this, even though I had been pushing buttons for decades, the weird thing was, only recently had I become aware I had been purposely pushing buttons.  That seems odd, doesn't it?  The ego was in charge, and I was oblivious. I had not understood how stupid it was.  How destructive, how evil.  In fact, my ego thought it was just the way I do things.  I even told people in all confidence that I'm the type that needs to test people.  As if "on purpose" wasn't really "on purpose".  I really thought I had figured that part out. I was proud of myself.  Oblivious to what it really truly was.  Oblivious to what others already knew.  A character flaw, personality disorder, mental illness, whatever.  It is all those things but most importantly, to the unbeknown victim, it is the definition of an asshole.

But then I realized what I was doing was wrong.  I understood that it was a flaw, I understood its error and acknowledged it, I even stopped doing it, or so my ego told me.  No, I hadn't stopped doing it at all.  I had only stopped doing it to new friends.  I was still doing it to my old friends.   I wasn't aware that my habitual, destructive behavior had not gone away.  I was still a raging asshole.  After all these years, after all I've gone through.  Still, a raging asshole.


I need to forgive myself and move on.  The damage is done.  No amount of apology will be believed at this point.  I brought that on myself.  It's over.  Some may forgive me.  I may never know.   I don't know what else I can do other than take the punches as they are returned.  And they are still punching.  It's their right.

I could say that I love my friends but if I really do, then I would be letting them live their life just like they have been letting me live mine.  So until I can lean to do that, I'm not capable of truly loving someone.  But, I want to love, so I'm going to keep trying.


You know, this entire blog was set up to air my Dirty Laundry.  I haven't always used it for that but that's what its main purpose was.  Why on earth would I think that anyone would want to read it?  And I hope that no one finds it.  Because if they think the shit I put on Facebook was offensive, most of which I don't even write, wait until they read the drivel here.

And that's another thing, if I could just fucking stop airing my Dirty Laundry on Facebook.  Of all the places not to do that, Facebook would be the one.  There really are places I can go which would be appropriate, for one, the therapist's chair, and here, once I make it a private blog.  It will do no good to try and erase the past.  The internet has made that impossible.  I'll have to own up to it eventually.

I do not pity myself for all this mess, so for hell's sake don't pity me.  I believe this is the essence of the human condition, to live, learn, and love.  I'm doing my best with what I have and there are bumps along the way.  And what I've learned so far is how not to love.

National NOT Coming Out Day

Apparently, I'm not as out as I thought I was.  In fact, I'm probably not out at all if being out means I'm going to happily announce on Facebook on "National Coming Out Day" that I'm out, which I'm not going to do.  Besides, if anyone on Facebook actually looks at my profile, he or she will see that my interest is in men and that I have a large mass of LGBT and other sexuality groups that I have "liked".   That's as "out" as I feel like I can do for now. 

I have "friended" many people from work, high school, my mission as well as from other times of my past who I know have not looked at my Facebook profile, and in a way, I'm glad.   I just don't want it to be a big deal.   But, I'm also screaming inside to talk about it.  It's the pains of living alone and isolated.  I just want to talk about it with people I know I can trust, because the rest of them just want to tell me how I need save myself by following Christ, and it's not just the Mormons that do that either.

I had lunch with a co-worker last week, who I also take dressage lessons with, and I mentioned to her my troubles with the "big elephant in the room" and the problems I had living and working out here.  I wanted to talk to her about the incidences I've had with some co-workers and their incredibly insensitive and homophobic rants during some corporate social functions, which HR effectively ignored, and the bullshit, insulting, gay and trans jokes that get tossed around as if LGBT people are just another group of freaks to made fun of.  

I know that simply mentioning that elephant issue made her uncomfortable so I didn't elaborate.  She's one of the many people I know out here that doesn't have a problem with me being gay but at the same time, does.  Still, I give her credit for trying.   But because I didn't say anything, she said that my elephant problem was mostly in my head.  Granted, I admitted that a large part of it is because of my fears, but I needed to explain to her that I've had it all turn bad enough times that I haven't been able to get past how it puts me on edge all of the time.  And then I gave her an example of a mutual co-worker whose entire family has shut me out of their life because of it.  I've written very briefly in passing about him on other blog posts.

She did admit that this place wasn't the best place for understanding.  That is coming from someone who has lived here for over 20+ years.  You would think that such a place, given its heavily touristy economy, would have a bit more diversity.  But I guess there really isn't any evidence to support that.

So, that feeling where I don't know where I stand with people continues.  Every day I have to find out if some new person that comes along is going to either let me live my life and wish to be part of that or they are going to instead turn around and make it needlessly difficult.  Already I've got a new office mate that is proving to be problematic.  And most of the time my solution is just to stay in the closet and not say anything that would clue anyone in.  And in order to do that I have to keep everyone at a distance, even the people who I have gotten to know and appreciate their friendship such as my dressage instructor and the other people I ride with.  Because, like I mentioned before, when that elephant came up, the friendship ended.  So, I keep it all bottled up in side until I'm ready to explode. 

To end a friendship over something as inane as person's innate sexuality is ridiculous.  But it's understandable that it's going to happen when there are people in the world who teach homophobia like Packer, Oaks, Faust, Kimball, Bednar, Ballard, Hafen, Holland, Cook, Monson, Wickman, Clayton, McMullin, Hinckley and many others.  And that's just a sampling of the Mormon leadership.

I've just got to find a way through this.  I don't know what that is going to be right now but there has got to be a way.   This has got to get better, right?  With all of those videos going around the Internets about it getting better, there is got to be a way it's going to get better for me.  So that I will be able to safely make that announcement on Facebook and not give a shit what the outcome is, even if it affects my job.   I want to be able to feel safe when proudly placing that picture on my desk at work of my future Partner/Husband/Boyfriend/Sir/Master/pup/boy or whatever the hell the title(s) will be if that time ever comes, just like every other God Damned privileged heterosexual does.

Part of the Problem

So, I see this little link pop on Facebook: Another Victim Bites the Dust

Well, I just have one thing to say to Mr. Fales about that.  FUCK. YOU. ASSHOLE!

Mr. Fales has probably never in his life felt the deep depression that precedes suicide.  And if he has I think he has quickly forgotten that when someone is in that state there is no rational thought at all.  I have been there many times in my life.  I do not seek help during those times because I'm oblivious to it.  EVEN if the god damn suicide hot-line is staring me in the face!  And I can, as well as the next person, put on a cheery happy face and laugh and have fun while I'm secretly planning my suicide attempt.  It's real, it's irrational and there is no other way of thinking while in that state.   So, people who get on their high horse such as Mr. Fales just adds the problem and drives people who get that way into further despair. 

And one more thing that I think Mr. Fales doesn't understand is that there is, even in this day and age, a massive stigma associated with depression and other mental illnesses.  That is one of the reasons I never sought professional help during my moments of rationality and why I still don't seek it.

I don't know what the hell Mr. Fales thinks he is doing claiming that the vigil has anything to do with politics and creating an enemy, and then that stupid statement he made about it being  "...narcissistic “Look at me, I’m gay!” when he uses the Mormon church and his sexuality as the basis for his bloody career.  Holy shit, that kid really needs a kick in the ass!

UPDATE (26 July 2010):  Words from the organizer of the vigil, Eric Ethington.

My Right to Wear Spandex

The following Facebook status was entered by one of my friends:

[Name withheld] good to be alive and good to feel like I'm walking to a bee gee vibe... I'm staying alive..

Then a few seconds later it was followed up by:

[Name withheld]... that doesn't give me the right to wear spandex and strut however..actually..hmmm..

I don't get this as a joke.  I understand that it's supposed to be funny but for some reason it bugs the ever living crap out of me.  Who the fuck says people have to obtain the right to wear spandex? 

I understand that this is underlying a joke about our poor self-esteem issues regarding our own bodies.  I can understand that, I had just completed posting pictures of me and my fat ass, trotting around on a horse minutes before.  And yes, I even made a comment about how that skinny-ass horse made my fat-ass look fat.  They were both self deprecating jokes, so, to be fair, since I was bothered by someone's joke, I can understand if my joke might bother someone else.  (Other than my use of the words "fat" & "ass") I seriously don't intend to offend.   I think. 

However, I believe my joke is less likely to offend.  I'm not trying to say anything about what someone chooses to wear whereas my friend is.  I'm directly mocking my body despite the clothing, whereas he is directing people away from his unshapely body type by mocking spandex.  Granted, I did make a comment about my riding breeches making my ass look fat.  But I was actually wearing them!  My friend, on the other hand, has probably never worn spandex in his life.

Spandex, made from a supper stretchy material called Lycra!  A type of clothing that accentuates the human (especially male) form in lovely ways, feels great, and it's fun and practical to wear.  I wear it.  Granted, with my current fat ass, I don't wear in public.   Or if I do, it's not visible.

Ok, I think I'm rambling now and I might be starting to talk in circles here.  I just wish we weren't so judgmental to others and ourselves about our fat asses in spandex.

Now, that fat ass thing, isn't really the core issue for me though, because what's hitting me in the back of my head about all of this judgmental spandex wearing is the truth of the matter, that even if I had a skinny, sexy ass, the judgmental spandex wearing would continue and it would even be worse.  Why?  Because I'm a man.  Simple as that!   And only the "faggoty" men wear spandex.  That's what I grew up hearing in my neck of the Utah Mormon cultural landscape.  God I hate that word "faggoty"!  OK, to be honest, I only remember hearing it once, but goddamn, it rang in my head for years!

Now, I'm not talking about the spandex common to biking; I'm talking about the spandex made famous by those big hair metal bands from the 80's.  That spandex caused me to stare uncontrollably at all of the male crotches who wore it.  I would secretly watch Friday Night Videos in hopes to catch a glimpse of a spandex clad, skinny ass, with a big bulge in front.   I didn't care who they were or what the music was.  I was just interested in the spandex and how that spandex was filled.  Bonus points if the spandex had a bright colored print.

Basically, spandex was all about sex.  There I've said it.  Sex!  Fetish!  And since I was just entering into the pubescent stage at the height of the 80's hair bands, my hormones raged.  The more my hormones raged, the more I wanted to see, have, feel spandex, the guiltier I felt, the more distance I would publicly put between me and my fetishes, the less likely I would ever have of wearing it.   Sad, isn't it?  It wasn't until well into my late 20's early 30's did I finally buy some spandex.  And even then, I did it as anonymously as possible over the Internet. Talk about living in complete and utter shame! 

OK, now, I didn't suddenly develop a spandex fetish during that time, I already knew I had one as young as 5 when I wore some tights for a little school play.  Yes, at age 5, I had experienced an indescribable emotional thrill from wearing them.  Emotional!  Not sexual!  So, those so-called experts who like to say we develop fetishes for things because of our misdirected sexual outlet are all idiots.  There may be some truth to that, but in my experience, I haven't been successful at developing fetishes, I can only discover them! 

Ok, if I go on much more with this I won't be able to post it to this blog.  This was supposed to be about how someone's joke triggered a mild frustration in me that is masking a deeper seething rage.   Yes, it's true, as much as I would like to think I've put my past behind me, I still have some baggage.  And I've been discovering over the past few years that my baggage is mostly about sex.  This has caused me some real and embarrassing problems in the physical intimacy department. 

Actually, I still have symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  This may seem like a joke at this point but it's not.  It has really been frustrating getting past a lot of the emotional and spiritual abuse I went through.  I'm doing really well considering, but something this seemingly innocuous will pop up on occasion and really send me into a dive.    I just want to fucking scream!  I believe my cultish upbringing has robbed me of being able to experience fully one of the joys of being human.  Why?  Because somewhere along the way, a few people had some serious hang-ups about sex and wanted to make sure everyone else in the Mormon hive-mind had them as well, so they institutionalized them into church doctrine.

Erm, I wonder who they were?  Anyone?   

Fuck them!

Am I still hiding?

Again, I wonder what I'm doing with this blog.  I've noticed a few things about myself recently with how I relate to this blogging stuff.   This blog, its title, the moniker I use, the tone and subject matter, etc. all contribute to creating an identity, an identity that I'm not so sure that I personally relate to for the most part.  I think this blog has presented a highly skewed perception of the real person behind all of this stuff.  

I don't feel like it's a very good representation of me.  I don't feel like I'm really helping people know the real me.  Perhaps what I should be doing is using this blog to simply help myself know the real me.  Either way, it seems I need to talk about myself more, rather than about the angst that occasionally passes through me.

Everyone mostly sees the troubling issues in my life.  Or, if they follow my other blogs, they might see a sample of my sense of humor or what I do for fun.  I wonder sometimes if the humor comes out on this blog or not.  It is hard to put casual humor across in writing, especially when it's juxtaposed with confusion, anger, depression, cynicism etc.  Or is it?  Is my humor cynical?  Is self deprecating humor cynical?  OK, not all of it is self deprecating.  Actually, I don't really know how to classify humor.  I just know what I find funny.

Anyway, it takes more than just bad humor to know a person.   It's obvious that the subject matter of my writing is shaped by my experience, but when do I simply write about the experience as opposed to simply mentioning it as means to convey my feelings toward something.  And by doing that, the experience as a story itself is diminished to much less than an anecdote.   Obviously, I know what is in my head when I write it; there is a lot of momentum behind it as a thought.   But what ends up on the page are a few words that summarize it into an idea that means only a fraction to the reader as it did to the author.  

An example, looking back at my last post, my simple statement, "Even though I wore tall black boots and long hair, I still had to conform in some things to keep the peace." carries behind it 20+ years of attitude shaping moments with people, enough that I could probably write a book.  And although they were life shaping moments, they all seem too mundane to write about the specifics.  So the best I can do is to oversimplify it into boots and hair vs. conformity and piece, assuming that such things carry with it the right cultural information to allow for understanding and bring about a shared experience between the writer and reader.   Barring that, I would need to write about a few specific incidents to get the point across.   Who knows though?  If I started to write about myself more than the angst, those moments might actually get mentioned.  But then, I might bore people.  Hell, I bore myself sometimes in my own writing.

I haven't had a profound angsty moment since January of this year.  Sure, I still have angst but it has really tapered off.  A small moment in March and April but nothing even close to what I went through last year.  I think that's a great thing!  I'm thrilled!  But the result is my drive to write things here, which were purely to work out my angst, have diminished.   I hardly even journal anymore.   Besides, my journaling was never about writing down a journal of my life.  It's just free association writing to clear my head.  I would say that 99% of it is garbage.

So I'm wondering if it would be a good idea to push myself to writing things here anyway. 
About anything.  Make this an honest effort to journal "properly".  And just let it free flow more and not put so much effort in editing and presenting a polished post.   Not being as articulate in person as I try to be in writing, I have a bit of insecurity about presenting my writing more casual.  It's as if I'm over compensating for my slow verbal acuity.   I'm actually a bit frustrated by my slow verbal acuity.  So, yeah.  

But I have been experimenting with making it more casual and off the cuff.  Like the way I speak.  I say a lot of things that are incomplete sentences; sometimes I don't even complete a word.  I say lots of non-sequitur shit sometimes.  And sometimes I say sequitur shit that doesn't make any sense.  And many times when I comment on blogs and Facebook I'm saying what's on my mind with little editing.   Mostly it's cynicism.  Although when I've started to comment on blogs I've found myself rambling between many different ideas.  I end up deleting most of them because I can't find coherency.  I'm really just trying to find words for things that I have never had before.  Words I've never let myself have or have always let other people make for me.  So in that respect, I could write posts that have broken ideas and incomplete narratives, and jump around and just say shit. 

Life is just a big experiment anyway, right?  Well I see it that way.  At least, I do now.  More so than ever.

Where am I going?

It's happening again.  I'm finding that I'm withdrawing into myself.  I'm not out seeking people to talk to, despite my increased activity commenting on other's blogs; I'm not interested in a dialog.  I'm just talking.  Talking for the sake of wanting, needing, having something to say.  And I've been saying a lot.

It seems silly to write huge comments on other's blogs when I not looking for interaction. Better to just write a big long post here that says the same thing and have it all in a concise easy to find location.  I have a hard time remembering where I've posted my comments many times.  Subscribing only works for a while and only if other people make comments.  But, eventually, the activity dies down and it's all forgotten.

Looking in my Google reader, I am currently following 226 (and counting) blogs.  Granted a few are Info/News sites and about a dozen or so of them are BDSM related, but the rest are very much the MoHo (Mormon Homosexual) blogosphere.  I spend a lot of time poking into other people's lives.  Mostly lurking, looking on from the outside.  But I'm also moving further to the outside.  Further away from the blogging community that I've currently found myself in.

I never set out to get blog listed into the infamous MoHo blogosphere, but it's there.  I don't really know when it happened.   I just noticed it one day.  I was both honored and irritated by it at the same time.  It honored me to get exposure, irritated me because it drove me to write things that would appeal to that particular audience. I felt a bit cornered.  And I think it kept me from phasing out of the MoHo blogosphere arena as my ideas evolved.  I don't consider myself a Mormon. I had resigned from the Mormon church the previous year before officially starting this blog.

So, as I've been commenting on other bogs I'm realizing more so now than ever before that I think very differently than most MoHo's.  I don't connect with those who are still seeking acceptance with the religion and their religious family.  I was never fully part of the Mormon culture growing up and I had given up even trying to be accepted by the culture long before I ever dealt with my sexuality, which then cemented the dichotomy into permanence.  Ironic in that it took me years to discover and undo the habitual faking behaviors that I had developed as a coping mechanism to at least get by.  Even though I wore tall black boots and long hair, I still had to conform in some things to keep the peace.

My family has been supportive for the most part but, by the time I got to dealing with my sexuality, I had essentially stopped caring about their acceptance anyway.  Well, except for my mom, but she's the one who help me accept my homosexuality so her acceptance quickly became a moot point.

So, I don't really feel like I'm understood or accepted in the MoHo community because my experiences have been unlike what most are dealing with.  And my spiritual journey, which does not involve Christianity, seems to be too esoteric (if not outright disturbing) for many.  I've always felt like I've been on a different road and my adventure into the MoHo community was essentially a brief intersection.  It's just I've sort of lingered here for a bit watching the action when I really should have just kept on driving.

It's not just the blogs; I'm also on various MoHo Yahoo groups too.  I've become too liberal for them too.  I've become even too liberal for Affirmation: Gay and Lesbian Mormons.  I used to think they were too liberal.

Perhaps, I'm over generalizing people.  I'm still connected to the MoHo world because I'm still very much a product of the Mormon culture from which this all has its roots.  I'm just on a completely different road "out of here" than what it seems most people are traveling.

But I do keep reading them.  I keep following them.  Why?

I'm looking for people who are on the same road as me.  I'm hoping that I will find someone I can make the same journey with on the same road "out of here".   Each person out there who writes something that provokes a thought, an emotion, even a hidden resentment in me; I hope that they could be someone whom I can share the lonely road of self discovery.  But when I open up and share my perspective, blank stares ensue.  Granted, whenever someone expresses their hope that the church will someday grant them a gay temple wedding, I have a blank stare of my own.  I'm a hypocrite.  But I'm not going to try and convince them it's a lost cause.  I do remember how hopeful I felt once.  It's not my place to crush other people's dreams.  I'm too busy letting my self-doubt crush mine anyway.

Ugh!

But that's not all, there is also this:

I'm also spending time watching my email inbox and Facebook page, and waiting for people to talk to me.  But when they do, I ignore them.

My Facebook inbox has messages waiting for me.  People poking, inquiring, wanting to know what has been going on in my life.  My email inbox has a few people waiting on me too.  Last Sunday I finally replied to someone after ignoring him for two months.  I'm sure he gave up on me.  Still, I have another one that I dropped the ball on 18 months ago.  18 MONTHS!   And I have it highlighted in my inbox reminding me to reply.  But none of these people are the people whom I want to talk to.

If I could just get honest with myself right now and admit that I'm really waiting for a particular person to call or write to me.   And at the same time, I'm dreading it.

This person whom, over the past year I've developed feelings for. We used to have long and interesting email and phone conversations.  He has been the closest and most intimate contact I've ever had with a potential partner since the mid 90's.  And yet, we live on opposite sides of the country across three time zones.  We are 17 years apart in age and we have never met face to face.  We both set a goal together to meet up and attend Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco this year, a goal that I still have no idea if I can turn in to a reality.

The last few emails I've sent where short, sort of a "hello I'm still here" type of thing.  They were weeks ago.  We are 'friends' on Facebook.  He spends a good deal of time on there posting comments about food, cats and politics.  I sometimes write flirty comments on his posts.  They seem to be ignored most of the time.  I fear that he will delete them.   (God, I hope he doesn’t read this.)

I worry that I've developed feelings for someone that will not or cannot reciprocate.   My fear is that I've let myself fall in to another desperate, one sided, needy, pathetic relationship.  He's busy yes, so am I.  But the amount of time he spends on Facebook has given me doubts as to his honest interest in me.  Especially if he will not reciprocate even a simple flirt on Facebook, even though he has told me in past emails he thinks of me often.  But, those emails were weeks and months ago.

I can't even begin to touch on the things that irritate me about him, which causes me to hate my predicament even more.  Seems unfair to be going through this seeing as we've been only acquaintances for about a year.

I'm desperate, one sided, needy and pathetic, indeed! 

Is this what relationship angst feels like?  I don't recall ever going through this stuff in high school or college.  Is that what teens and young adults experience?   It this how it works?

God I've rambled on.

Less Angst, More Coffee!

OK, Peeps!

Just checking in to let everyone know, if you haven't already discovered, that I have another blog.
Yeah, I angsted (word?) over this for awhile and realized that I was tired of being angsty so I created another blog to post funny, silly goofy things that I do, think, say, etc.  And leave this space for my angsty stuff which I'm finding to be less relevant as of late.  It's as if I've become an adult or something.  What's up with that?

Anywho... the other blog is here:  The Gay Dactyl

Now, I don't promise to keep it updated all that often either.  And many of you who are also friends with me on Facebook will see a Facebook version of the post which is essentially identical most of the time.   I usually end up making the Facebook one first on a whim and then later post it here after a few edits.  Unless I do it the other way around. Either way, the one on here will be the one that gets edited to its final, perfect, form.

Yeah I'm all about form. 

And yeah, in past writings I also talked about making a separate BDSM blog too.  Yeah I will.  But no one will ever find it.  HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!   Seriously.  :-)

Claiming My Life

This blog isn't working for me anymore. In particular, the current format of trying to maintain my anonymity.  What was this anonymity suppose to help me with anyway?  It's has a good side but it's mostly been a curse.

The good side is that I was able to work out my feelings somewhat publicly and vent my real frustrations openly and without restraint and fear of retribution from someone that would take offence of what I would say.  Although there isn't that much evidence that I'm in any danger of retribution.  But, I certainly don't want my co-workers, relatives and friends to read a lot of this drivel.  Even so, a few co-workers and family have read this blog.  But then I actually went as far as inviting those people to read it.  Duh! 

The curse is that I feel restricted in what I can talk about as long as I'm trying to stay anonymous.  I thought anonymity would make it easier but the way I see it, the situations, conversations and events that happen in my life, the ones I want to write about, are so bloody public already that mentioning them here would give me away.   There are many things I would like to have posted but didn't because the events were too specific.  I've tried to avoid mentioning specific people and, if I do, avoid using real names, but even that isn't good enough.  I realize the chances of the wrong person finding these posts are slim, but they are not none. 

But one thing is for sure, this anonymous game has taught me that I'm still in the closet.  I'm still trying to live a double life. The life of how I really feel verse the life I want people to think I feel.  But ultimately, it's apparent that anonymity isn't my real problem.  It's just the symptom.

My real problem is that I worry about what people think.  Especially if I believe it's negative.  I don't usually get hurt by negative comments like I used to but I still have my moments and naturally want to avoid them, especially here when I'm trying to express my more authentic self.  

Most of the rude and negative people I've had to deal with were in email, on Facebook, and in person.  So, I naturally assume that the same thing is going to happen here.  This is 100% public.  Not limited like Facebook and email.  Any crazy asshole can post here.  But, it's not the assholes that worry me.  It's everyone else.  The ones I care about.  The people that have gotten to know me here.  And the ones I know in person.  I care about people.  I care too deeply.  And I'm embarrassed because I haven't been 100% truthful.  I'm still hiding myself, I'm still afraid of letting people into my life and letting them see all that I'm about. 

So, part of me is bristling to shed the anonymity and bust out of my shell.  The other part is still scared as hell of rejection.  The more people I know who read this blog, the more I plague the course of my writing with assumptions about what I suppose people want or don't want to read.  I thought by making it anonymous I was avoiding that.  But it didn't matter.  They didn't even have to say anything.   I assumed what they were going to say before they even say it.  And 100% of the time, my assumptions are wrong. 

So, when the comments came, very few were negative, most were encouraging.  The ones that were negative came from my mom. But she didn't post a comment; she called instead.  What she said actually didn't bother me.  This seems ridiculous but what she said actually didn't bother me, it was the positive comments that fed my ego.

By avoiding certain subjects or areas of my life, I could continue writing about things that would appease to get more pleasant comments, rather than go in my desired direction.  I did more than keep the status quo.  I started to gear it back.  In one of my posts, I even made a big deal out of not taking a direction that I really wanted to take because I was afraid of possibly displeasing my readers and eliciting negative comments.  I even found a way to convince myself it was what I wanted to do.   Looking back at that, I am still angry with myself for copping out.  This non risk-taking pattern had been building for the past three months in all aspects of my life.  As I fell into the trap of not thinking for myself, the frustration and anger built up and I exploded. 

Even so, the comments that I've received have meant such a great deal to me I can't even begin to explain how.   Even the simple acknowledgments that I'm not alone are very rewarding.   But I continue in fear that I will write something offensive and drive someone away.  Hell, it may have happened a few times in the past as I've seen my followers list shrink.  But then I've stopped following blogs before, and getting upset for losing a follower makes me a hypocrite.  They went a direction that didn't interest me so I left, ironically the ones that have offended me I still follow.  So, I would hope that they left because I'm not of interest as opposed to being offensive.   Yeah, I see it as rejection either way and I hate it but I hope I'm getting better at not caring about it. 

Some aspects of my self-esteem are still dependent on outside validation.  And thus, I want comments.  I want to know what others think.  I want people to interact with me and be frank and honest.  If they don't like what I say, and feel a need to disagree, then by all means I want them to.  So far the only comment that came close to stating a disagreement was in green and purple's comment when he said, "I agree with almost all that you say."  I'm curious what the little bit was he didn't agree with.  He's right in that it doesn't matter, but still, my curiosity gets to me and ultimately the disagreements can be learning experiences in and of themselves as they challenge my ego; help me understand the holes in my self-esteem. 

But, with that being said, I've started to get a sense that the comments left by readers are not always there for me.  They're for the readers.  As I've been poking around the blogosphere making comments on other people's blogs, I've noticed that when I've written comments I was essentially venting.  That, in effect, actually helped me clarify a thought in my head.  In the end, the comment was just something I needed to get off my chest and didn't matter if the author of the blog read it or not.  Although, whether they agree or disagree, it's still quite satisfying when the blogger or someone responds to it or references it in a future blog post.  At least it's evidence that someone noticed it.

The other aspect of all this is that I'm lonely, desperately lonely.  I'm acutely aware that my desire to fill that loneliness hole, a hole that severely depresses me often, feeds my desire for comments.  And that is a hard thing to admit openly because this depression and unhappiness is all some people in my life need as evidence to fuel their anti-gay religious shit and throw it in my face.   If I can put on that happy face they have no case and will leave me alone with their silly "wickedness was never happiness" bullshit and how turning way from God and the church is the reason I have these holes in my soul. 

It's so fucking pathetic.  I'm right back to where I was a few years ago when I was a miserable, Mormon, fuck with a plastic smile so that I wouldn't make the church look bad.   Now I'm a miserable, lonely, fuck with a plastic smile so I don't make the Gay, ex-Mormons look bad.  Fucking bullshit!  And I'm being a drama queen!  Yes, it still makes me angry; I still have a lot of bitterness left in me.  But I should be 100% honest, I'm not as miserable now as I was then.  But still, any misery sucks and I hate it and I just want to scream.

But, as of late, not all of the bullshit has been related to Mormons or their silly beliefs.  It's been bigoted and ignorant co-workers, slummy landlords, thieves breaking in to my house, distant family, shitty job, distant friends, my shrinking bank account, and no one to talk to about any of it at the end of a hard day.  For the last few months I've been wondering, what I am going to do? Where am I going to go?  And with all of that, there is the added frustration and anger of not finding an answer.  Again, another aspect of all of this apparent misfortune is that those silly Mormons are going to use it as evidence that God is punishing me for leaving the church to have gay sex. 

It just keeps coming back to worrying about what people think.  And it goes back as far as I can remember.  Hell, just read some of my past posts!  I totally dwell on shit from my past over, and over, and over...ad nauseam.  Yes, we all know now that my past sucked and I'm still not over it.  Give it a rest, right?  Easier said than done.  Besides, I get to decide when to give it rest anyway.

I've been struggling for a long time trying to find a way to reconcile or connect in constructive ways with my past.  I wanted to remember all of those times were I got misdirected so that I could change or realign the beliefs I formed around them, beliefs that misinformed me later in life and continue to do so; such as why I still care what other people think of me.  But it got daunting.  My past was so vast and my memory so jumbled and broken, I was getting frustrated with that alone. 

A few days ago, I stumbled across a photo album that my dad sent to me few years ago.  In it were miscellaneous photos of me mostly between the ages of 3-16.  Many of these struck me as odd because I had no memory of the event captured in the image.  Others, I had a clear memory of them and was surprised by the memory.  Some were good, many were bad.  But all of them invoked a thought or emotion of some kind.   I realized that some of these pictures captured events in my life where a belief was forming or being exercised, a belief about myself, about the world or about life.  Some were positive.  Most were negative.  That's probably why I had the photo album shoved deep in the back of the filing cabinet rather than on the shelf or with all of my other pictures. 

I've been told that worrying about the past is a waste of time; it does nothing to serve the present moment.  And exploring those moments would just be wallowing in the past.  So, I've convinced myself that these moments are not important.  These moments are all just shit that happens.  They don't affect me now.  But is that really true?  I feel like I'm wallowing in my past more than ever because I refuse to accept it.  All this drama I face in my life came from somewhere and the same shit keeps happening to me over and over again.  Why?

So I'm going to call bullshit on the non-importance of my past.  I've come a long way by looking at my past, piecing it together, and figuring out what happened.  How dare anyone tell me it's a waste of time.  It's bad enough that the feelings are not easy to confront, I don't need people telling me that I'm doing it wrong just because they think they know what's important to me. 

Fuck them.  This is MY life. 

Through the course of writing this post, I continue to have moments of worrying about what people are going to think.  It's always been my problem even before I realized it.  I'm more conscious of it now.  The anger for it has surfaced so as I move forward, I'm going to be confronting that head on, even if it means starting every post with the phrase, "This is my life, if you don't like it, then fuck off."  Anger serves a purpose.  I have not been honoring it and so now, it is seething.  If I don't let it out, I will continue to wallow in it.  I definitely know that that doesn't serve the present moment.

Because my life is so multifaceted, so esoteric and so gut wrenchingly depressing, sometimes I'm pressured to spare people the "Too Much Information" (TMI) that will eventually come.  Of course, I'm only assuming it's going to be TMI mainly because I've had many people who were eager to point that out to me.  Having people do that only feeds my habit of editing myself, smoothing things out or censoring things so that I can spare other people my most intimate details, the most important things to me.  What I end up with is a thick layer of orange paint that covers or obfuscates who I really am.  And I resent that.  Orange is a nice color; it's just not MY color.  This orange paint represents that nasty habit of self-deception, a habit that has managed to totally fuck up my life and continue to make it difficult.  Well, no more.  If anyone thinks that any aspect of my life is TMI, then they too can just fuck off.  

Happy New Year!

Before I go off on a heavy handed tyrannical rant, I would just like to pre-apologize for the offenses that I will deliberately be dishing out.  OK, to be honest, this is only a partial or rather fake apology.  What I'm really getting down to is that this is just a preamble to some serious and offensive ranting and I'm not holding back.  Why I'm even bothering to warn the reader?  Why don't I just start ranting?  Because I seriously don't want to hurt anyone's feelings with what I'm about to say.  As I'm currently in a state of some deeply hurt feelings myself, I wouldn't wish such things one anyone else.   With that being said, I'm going to start off my little rant by first inviting anyone who might be offended to seriously fuck off.  I'll recap on that later.

Anyway...I just got past the holiday season.

Oh My Fucking God!

I have a love/hate relationship with this time of year.  But this time around it's mostly the hate.

How did the year end and how did the new one start?  It ended with a crash and a bang and bunch of other complete bullshit.  It was an otherwise great year that came together in the most fucked up holiday season ever.  And it's still not over yet.  In fact I think I'll still have a few more months of this shit before I might be clear enough to start thinking and feeling grounded again.  It's not to say I'm in a constant state of rage.  I do have moments throughout the week of positivity, but it's only about 0.6% of the time.  I think that equates to about an hour per week where it's just me and the equines.

I debated if I should even bother listing all the shit that has gone down since October but I don't think I will.  There is just too much of it.  Perhaps it would have been better had I made small blog entries for each incident as they happened.  But it really came down to the fact that I'm still relatively anonymous on this blog and after considering the implications of revealing the nature of the shit that's gone down, it would seriously compromise my identity.   Besides that, listing all that shit would incite a pity party.   It's bad enough that I pity myself as much as I do.  Getting it from others doesn't feed my ego in healthy ways.  And right now the combination of all this shit going down and the affects of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), regress me to some serious irrationality.  Besides, all of the shit that's happened is actually incidental and doesn't really have any real meaning.  The important question to ask is: How I've been handling it all?  To which I would respond: GAH!!! 

Needless to say I've got so much pent-up anger right now I could bite anyone who crosses me...until they bleed of course, and then I would let them go.  I'm not a vampire and don't like the taste of blood.  Don't worry.  I am seeking counseling. 

But for now I feel like ranting about shit that I've wanted to rant about for decades.   And to make it even worse my rant is all a fucking cliché.  When ranting about the so-called Holiday Season how could it not be? 

When I see people walking around wishing each other "Merry Christmas" and "Happy New Year" and all that crap, I want to gag.  And yet I find myself going along with it anyway so I don't come across as a complete asshole.  But deep down inside I'm screaming, "Whatever!"  That alone pisses me off further.  It's hypocritical and I'm angry at myself for playing the game.

It's a pointless and mindless time of year where people try to act extra nice.  Why now?  Why not all of the time?  These holidays and their dates are utterly arbitrary to me.  Take New Year's Day for instance.  That one is especially pointless to me.   It is a week and a half after the winter solstice.  To me the solstice is more like a new year than January 1.   A solstice is an actual measurable physical phenomenon that can be used to mark the end and beginning of a solar cycle.    January 1 is just a number on some made-up calendar.  Who made up that calendar anyway?  And why does that calendar say the year has to be 2010?   Why not 8302 or some other number in say, base 12?

And then there is the Christmas holiday and all of that crap.  Set aside the fact that December 25 is not even the actual date of the birth of the Christian religion so to speak.  But that doesn't really matter.  What matters is that it's the one time out of the year where all of the hypocrites can come out in droves and be EXTRA hypocritical.  Personal experience has allowed me to witness many so-called Christmas holidays where Christianist behave in some of the most unchristian ways ever seen.  That really doesn't bode well for celebrating the birth of their Savior™.

Another thing that doesn't bode well is that most of the modern Christmas traditions claimed by some Christianist come from the Pagans!  Yeah, PAGANS!    After all, to trick the Pagans into becoming Christians they had to assimilate their traditions.  But don't worry; it was all done in the name of Christ.  Too bad that Christians don't know who Christ really is anymore.  Not that they would care anyway.  And they especially wouldn't give a shit what a godless heathen such as myself would have to say about it anyway.

Sorry folks, I guess I just don't have the Christmas spirit.  Well, I guess if I stick with just the hypocrite part I do have it.  I get that.  But the rest of it?  Whatever!

Am I waging a war on Christmas?  I don't think so.  Christianist are doing it themselves just fine.  I'm just watching them go at it while I do my own thing.  Such as: no lights, no tree, no music, no shopping, no family, no handouts and no Christ.  Selfish?  Meh.  If you want all that stuff, great!  Go for it.  I don't care.  Just don't expect me to do it to. 

God, I'm glad the holidays are over!

I guess this makes me a scrooge or a curmudgeon or something.  It doesn't matter.  I'm hated by one group of people or another no matter what I think, say or do.  So I'm going to do my own god damned thing from now on and if you like it, join me, if not, FUCK OFF!  I'm serious.  I invite anyone who finds my little rant offensive to seriously fuck off.  I don't mind at all.  It may sound like I mind because of the seemingly harsh language but at this point I'm really not talking directly to anyone.  It's more of a proverbial use of the phrase to anyone in my life who really does need to fuck off.

Postscript: It was the Christians who came up with the word 'Pagan' to call these unbelieving, polytheistic, heathen, low life, evil people.  I'm proud to be called a Pagan.  It's like taking back the word 'fag', which I'm am one of those as well.  :)  Happy Xmas!  (Nov 20, 2010)

Wanna fight?!

For the past several months I've been in one of those moods where I feel like picking a fight with Mormons again.  I get really fed up with the stupidity and I just want to make a point of telling people they are being hypocritical. 

I used to be on a mailing list with several friends.  The list was intended as a social community to stay in touch.  On occasion politics would get brought up and create heated debates filling my inbox with 30 page email posts.  I despise politics. I have a hard time doing nothing more with it than mocking it.  Equal opportunity left and right so I didn't read most of it.  Just skimmed for key words to get the gist of what they were saying. Unfortunately I found that on a few instances a few of them managed to find a way to offend me when they took whole classes of people and demonized them for a political point.  The first of which was right after hurricane Katrina.  The next one was last year when one expressed his outrage that our government was endorsing immoral and perverted sexual behavior in referring directly to gay marriage.  The comment was out of the blue because the discussion was about the economic bailout prompted by some article on a Mormon blog that happen to mention that gay rights were an example of corrupt government.   ( It seems that no matter the topic many Mormons will find a way to make it about "Teh Gays".) 

For the most part I just stay quiet.  And I eventually left the group as I didn't want to be tempted to spew a bunch of angry words as I made the mistake of doing a few times in the past.  I'm still friends with most of the people from that list on Facebook, just not the ones who made those remarks. 

But here is my problem.  On occasion they continue to throw out their view of life and take for granted that they think they are "preaching to the choir".  Every so often they express their disgust for the declining morals of society and then go on to list what they are.  They always seem to include homosexuality as that is one of the many things in the Mormon church's handbook of things that destroy societies.  It's those people I want to pick the fight with. And sometimes all I have to do is post something on Facebook that disagrees with the church and wait for the arguments to start.  It's as if all I really want to do is state my piece and let them make a fool of themselves as they state theirs.  So, which choir do I think I'm preaching to?   

I hope that those people will take me off their friends list rather than just "hide" or ignore me.  That's all I really want.  I feel like I'm walking around amongst people who despise me but rather than be honest and tell me up front, they do it behind my back.  But after they remove me then I can hate them for it.  I never said I wasn't a hypocrite.  I just want them to see where they are one too.  And those that stay with me I would hope that they learned something of the whole discussion and got some perspective.  I hope I get some perspective too.

I've been cranking in my mind how there could be a connection between the people who so strongly believe their religion and those that see religion as a form of mental illness. And that's just it.  If we do see it as a mental illness then the correct way of dealing with it is clinical.  Meaning that we must employ the skills of a psychologist.

It's like the time I realized a solution to the rocky relationship with my dad.  I had for years been expecting a 60+ year old man to have the maturity of a 60+ year old man.  But when I realized I had to handle him with the skill and patience the same way one would with a deeply troubled 5 year old child, things started working out and our relationships improved dramatically.

Unfortunately most of us, including me, don't have the patience and skills to deal with the insanity that is religion despite having dug out of that hole myself.  So we end up fighting with the insane.   Lose-Lose!

*Sigh*

And here I am, trying to pick a fight with insanity.

Comeuppance

We got a new employee the other day.  She is transgender.  It's our first one and a first for most of the people who work here.  Hell, I think it's a first for the entire fucking region!  So, the buzz around the office has been, "Have you SEEN 'HER'!"

 I completely respect transgender people and I will defend them.  I don't need to fully understand the nature of what it's like to be transgender to respect and honor someone who is.  Because I'm out to some of my co-workers, some of them will come up to me and ask me about it assuming I know anything about it or actually understand it.  Most of the time people are just confusing sexual orientation with gender identity. But I'm not an expert and I tell them the truth, "I don't fully understand it but here is what I know from a clinical perspective...etc."   

But, I was really holding out for the inevitable to happen.  The gay/trans jokes.  It's bad enough working in a cultural environment that is sexist and homophobic but this?  It was just too much for most people to keep their stupid mouths shut.

So, one day, there we were, me and two of my co-workers, who I'm out to, where all doing some work together when a third co-worker came in to help.   But, for reasons only known to him, probably because the buzz is still fresh on everyone's mind, he just randomly tells a very rude gay/transgender joke.  One co-worker, she feigned not to get it.  The other co-worker, he just stared in shock. Me, I just turned and went back to what I was doing as the joke teller, seeing that no one laughed, tried to explain it, digging himself in deeper.  Shortly after which he seemed to appear embarrassed and left the room.  I didn't bother saying anything to him.  I was going to get my revenge later.

I friended him on Facebook. 

He avoids eye contact with me now.

Facebook Folly

I had originally intended for my brain-dumping on this blog to be more frequent and on a somewhat regular basis. But I got a bit side tracked. Not in the way that is usually thought of where life gets complicated and work gets busy and all of that. It's all true but I still had plenty of time to write and I didn't.

Through the course of the weeks since my last post, I noticed that my journaling had become erratic and often times it didn't contain much more than a date at the top of the page. I would sit down at my computer intending to do it but I never got past opening up Word to a blank page before distracting myself with something mindless. I kept avoiding it. I thought that I really had nothing to say and yet I was spending a lot of my waking time in a state of emotional crabbiness.

My mind, so I thought, had no need of dumping. Sure I had moments of venting but it was on forums where the other people were anonymous strangers without dissenting opinions. In other words, I was only posting to "safe spaces" but because my venting was in the heat of the discussion, it was only within the context of the dialog so it wasn't something I could make a blog post out of. Perhaps later I will when I really get my ideas in check.

I also stopped posting pro-gay marriage stuff on Facebook too and that ultimately was the real kicker. It wasn't a "safe space". Every time I wanted to post something or comment on someone else's post, I would stop short and tell myself that what I had to say was unimportant or that it would irritate someone. I was especially afraid of what my Mormon friends and family would think, even some of my co-workers as well. I was essentially starting to push myself back into the closet again. Avoid drawing attention to myself by not talking about it. Letting it all pass by as if I hadn't noticed anything was going on, hoping that someone else will address it so I don't have to look like the angry-gay-activist-enemy-dude etc.

Incidentally, also over the course of the weeks since my last post, several old friends found me on Facebook. Some of them actually talked to me to catch up on things, clear the air about the past, or just say hello. Unfortunately, I also had a few un-friend me during that time too. And I will probably never know why. I could assume that it was the gay thing as that does bother a few of the really religious types but I honestly think that most of them just ignore me or disable the notices. Admittedly, I've done that to a few of my friends but it was to curtail having to sift through all useless spam generated by those stupid games they were playing all damn day.

But, with the un-friending, I know I can't really know anything for sure. And I'm just too chicken to ask. Besides, if I know what it was, it would probably make me hate them even more. Especially when one of them also un-friended my brother but didn't un-friend all the friends we had in common. They were just eliminating my family from their friend list. Do I want to know? Well, yes, but I'm not going to ask. They are gone and I'm sure it will be a better world without them.

What gets me about the un-friending is the audacity of it in the first place. For someone to friend me, even chat with me and post comments to my wall or photo gallery and then one day decide that it was time to cut it off is just really odd. To me, friending someone is to say, "I want to link my page to yours and be associated with you." But, to un-friend seems to do more than just say, "I don't wish to link my page with yours anymore", it also tells the world that "We are no longer friends in real life." Clearly this doesn't apply to the friends who are total strangers to me in real life. It's the ones that I have known personally throughout the years and we have a history together. It's rejection, simple as that.

I hate rejection. It's still my weak spot. It fucking hurts and I fucking hate it. And then to have it happen several times in a series of a few weeks is earth shattering for me. It's odd how a simple little act where someone makes and breaks a friendship on Facebook can trigger depression. But that's what it did. After a few rounds of un-friending, I found myself getting cautious. I started to regress. Go and hide. Don't make waves. Don't say anything that might drive any more people away, especially my friends who hadn't been paying attention recently and noticed that I'd decided to become a flaming homosexual.

Yes, rejection is something that I have always been hyper sensitive to. It is partly the reason it took me so damned long to deal with being gay in the first place. So every time I notice that someone has left, I feel utter terror inside. "What the fuck did I do now?"

Depression has a way of slowly creeping up on me so it took me awhile to realize what was going on. I had essentially revoked my own permission to express myself at all, no matter what it was. I had regressed to the old, emotionless, robotic, overly self-censored thinking from my past. And I resented it. I stopped doing any writing. I didn't want to talk to people about the things going on in my life. It was affecting my social life, my interaction with people at work, my family, everything. I didn't want to risk doing or saying anything that might express my true self in fear that it was something about me that pushed people away. Ironically, my anger, frustration and bitterness did it anyway.

Of course I was blaming everyone else for feeling like I needed to censor myself. After all, I grew up believing that it was my responsibility to do whatever it took to make sure that other people were happy. And no matter what, I would invariably fail resulting in getting horribly criticized for it. So it used to be that any little bit of criticism would push my self-censor buttons.

But this was different. I wasn't getting any criticism. I was just loosing people with no reason as to why they were leaving. They weren't sticking around to criticize. The ones that did stick around to criticize didn't bother me. I found that I was now comfortable enough with myself to brush it off. But I didn't know how to deal with the ones who just up and walked out without saying a dammed thing. That was a new one on me.

I realize that spending all of my time trying to figure out why people end a relationship is a waste of precious time that I could be using to make new friends. I'm still in a transitional time in my life where my social links are realigning. As I grow into a new and complete gay man, sure of who I am and unwilling to pretend to be what other people want me to be, I'm going to be making new friendships, adjusting existing ones and ending others. It's just the way it is. Yet, it's still hard and it's not without some hurt feelings. And quite honestly, there are a few people that, had things been different, I would never have been their friends to begin with.

I'm trying to keep in mind that, for many of those people, I'm no longer the same person they got to know years ago. Many of them, including my family, don't really know the real me. They don't know my real interests or any of my religious or political views let alone my philosophical views about life, love and sex. They think they know because I never corrected them when they made assumptions. Instead, I just pretended to take an interest in their interests and pretend to agree with their opinions. After all, I just wanted to fit in. I needed to hide myself and everyone else from that evil scary gay thing inside. So ultimately, the person they all got to know was a complex shell they helped create for me and I accommodated them by making sure I wore it full time. In many ways I even believed some of that shell was the true me.

But that shell is gone now. Quickly and violently ripped away. So much so that I'm still trying to sort out what is real and what isn't, what matters and what doesn't, who cares and who doesn't and where my spot will be in all of this. And I still wonder why the fuck it couldn't have been different.