I waste a lot of my life just waiting...

Oh my dear Braille-Reader, how I've lost myself in the murky dumps of my own self-imposed misery.

That's a pretty good opening line, right?

But on to the point, in such a vague sense: I'm never prepared. I've finally gotten a handle on the process, factoring out the immediate, knee-jerk response to all my worry and pain and anxiety. Because, to face it, I was already prepared for nothing, so what's the point of worrying about going back to it? You see? I'm not as dumb as I look.

Finally, however, I realize the plights of those that came before. The ones that looked at me with teary eyes while my blank face stared back at them. I suppose this is why I'm the one that feels all the more now. Or maybe I felt too much from the beginning, and being overwhelmed, locked those feelings away until I convinced myself they never existed. Either way, this boat has lost it's paddles and I'm floating now, for better or worse, to the end of this stream. It could dry up. It could lead to a waterfall of spiky, jagged rocks. Or it could lead out to the ocean and forever. Time and patience will tell, and though I wish and hope for so many things, I've adjusted my expectations to something more realistic, likely a little pessimistic to save myself in the end, yet save for the surprise of happiness.

I do, however, relish the fact that I'm not my usual self. Albeit, I've been a tad in the deep end of my emotions, but it's nice to feel again and know that I'm actually human. And know that others CAN effect me in positive ways. I only wish that I could manage those hopeless moments where I imagine everything crashing down around me. I wish I could have exactly what I want, when I want it. But that's not life. That's not realistic. And though I am a dreamer, I also understand reality and am bound by it's laws. But to be able to break a few every now and again, is that so much to ask?

I hate that feeling of defeated uncertainty. 

Somewhere deep inside of me, there's a failure waiting to get out and crush me, Braille-Reader. In that shallow, murky cesspool of self-confidence, a karmic sabotage is just waiting to be sprung.  

I've spent a lot of time lately thinking on the emotional spectrum and drive behind it. I don't really know that I've figured anything out. If anything, I understand myself a little better here and there, but I'm even more profoundly confused by other people. Their perceptions and processing of what I take to heart or disregard are wholly different.

I've found similar opinions and ideas about things, usually shared with the people I'm closest to, however, I've never met someone with the same processing I have, save for one now, but I'm still not sure how aligned that is. That's neither a good nor bad thing, just fascinating and new. I've often thought of myself as having a bit of a cold demeanor - being able to distance myself from emotion and regard each situation after I've shaken loose of its initial shock. Lately, though, the shock hasn't been wearing off as quickly and I feel my reasonably fair and logical way of looking through things has become a bit skewed.

I can't tell if I like this or not, finding myself vulnerable to this primal instinct again, pissing contests for territory. All I know is that I'm smarter now that I was, more aware. I hope that makes a difference. If not, all my sage-like wisdom is going to lose all its weight.

Last Year's Fortune Cookie That Got Everything Right

"Sometimes you poop, and sometimes you don't always make it to the toilet. Good job for making it to the toilet every time."

Lucky numbers: 6, 6, 6

Learn chinese:

这是他妈的金属，兄弟 Zhè shì tā mā de jīnshǔ, xiōngdì

Yesterday's Fortune Cookie That Got Everything Wrong

"You will experience a catastrophic event that will lead to the usurping of the King's crown in a far away land. Then and only then will you receive the reward of knowledge."

Lucky numbers: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

Learn chinese:

迪克剑 Díkè jiàn

I haven't felt particularly keen on writing anything as of late. Hell, I haven't even been working enough to make my well paying job worth it. 

And it goes to prove some sort of ebbing tide of long faded nostalgia, that five years ago today was still arguably one of the worst days (and thusly beginning one of the darkest and most painful periods) of my life. I feel that I've learned a lot about how to live since then. I've dealt with a lot, as well, but one thing that will never change is the armor that my soft skin has grown over since then. The appreciation and beauty I see in life and the interaction and relationships between people and the importance and fragility of it all. I appreciate more than I ever have before and all because I lost (what I considered) everything and broke myself down piece by piece over the years, learning that I was never anything more than I had to give and I never gave anything of myself. 

So where ever you are, out there in the great and wonderful world or some passersby's imagination, know you're still in my heart, informing the small growths I have every day. I could not have made it this far without you and never hoped (after knowing you) that I would have to. 

To the rest of our lives, apart, and hoping that we're worthy of every second. 

Do yourself a favor.

Find the means to listen to the complete discography for both:

Death from Above 1979
&
mewithoutYou

Thank me when you start enjoying life again.

I'm still alive. Seems like I'm wasting more time based around an idea than anything else. Maybe I've forgotten that not having time makes me more productive than having too much.

Point being, in the past three weeks I've got from no free time to all the time in the world and I'm realizing that the latter is pretty much fucking me in the ass. I'm not being very productive at all, am I?

DREAM

I'm not exactly sure  where this started, but here's the most vivid beginning I can give you:

There's a structure that I and my dream girlfriend (who looks very much like Kate Micucci from Garfunkel and Oates) decide to investigate. It looks like a derelict fountain with a passage down to some hidden room or enclosure that feels very illumanti (and what I mean by that is that it feels secretive, that no one should know about it unless you're deemed worthy). And somehow we've stumbled across this through rudimentary research.

So we have torches or phone lights, something that keeps us mostly out of the dark, and we're walking down a tight, confining spiral stone staircase without being able to see where we're going. I'm leading the way. Eventually, we see something akin to firelight and we know that this exploration isn't in vain. But when we get down toward the end of the first staircase, we're overwhelmed by the open area. It looks like the hanging gardens of Babylon, poorly lit and underground. Overgrown like some forgotten temple. It's massive and dark and we're not really sure were to go from there.

The dream jumps to having explored a lot of the temple cavern and knowing that some people do meet down there for various things, since there's so much room to do whatever. But these people are all part of a secret society of some sort. However, just discovering the place seems to be enough to not raise any suspicion. My dream girlfriend (we'll just call her Kate) and another male friend (let's call in Jeff) join me in going to an underground temple club, which is (ironically) a karaoke club. The room is huge and white, with tables scattered everywhere and a stage in the middle. The KJ is off to the side while a  live drummer sits in the middle of the stage and provides a live-esque appeal to singing. We talk to a few people who seem nice enough, but make me a little uneasy (which could just be the infiltration of an underground club) and we take our seat.

The karaoke begins and presses on into the night, while we never actually sing. We start having a good time and are trying to think of what songs we'd want to do since they literally play anything, but we can't figure out how to put in a song. That's when an older, balding overweight man lays a weird square reed parchment in front of Kate, then another and walks off. Some younger guy lays one in from of Jeff. And we realize that you have to be nominated, in a sense, to sing. So Kate's about to write her song choice down, when I grab the parchment and begin to read it. The front is an elaborate form, including song title, artist, performer and other various personal information, then
on the back is a contract that would bind her into doing live porn on the internet. So I grab the next parchment, it's a similar contract to the first. And the third (Jeff's) is one that sells himself as a slave to the young man for the next 30 years.

Needless to say, I wasn't willing to trade that much for a song. So we sit and wait out the night, not trying to leave looking afraid or suspicious. And at some point, they announce that all newcomers - in a very Fight Club fashion - have to sing if this is their first night. Though, I don't remember singing, there's a gap between viewing the contracts and the room being cleared out. Kate and Jeff were staring at me strangely, and I was really scared. I told them we had to leave immediately, the lights were on in the white karaoke room and they were cleaning up. The patrons had already emptied out and the workers were eyeballing us really hard. While rushing Kate and Jeff out, we caught up with other people walking slowly up a staircase (also renovated and white), the people were talking and laughing. Kate was in front of me, trying to rush up in heels. I tried to get her to pick up the pace, when she'd said something about twisting her ankles, so I lifted her up and carried her with one arm. Effortlessly, I started scaling the steps, which impressed some people we passed, as well as her.

Once we reached the surface again, it was night and slightly rainy. Kate, for some reason, was really into what little chivalry I displayed (I'd thought I was being an asshole) and wanted to go home and spend the night getting intimate. And for some reason, I turned her to Jeff and said I hated them both. When she turned around, I'd disappeared.

The dream continued, as I watched in third person. Eventually, a man that looked like Gus from Breaking Bad approached Kate and Jeff saying that he was looking for me. He wanted to ask me some questions and help me, as he was investigating what we were (though more intently) and thought he could help. Kate grilled him smartly (which is weird to say, but I know what I mean by it) and found that he was just a private investigator with no police or military ties, but he had led her and Jeff to a small house to discuss the reality of the situation. That was this: there were other powers at play in what we were looking into and dabbling with, which had apparently taken hold in me in some sinister way. My friends were reluctant to believe him at first, until his monologued about it a bit more and she his skin to reveal the monster underneath. During his monologue, he made it seem that he was a byproduct of some monstrous experiment. A man that had become something more, but still retained his humanity. However, in my omni-present dream self, I saw that some devil was still pulling his strings and watched as my friends looked on with horror at this creature in front of them, but did not run away.

And that's where the dream ends. It felt very Clive Barker-esque. I should probably develop it into some rad story.

I've been feeling pretty non-productive and defeated for the passed couple of weeks, and I'm not really sure why.

If I had to track it down, I would want to say it was the coding classes that are beginning to not make much sense, but I know that's just me being stubborn and not wanting to ask for help. I'm actually doing fine on absorbing the material and when I work in the medium, I get a good 70% in the thick of it before hitting a roadblock.

And to be honest, the funk started before that.

I've just wanted to absorb and do nothing. And I've not been in much of a mood to create anything. Maybe that's just the turn of the coin in who I am.

Today's been fine, I think I slept too much and I'm just feeling weird.

Tomorrow. It will be better because it'll be a brand new day.

"Would you find living in a nuclear apocalypse exiciting?"

I'd be hard pressed to say no.

And this isn't because Mad Max has once again become a topical name for the household, though he had a hand in my growing up.

There's been something romantic about a nuclear ravaged world that's been in the back of society's minds for a while. Especially noted with the Chernobyl meltdown. People find the aspect about it fascinating, or at least those of us with something a little askew in the well balanced and normal part of the brain.

I think of movies like a "A Boy and His Dog" or the Mad Max franchise, even the Fallout video games and always think - man, wouldn't that be rad. When in all actuality, I know it most certainly would not be. There'd be radiation poisoning. Shortage of food and water. Constant fighting and struggle for survival. Literally, it would be the least fun of anything, ever.

But for some reason, that world is tucked in the back of my head like a dream that I'll wait for to come true. It doesn't make a god damn bit of sense, but I think that's usually the case with things that we really love. We just like them. No real reason.

If I had to break it down, though, and make the ending of that last little thought hypocritical, I'd probably say that it's less about the death of everything and more about starting over. Fresh. Being able to become something you're not. To me, that means I'd have the possibility to become someone better than the person I am now. In a world with societal standards have broken down and people eat people in the radioactive sand dunes of the world, I'd like to think that I'd be a good person - and in that world, it would mean that much more than it does now.

Then again, knowing me, I'd either be the first to die or quickly turn on anyone around me for a quick sip of cold aqua. It's just the idea of not knowing. Especially when you look at the movies and the stories and everything we've fictionalized into these worlds. There's always a clear cut good vs. evil. Something that my generation has sorely missed, purpose. And interesting mutated characters, among those are the ghouls and super mutants from Fallout, or any rad Mad Maxian villain. The worlds get diversity. They have a hero. They have nostalgic easter eggs. But I'm off topic, creaming my jeans thinking about how tragically beautiful the dystopian future could be. Plus, leather armor and a V8 Interceptor wouldn't hurt.

I really want to go more into this, but my brain is getting mushy with infatuant thoughts about the wastes. I'll have to revisit this train another time.

Something not surprising: a lot of people (after noticing my Deathly Hallows tattoo) usually ask me what my favorite HP book/movie is. That's pretty broad to assume I've (hopefully) read and watched the movies based on where (as far as anyone else knows) the symbol came from.

My answers are always: (book: Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows && movie: Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkaban)

And my reasons:
Book - Deathly Hallows are what all the build up is to and where all the real shit happens. Real deaths. Heartbreaking moments. Acts of selfless heroism. Even the part where Hogwarts because a war zone, a fucking school where CHILDREN are taught. There's something WWII about it that's dystopianly beautiful.

Movie - I know that Prisoner of Azkaban is a somewhat unpopular choice to some, but the whole look embodies (and is copied for the latter films to a degree) what the darkness of Voldemort's existence would bring to an otherwise normal/bright land. Not to forget that two of my favorite characters in all the books are introduced (Sirius and Reemus), so to actually get to see their actor counterparts beautifully cast and walk around in their skin is something really exciting for me.

The next typical question: What house do you think you would be sorted into?

Gryffindor. There's no doubt in my mind about that. Not that I'm particularly heroic, but I'm honest and hit the mid-range on smart. Plus I'm stubborn but honorable. The only other place I would even fit would be Ravenclaw, but I think they're a bit too intellectual for my brain.

But the question that never comes up, so I have to ask it myself is: What's your favorite spell?

Which usually catches a few people off guard, and they jump to the familiar ones - accio (the summoning charm), alohomora (unlocking charm), stupefy (stun charm), or wingardium leviosa (levitation charm). Well, that's aside from the killing and torture curses.

I have to stray from the pack on this one, though. I think the best spell in the book is one that's introduced in Half-Blood Prince - sectumsempra. Swords flying out of your wand? Are you kidding me? How is that NOT the coolest spell around? Though, wielded carelessly could straight up murder someone, like Harry almost did to Draco - it's still both handy and badass. I'm just curious as to what would happen should two wizards/witches cast this spell simultaneously and at each other. Would it be like a ghost sword fight or would they pass each other unfazed and continue to fuck shit up?

Either way, pretty fucking legit if you ask me.

Tonight was a night that, when driving, I just wanted to keep going until the streets ran out.

Not that I'm trying to run or leave anything behind. It just felt nice to push through space with the windows down at night. The smell was nice. The breeze was cool. And everything felt good.

And now I'm just thinking of Protomen lyrics from "Breaking Out".

Sometimes, it's more obvious how selfish I am than others, even still after knowing for so long.

I'm not an only child, but the age difference between my sister and I is seven years, by a psychologist's standpoint, that's apparently like having two only children. Though, in some cases, they bond less like siblings and more like parent and child - it's not the case between my sister and I. We shared the same parents, the same fundamental ideals that came with living in the same household, but things get a bit foggy after that, despite how much I respect her as a person.

So, growing up, I got away with a lot that she didn't. I even got to blame a ridiculous amount of stuff on her, which - I guess - instilled some weird sense of entitlement in me. I got called spoiled a lot when I was younger, and often couldn't understand how things existed outside of my dome. I always put myself first - to hell with everything else. But over the years, I've consciously tried to correct myself and reset my compass. There's a POV that I'll always think in and see through, but I'm trying to consider and react with educated information, rather than jump on the Tristan train and plow through what-the-fuck-evers.

But sometimes, Braille-Reader, sometimes I apparently just have no fucks left to give and I'm back in the Tristan Show, ready for my prizes just for existing.

That's probably why I like things like karaoke and being decent at telling stories or commanding attention for a brief window. All eyes on me until I'm done with it. It used to be all the time, but recently, I've toned it down. Maybe that's getting older or maybe the effort I'm putting forward to not be a selfish dick all the time is actually paying off.

A.I.

An interesting thing to think about (especially with movies like Ex Machina and The Machine being release relatively recently) is artificial intelligence.

I don't really know where to start. I guess the idea had the most profound impact on me when taking in anime like Ghost in the Shell and AniMatrix (which was based on a movie series that WAS heavily influenced by manga and anime). I started to think about young A.I., as in the early days of its existence before human beings were used to it, then the struggle it would have to go through for equality. We as flesh and blood humans beings don't even recognize many of our own ilk as equal based on gender, orientation and skin color, so how would we react to something so foreign trying to ask for their right to vote or have a say in how the world works.

Honestly, my mind is drifting into bigger things while I'm trying to write this, such as humans viewing A.I. as the new kid on the block that haven't earned the right to have a say - when/if we join a pre-established galactic senate, we (as a race) will be viewed the same way. We'd react kicking and screaming like the spoiled children we are, when we'd be subjugating our own world population in the same manner.

Back to point, people (on the whole) are flawed creatures, and creating a system that can divide logic and emotion to make a swift, decisive action - would ultimately lead to human beings being targeted as a problem. Maybe that's after hundreds of years of conflict, maybe a few decades, evolution is weird like that and I, for one, wouldn't be able to fully understand or predict what evolution in an unorganic creature would be like, especially since I know pretty much jack shit about how it works now with organic life.

But then that brings in more interesting thoughts on co-existence, or if there would be any usefulness to humans at all. And would be utterly destroyed or harvested? Maybe even ran off world, or left to the dying world that we've ruined with battle and a greedy existence. All of these ideas have been ran with in some form or another through fiction, and they're all (mostly) amazing as they explore a good chunk of what-if scenarios. I'm only curious about which would be the reality.

Backtracking a bit, though, what I find highly intriguing is the infancy of A.I. after it's self-aware. Would it at first want to be like us or would it immediately recognize our potential threat? And what if, eventually, when A.I. developed emotion and learned to love - how would it procreate? Would that be a need? And if two A.I. in a loving relationship wanted to have a child (or whatever their version of creating life would be) would they build it a body, or would it be a software that learned and grew? What would the gestation period be before it was considered an adult A.I.? How long (if they would) would they model their lives after humans? Would they build tiny robot bodies to house their minds and upgrade and grow the form until it was an average, but unique model?

Okay... okay... I'm asking a lot of questions that only theory can answer, and I've gotten my brain all worked up on science-fiction. But I'm curious and wildly interested to see what would happen. That's the fun of writing and thinking and developing, there's no particular 'wrong' and nothing but possibilities laid out in the vast outstretching of imagination. This is one of the subjects I like to have running in my mind's background, along with Mad Maxian stories and wasteland worlds. I won't get started on those right now, but just know that it's likely an imminent topic of rant.

Three Secrets

I think I'm gonna get real for a minute. I've been thinking about adding a bit more structure to this personal blog, maybe chasing down a few topics and digging deep on some ridiculous questions since, sometimes, it's just plain nice to write and have a bit of focus here and there. Needless to say, I've been making notes on what to focus on when my mind is blank and the urge is there to write away.

Tonight, the focus falls on this: Three Secrets.

There's no condition, and I don't typically have secrets, but what I have in mind are things I keep close to the chest and don't normally parade around for the world to see. These aren't ever things that I'm ashamed of, and these are things that I've worked passed, so mostly I don't bring them up because of other people's reactions. If you live for long enough, some fucked up shit happens along the way. I like to think of it as the hero's journey, and these trials forge the person I'm to become in fire. Anyway, without further tangent...

1.) When I was younger - right around 13/14, a friend of mine committed suicide. Shot himself in the head with a shotgun, and I saw the aftermath in person. I've shared this with a lot of people over the years, especially since it happened when I was younger and more open with my emotions - and even in some fucked up way, thought it gave me a one-up over everyone else in being weird. I wrote a short story about it, though I can't remember if I put on online yet or not, either way - I'll save the whole of the story for those more interested. I'd say that of the three, this one feels like it effects me to this day the least, but I was also really good at repression from a very early age. I didn't go to his funeral, and rarely spoke about him afterward outside of the suicide story. Quite literally, I shut down and shut everything out for a very very long time. Today, I'd say the most prominent effect I see is my desensitization to violence and gore, be it in movies or weird online leaks.

2.) I once came close to proposing to a girl I dated. I was 25, and the relationship was rounding on a year. All I knew is that I was madly in love with this girl (though in hindsight, we had more than our fair share of unhealthy problems outside my being a terribly shitty boyfriend). She had no idea. I was broke all the time because of student loans and saving up for a deposit on a ring that I never told her about that I just looked like an asshole. I never asked her to pay for anything, but it put a damper on going out with friends or just getting drinks. I can't say if that was the biggest strain on the relationship, the main crack that the fissures started to pour out from, but it was definitely an anchor in my head. In the summer, she left with her friends on a trip to Florida. Right before she left, we stood outside for an hour because she didn't want to leave. I guess she had separation anxiety, but I encouraged her to go, it'd be good and fun and summer and blah blah blah. I was pretty stoic, and fucking stupid, but I had planned on asking her when she got back. Once the week was up, I was so excited I couldn't contain myself - I'd put the deposit down and set up a payment plan and everything. It was the first real adult thing that I felt like I'd done. But while she was on the way back, her texts were mired in this distant voice and I knew something was up. I couldn't let it go and kept pushing until she eventually spilled it. And like the adult I actually wasn't, I curled up into myself. Watched her come and pack up all her things and leave. And never once uttered anything about a ring. To this day, she had no idea whatsoever, and to this point I think I've only shared that with about five people. It was the second most difficult thing I've faced, next to...

3.) I almost had a kid. Yep, me. Even earlier than that near proposal story. It was a bad, too fast relationship with a lot of details of those that were there know, but otherwise I feel too lazy and apathetic to fill in the blanks now. Only two things need to be said before going in: all of my friends hated her (the would-be mother) and the kid was mine (despite everyone thinking otherwise). Now, the situation wasn't just a pregnancy scare. The test was positive. I'd even thought I was smart enough to get ahead of the game and pick up some clothes and essentials here and there - so we weren't overwhelmed when the time came. I forget how far along she was. There's actually a lot of the smaller details that I've pushed out of my head because it was easier to forget as much as I could to get on with my life. Anyway, this one - pregnant - borrows my car to go see her ex play in a band in Cincinatti (while we were living in Lexington), and I (being the type to trust the people I date) say "go for it", but stay back because I had to work early the next day. That night, she cheats on me with her ex and I don't find out until a couple of days later, on my birthday, only because she left a window up on my computer with their whole fucking conversation. It was pretty rad. A couple of days later, I'm working passed it (you know, because of incoming kid) when she tells me that she's leaving me to move back home and get back together with her ex... also pretty rad. Now, at this point I have no idea what the hell I'm doing, I'm in a fugue state for weeks, until I gain enough composure to plan on how I'll deal with it when the time comes. It was summer at this point and the kid wasn't due until December at the latest. It must have been two months after she left, maybe three - but that September, she decided to drop a line through MySpace (hold your fucking judgments on my social media choices) just to tell me: "Hey, just thought you should know I took care of our little problem. I got an abortion." To that point and since, I'd never felt a maelstrom of emotion from (sadly) relief to extreme sick depression and devastation. And I rambled on and on about it for months, until my friends got tired of it and someone told me to get over it. (Sounds super inconsiderate and rude, but if that hadn't happened, I would have sulked into the bottom of a bottle at some point. So it helped.) But the most revolting development is that I found she had a kid that April (following the December that our kid would have been born), meaning that she vacuumed out that little spark we got burning, just to get pregnant again. It fucked me up for a while, I'd gain a little traction in sanity just to slip back down the dark mountain. All in all, though, I guess I avoided a lot of terrible days that would have laid ahead in dealing with this woman. Though I would've made being a parent awesome.

Three secrets. There they are. Now, Braille-Reader, you know more about me than you did before. And I got the need to write out of system, for now. I'm learning to be open and feel less guilt for some of the shittier things I've experienced. I'd like to stick with it and see what kind of a person it'll make me. I've been wondering about it a lot and hopefully I'll take it with me to the next where ever I go.

How slow I've been in getting here, and who knows how long this surge of motivation will last. But I like this freedom I've been feeling, not a pressure to create, but a foreboding fulfilledness that this is what I'm supposed to be doing.

I want to know more people. I want to sit down and talk to everyone that holds my attention for longer than two minutes and really get into the weird shit with them. I'm genuinely curious, but I don't like forcing things. Don't like the conversation unless it's organic. I don't know how to introduce myself to people I've never met and I rarely know how to be serious with those that I have.

Maybe I should start a podcast and interview random people. Break out of the comfort zone and focus on what makes people people. Then again, I often say that I don't like people, generalizing or not.

Am I a hypocrite or am I growing?

I wanted to take a minute and explore something for a bit:

Yesterday, a friend of mine ask (or posed a question): Do men pursue a friendship or show any interest in a woman based on sexual/physical attraction?

Obviously, this does go on a case to case basis, and there are a lot of circumstances to include. But all in all, I'd like to think that men are more open-minded than to just regard a woman as a thing. I know, speaking for myself, that I have good relationships with female friends who are/aren't attractive (to me). Now, the relationships that I'm thinking of were built on things other than my free will drawing me to them. Most of these were either forged from mutual friendships or they're my coworkers, at least for the most part. I can count a few that just slipped in there, but there's some sort of commonality there that spurred a friendship.

That being said, I also don't mind being friends with attractive women, there will always be a part of my ape brain that just likes to look at pretty faces.

I'm also the kind of person that doesn't often make new friends, because I generally don't like people. If you're someone who doesn't annoy me immediately and you have some staying power, then eventually you get passed my shell of trivial knowledge and get down to some chewy nugget.

I also can't say that if a super attractive woman approached me, and ended up being super rad, that I'd be hard pressed not to jump into the "Hey, let's get romantic." spectrum. So, that pretty much throws out all that exposition I dumped previously. So, like I said, circumstantial - and I'll take the optimistic route, though it may not always be the truth.

There was another point I wanted to touch on, since it's a tangent of this thought (sort of) that I find funny. It's a observational difference between men and women that I think is really funny and attributes more to men thinking they own and deserve more, like an innate territorial thing.

In the service/retail industry, one is expected to treat everyone nice and pleasantly, being super friendly and helpful while helping a customer part with that hard-earned cash for some trivial thing in the story/restaurant. Now, when a woman is approached by a man who's nice and friendly - they get what they want, thank them and go on their merry way. No one says anything about how the guy was making eyes or being flirty. On the other side, however, this always changes. When a woman is helping a guy and engaging in the exchange, like a normal human being would, suddenly the woman is TOTALLY into the guy and probably wants to have all of his babies and follow him to the end of the earth. Weird, right? I've dated women in the field, as well as have a lot of friends there, and it has happened to each and every one of them multiple times, sometimes going on just a smile. Hell, my first super serious relationship spawned from me thinking that my ex was really into me when she sold me a fucking movie ticket. Turns out, she didn't even remember who I was, but I had the audacity to track her down and bug her about it, and it just so happened to work in my favor (for a little while at least). And I'm even still guilty of assuming things like that TO THIS FUCKING DAY. I remember a woman smiling at me, just a little longer than usual - with eye contact and everything - and I really thought that I was in. All I had to do was make a joke and she was all mine. Turns out, I'm just as dumb as most men. She was already dating someone and I just made an ass out of myself, which is typically why I don't approach women, since I'm not great at context clues.

But that's my rant for today. I'm losing focus and I'm pretty sure a bunch of the stuff I've written has already negated other things I've strung together with words.

Sometimes I question why I don't immediately start writing when I'm mad with inspiration. Such was the case last night, I felt a click of the buzzing cogs in my head and just KNEW that I had that demon in me. But I turned over and tried to claw my way back to sleep since I had to be up early for work.

All I saved where two lines that could've been part of something amazing, but have settled into what I made for them instead.

I just remember the biggest part of my mind wholly wrapped around the juxtaposition of ourselves (as materialistic people) basically being Pavlov's conditioned dogs. We jump for a paycheck. We roll over for entertainment. We'd salivate at the thought of being free. This is where we are. How we live. And for the most part, I don't know if anyone cares. I know I don't. Seeing and understanding are one thing, but changing is a far different tune to dance to - and I'm terrible with keeping rhythm. I know my symptoms, and I'll likely always stay sick.

I'm angry a lot lately.

Probably for good reason. Maybe not. 

Maybe it's for the best that I'm angry and nothing else for a little while. 

Maybe it's best that I just stay butt-hurt about nothing important because nothing important is just a distraction.

Distractions tend to put my creativity on the back burner. 

He's to another countdown to moving forward. A countdown that starts in zero. 

Right now, I feel like I hate everything. Maybe years of being selfish doesn't shed off that easily, or maybe I'm stubborn and once I decide I dislike something, having it could back around irritates me in a way that I don't realize until I'm in a quiet space. 

I wonder if I ever have that effect on people. I'm sure I do. I can get pretty annoying and insufferable. If so, open apology to the strangers and not that I've gotten under the skin of. But also, you probably suck as much as you think I do, just like I'm probably about as awful as I think some of the people I judge are. 

The circle of life rules us all. 

Why is procreation so deeply programmed into us - as humans? The older I get, the stronger it is and, somehow, the pickier I become with who I'm naturally attracted to. It's just food for thinking on.

I get confused a lot with what it is that I'm supposed to be doing. Most of the time, I've turned off a lot of my brain just to get through the day without some sort of anxious incident in which I've found a new thing to panic over. However, turning completely off feels entrapping and neutering. I don't much like it. There's a balance to be found there somewhere in the ether between too much and not enough, but I'm hardly great at solving anything, I'm more of a mind to make things more complicated and intricate beyond need.

Something else:
An inherent thing that I've found with myself is that I typically share in areas that have been shared with me. For instance, work colleagues usually share gripes and complaints about the job, the clientele or even co-workers - so, in fashion, when someone has vented about said things, I have inadvertently returned in kind. Maybe not immediately, but as time presses on, experiences are unavoidable in commiserating or finding some overlap. Now, I've known for a while that I compartmentalize a lot of my relationships, this is based on the idea that I think of myself as a complex person, and therefore scatter the puzzle pieces of my personality along the few very close friends I have, so they all have an very good and intricate understanding of who I am, but there's enough that I keep to myself that I'm not utterly and completely vulnerable. This is a self defense mechanism that I've known about for far too long and have no desire to fix. However, knowing (or paying more attention to) this share and share alike facet of socializing seems to make sense in more subliminal ways that I intended. It helps when looking at the map of friendships that I've grown dearly attached to.

I'm beginning to understand the blueprints of what kind of person I am more and more each day. I kind've wished I'd paid more attention to these things sooner, so I could be further along than I am now. But that would mean that I would have had to trade the people I know now for blurry unknown faces... I don't really think I'm down for that.

While trying to maintain a sense of emotional transparency, I feel like I've made myself invisible by becoming an idea of a person, while keeping my physical self in hiding.

There was something I really wanted to delve into tonight, but - for the life of me - I can't remember what it was. 

All I can say is that I've been working on transparency with myself and what goes on inside my head, no matter how insane some things come across. That's my hope for the exercises here. 

I don't think I understand how to express my interest anymore...

So, to put it bluntly, I'm not exactly looking to date anyone, but I figure if something comes up then I'm open to the possibility of following through. And a person of my awkward social cowardice, I tend to gravitate toward things like Tinder and OkCupid... that being said, I don't often find women on there attractive, so I don't often swipe right nor make the first move. However, there has been at least two occasions in which the norm was disappointed.

Moving on. This particular instance was with Tinder. I matched up with a girl, but since then she hasn't been on to see the ridiculously dumb opening message I tried to send her, so that was over a month ago. I'd given up on it. It was pretty much a whatever. Until the other day when she walks into the store, shopping with her mother. At first, I thought she looked familiar, but I couldn't exactly place it. So I was creeping on her, watching her roam around the store and shop. AND THEN I placed her... you guessed it, the Tinder match-up.

Now, nothing happened. I didn't make any conversation. I didn't lay down any charm. I ignored her, except for a couple of connected sideways glances that she smiled back to (which I'm more than sure I read more into). And she left. Oddly enough, however, later that night I was bored on instagram and ended up finding her on a suggested list of people, and like an idiot figured I should follow her private profile and yadda yadda, excuse excuse.

There's no positive resolution to this story. It's just that, a story that ended not the way I'd have liked, but how were things really going to change. There's a lot of variables that go into it.

The only things that aggravates me is that I'm sure I came across as creepy, when I'm really not. And I can't put blame on other guys out there being super pushy and assholes about approaching women, because they actually do it. I don't. I hide behind social media because it's safe and I'm a coward. I don't like putting myself out there for anyone, regardless if I'm interested or not. I stay safely in my head and play out on excuses of why it wouldn't have worked in the first place and I'd be dumb to think otherwise. That's the root of it all, beneath the pompous prick that I am, I'm just an insecure child with boisterously bold advice of how other people should do the exact opposite of what I'd do in that situation.

I'm just aggravated at myself for being bothered by it and letting myself be bothered. I'm aggravated because I both love and hate being lonely. And I'm aggravated that even if I did interest someone that I wanted to interest, I'd have nothing substantial to bring to the table. I'm a writer that barely writes. I'm a college dropout. I have no motivation. And all I want is the world to flood so I can sleep during the rain.

That's me.

There's a lot of things I don't really understand. And half of the time, I don't try to understand them.

There's a necessary margin for mystery in the world, and I use that to mask my lazy indifference.

I'm getting there again. It's nice to know that even after a long time of being lazy and neglecting the side of me that I enjoy the most - how naturally the faucet runs when turned back on.

I can't wait to get more time to focus on this. Routine and ritual. Habit.

And I guess I'm also back to being vague.

Two things:

-I've been listening to a lot of podcasts lately... particularly just one with some others thrown in to change up the voices, but 80+ hours over the past two weeks.

-Today I had a nostalgic attack and was overcome by a sense of longing.

I choose to explore option one (first, at least):
It's interesting to hear people who are successful talk about their success and background and the obsession that drives them. But also from the places that they come from. It seems like there's a very good amount of struggle, but eventually everyone moves to the places where everyone has this idea that successful people go, then they work their asses off, surround themselves with like-minded people and boom - 10 years later, there's a small amount of payoff, if not more. It's gotten me to explore what I believe is my passion and what I'm doing about it - what I have been doing about to lead up to now, which is a whole lot of passively writing and promoting, believing that what I have is mediocre and letting it fall to the side because I really like something else more instantly gratifying at the moment. Even WeBe has suffered from my laziness more than my bouts of obsessive drive. It kind of makes me feel useless, like I'm wasting what talent I thought I had for complacency and safety, while I trap myself in a world that I'm not exactly happy with, all in the name of dulling my mind so I can continue to exist. I don't travel. I've barely written anything in the past year outside of WeBe, which I did in a couple of days and fell back on lettering. And I don't make the world any better than what it was without me.

I've made the posts before, over the many years of my narcissistic ranting, and made promises to myself that I've quickly broken over trivial things. I want to break the cycle and change it now, but I'm not really sure I know how to. We'll see how that goes. I've began a ritualistic routine that will hopefully get me addicted and inspired again, because my honest day to day dredge now is: work - home - tv - bed. I need something more than that. Especially when I get tired of absorbing and feel the true boredom weighing down on me, when I could just focus on what's important to me, so that I have something to be proud of that's not a totally rad mask collection or overwhelming comic book stack.

Deep breaths.

As for the other thing, I'll have to come back to it another time if it's pressing enough. I just know that I (from an objective perspective) realized exactly how important someone was to my mental development and I wished I could reach out to them to reconnect and let them know that I appreciate it deeply. But I can't.

Some days are just harder than others. 

There was a moment where I lost my sense of self when sifting through pictures from earlier this year. I was lost in the rhythm of scrolling and suddenly outside of myself.

It made me dizzy.

I've been dreaming about you all my life.

I feel like my body is turning against me.

Starting with my mind. Ending in my esophagus, scarred and burned with bile.

I woke up last night because I couldn't breathe. I was choking and my throat was burning and I thought that was it for me.

It wasn't.

Now I'm making the most boring note of it here. Leaving out the fear and the flashes and the worried bouts of panic that kept waking me up.

If you're not dead, you're alive.
I guess I'm alive.

One of the hardest things about being single is not letting the loneliness get to you and jumping the gun just so you're not alone. 

The trouble is waiting for the moment to know when jumping in is right. 

Dream time:

There was a stream of weird scenario-jumping so I'll start with what I remember and leave out the segue, because there isn't one.

This dream started with a western feel do it. In a city with dirt roads and overgrown grass, not that it was technologically impaired, it's just how the time was. And there were beasts that were using this town as a feeding supply. I'm not really sure of any back story here, just that I was caught in the middle and tried to save who I could. Ultimately, I realized it was a dream because I wasn't afraid, and I tried fighting back. I was weak, though, I couldn't really hurt the things, they were nearly immortal. Though, I did get to split one's jaw at the hinges, that was the most of my damage. And these things did destroy a house/building that I was primarily residing at. Throughout this whole segment, though, I never felt like I belonged in the town. I was more in the feeling that I was passing through.

Then I'm at a lesser known award ceremony, something to do with music predominantly, and it's in another country or rather some small city and not a lot of people care much about it. I figured you wouldn't be there, Braille-Reader. But somehow you sneaked into my unconscious mind. At first, things were passive and nonchalant. I didn't want to hound you with anything I had to say, but somehow you still knew. Maybe you didn't, actually, maybe you were just acting on your own accord. (Except for the fact that this was my dream. So I'm sure I had some influence there.) So despite my few attempts to leave you to enjoy the awards show and possibly reap your own if you were nominated, you stuck around with me. The most vivid part of the dream: we were leaning over the edge of a balcony, standing, and you were close to me. Elbow to elbow. And I remembered wondering why you were there. You had literally a million other places you could be, where other people more deserving of your company were, but you kept looking me in the eyes and laughing at the extremely terrible jokes that I nervously made. And in a moment of silence, I saw you looking out over the crowd, toward the stage - your hand was close to mine and my heartbeat began to drown out the din of the theater. So I stretched out my fingers and started to weave them into yours, scared and curious and excited. Before I knew it, we were holding hands. I was too focused on them that I didn't notice you staring at me. Smiling. But there you were. We locked eyes. Didn't say anything. Just looked back out to the stage, hands still together. It felt nice. Not overwhelming. Not devastating to wake up from. Just nice that it happened, regardless of it being real or not, just that I had the moment to feel that, even for a second.

Then I did wake up.
I tried to will myself back in it, but we know that never works.

Here's still next time.

People are weird.

They grieve and mourn in weird ways.

I've just spent the last hour visiting Facebook pages of people I know that have passed away, died, however you want to say it - and see people that've been gone for 3+ years that are still getting posts on their walls - on the daily. People videoing themselves singing the deceased favorite song, or some song that reminds them of the dead, then posting it to their wall. What did people do before this upswing in social media to cope? Write letters and mail them to an address that some living person had taken over? Leave messages on a stranger's answering machine?

It's odd. I don't understand it. I've never really been effected by death as much as others. But I've always thought of death differently than a lot of people around me. I feel like I think of a lot of things differently.

I don't mean to be insensitive. It's just weird is all.

My guts feel warm like maple syrup on a fresh pancake. It's nice. It's like I'm full of blankets just out of the dryer.

...and no, I'm not drunk. I'm just full of Chinese food.

I've been trying to write poetry for half an hour.

They're all shit.

Memories are a funny thing. Each time you revisit something in your head, you're reconstructing that memory from pieces and fragments that you placed elsewhere - sometimes those pieces are probably exactly what happened, but other times your brain can't find the authentic piece you made and basically creates a new image to run along the celluloid of your memory. This means that the more you remember something, the less you can actually trust that it's the real moment that you experienced.

Don't worry - I have a point.

My mind is packed with such vivid imagery that I can sometimes feel my night and day dreams shuffling in with my memories like a stack of cards. Lately, more than a couple of times, I've riffled through my grey matter and retraced a memory that was actually just a dream. A moment I shared with someone that didn't exist. It's unnerving at times, mildly heartbreaking at others. I actually have this one dream that I can recall better than any memory I've made so far. It's been five or six years now, but there was a silhouette of a woman. No distinct details of her face, just the shape of her dress and the cut of her hair and the feeling I had wanting to burst from my chest just knowing that she existed. I can remember the floral pattern along the bodice and the stark white Peter Pan collar. But what's most gripping, the most intense footprint in my head from that dream, was the feeling of loss once I woke up. I knew I'd never be with her again. It's odd to say, sad even to know, that I'll never feel that happy or depressed again as I did within that 48 hours. I've been in love. I've been shit all over. This was still nothing compared to the dream.

So sometimes, when I'm getting nostalgic, I revisit the relationships I've had. And then I get to one where I just remember the feeling and vague, yet crystal clear, details of this moment I shared inside my own mind and try to play it off as something real, when it was just a fantasy. That is, of course, if I'm not actually sending myself a dream theater from the future in hopes to hone my skills and start to build a blueprint of accepting future information in a past brain, therefore successfully lubing up my unconscious mind to make myself a super genius and profitable so that my future life is super rad.

Then again, I do indulge in way too much science-fiction.

Also: I think I'm going to title my short story collection "Thick Fiction" - at least I feel better about it than "Chronicles of a Heavy Sleeper" - we'll see, though. I haven't even begun the first round of edits.

I started having those dreams again, the ones where I'm displaced in a different type, but I'm still in my body. They happen enough so that I know I have an obvious obsession with science-fiction scenarios gone wrong, but also they come in such a frequency that I'm worn down to wandering if there is such a device that makes dream implantation an actuality, regardless of time. Say that (and step far back from Inception) there is a way to affect someone's brain waves while they're in the R.E.M. stages of sleep, like a radio broadcast and you can only nudge a few things here and there... unless you're actively fucking with your own dream patterns in a time that allows you to send such waves back through your own timeline.

I know, it's weird and very very unlikely... but what if.

The truth is definitely much more grounded. I'm sure that my subconscious mind is pulling fragments and miniscule pieces from all these random parts of my brain that I've long forgotten and put them together like a digestible jigsaw that I scarf down. There's enough from my actual waking life sprinkled in there to drive the curiosity away for authenticity, while piling on loads of distractions in which keep my brain and self occupied, especially after some randomly awkward future time shit is brought up.

For example: another person in the dream I had last night asked how things were since I got married. (Which for those of you that know, I am not married - nor am I in an sort of romantic entanglement.) Since the mind in the dream body was that of the person I currently am in the waking world, I didn't know what they were talking about, but still being me (as I'm sure this other version of myself was), the person thought I was just being facetious and laid a trail of bread crumbs saying that this woman I married was my best friend and we'd be together a while, which still didn't give the real me any inkling as to what they were leading to. Then the name dropped and it took me by surprise. But instead of getting to ask any questions, some shit started going down in the underwater alien/illuminati pyramid that we were in that was used to house the history of existence, including human and alien currency since the beginning of time. (Like I said, this is obviously sugar-coated in fanboy fantasy, like Stargate meeting the first AvP movie with elements of The Abyss and some other horror franchises thrown in. But like I said, that's wasn't the focus for me, obviously.)

And that's the deal with these dreams, I'll have this moment wherein I am teased with a string of information (probably not real, but enough to snag my curiosity) wrapped in this thick fiction. I actually had one the other night where I had to survive a battle arena and ended up acting in an improv play as the husband in a cat family (as anthropomorphic cats which were really just people in costume for this play), and something in it triggered this inspiration that bridged the gaps in this story I've been working on. It was so intense that I immediately woke from my dream and madly began to write in the notebook I keep next to my bed for such occasions. However, once I grabbed the pen - I couldn't articulate what was rolling around in my brain, so it dulled and most likely ended up getting lost in outline notes with the sloppiest handwriting I could muster at 5am. But I still have those images rolling around in my head through the faint fog of memory.

Dreams are weird. And I feel like mine are slightly making me a bit more disheveled. Anyway, crazy or not - I'll likely never know until I'm lying on my death bed.

Lost, I guess, is the way that I would put it. The way I feel. My state of being. Perpetually lost. As if I don't typically or wholly identify. Sure, I have my element and my comfort zones, and when I really like people and truly feel like I appreciate them (or feel like I want to know them more on a personal level, regardless of romantic/platonic entanglement), I try to express or invite them into these said zones, whether they be physical (bar, apartment, etc.) or ideological (personal beliefs, political standings, being a closet anime kid). But it's not always that, I force people through these fiery loops to "earn" the right to get to know me better as a person, when in actuality I don't feel comfortable letting people get that far. It's a weird process, and allow me to illustrate it for you - the reader that may or may not be on the other end of this rant.

I am happy in my misery. That's the whole of what you should know about me as a person.

I feel fine leading the boring, lackluster life that I lead because I am a miracle in myself. Now, don't let that confuse you in my belief that I am a modern American god - I know some friends would argue that of my cockiness and self-absorbed, nonchalantly conceited existence - the fact that I exist out of all the sperm cells that came out of the father before me and paired with the mother that housed my for 9+ months. That all in itself, that I came to be into this world and became self-aware without any other factors making it more difficult for me than my own self, is a fucking miracle. Now, moving forward.

I am happy existing, I truly am, even though there are nights that I lay awake and wonder the what if's and feel like I'm not living up to a certain potential. But wait for that bit later. I am happy that I get to experience honest friendships. I've been in love. I know what a lot of other people may not or may have taken for granted (I, as well, have taken a lot for granted), but these things are not (despite the beginning of this rant) lost on me. No, I appreciate my begrudging obsession with pop culture and pop celebrity icons regardless of their power to stay in the spotlight. I am happy claiming to be a writer with a shitty string of poetry and short fiction in my wake to claim as mine. I am happy that I have to option to go to sleep every night hoping that I don't wake up, but despite my pessimistic tendencies, I  do anyway. Not to discount or exclude all the millions and millions of unfathomable cool things I get to experience and take for granted on the day to day.

However...

The only time I ever feel like I'm falling short is when I have to measure up to people around me, maybe not immediate circumstances or those far fetched ones (because I'm usually acquainted with college dropouts who understand my plight - and I'm not ever going to be the male equivalent to Taylor Swift or Beyonce) but when 20/30-somethings are portrayed - erroneously, I might add - as the pseudo-successful types with a disposable incomes and their only problem is finding someone who they can marry forever and ever, I feel inadequate. I know that's not uncommon. I know that I am a minnow in a stream of this particular thought. But that's the only time I ever feel like I hate being myself... when other [fictional/well-adjusted] people come into the picture. These fictional fucks that are the collective dream of what life should be like, when no one even knows how to really live until they're ready to die.

I often find myself wondering what life would be like if I secluded myself from the massive amounts of bullshit that's posted online/that I watch in horrible RomCom situations and honed in on the people around me. The real life people who struggle every day with self-identity issues and finding their own happiness. I wonder what life would be if I and everyone else in this whole goddamn world stopped dreaming these unattainable dreams that aren't even our own and just focused on the life in front of us. I never wanted a big house. Maybe a shack on a beach so I could die understanding the infinite nothing that exists. I never wanted a top-line sports car. I'm happy with the size of my penis, and I just want something that's reliable and can maybe take a hit or two and keep going through rain or snows or a fucking motorcycle to roam around the country nomadically without materialistic bindings. I never wanted a trophy wife with honor roll kids. I just want someone that I like to look at, who laughs at my dumb jokes and knows that even though I stumble and fall a lot, that I'll still do everything in my power to be the best that I can be for them... and maybe have a child that fucks up as much as I do that I can impart my terrible sage-like wisdom of "nothing's perfect, but things will be okay if you know that you never have to be perfect as long as you're happy with who you are". I never asked to be alive and live a life that I was happy or unhappy with, but I'm here and I'm grateful - I really am, despite all these self-analytical and doldrums shit that come out of me. It's all a venting process that I've found helps me understand the human condition, and despite my weird complex, I am - after all - human. I am alive and I'm human. I'm lost and I'm happy. I'm not every single person, but I am wholly myself. I just don't feel like that should be something to be ashamed of.

I'm too drunk for this shit right now.

Strange things, we are - creatures too smart for our own good most of the time. Duality. Procreation. Has there ever been a more self-destructive and self-obsessed species?

I think a lot about this bullshit and, honestly, I'd rather be asleep than have my brain turning over tiles just to see what's underneath.

Being human feels like a curse sometimes. I'd rather be a cat and be okay with being a shithead.

Sometimes, it feels good just being able to type something out. The movement of my fingers stretching and seeing something on the other end of my mind, something not quite tangible, but still more physical than it was before. It's nice every now and again.

The "can't sleeps" have begun. And I've already reached the end of the Internet, as well as looked at everything on Facebook AND read the comments... can I die now? The world has no secrets!

Those eyes make me feel like a pierced veil. 

Stifling. Intriguing, but still stifling. 

My life is full of unrealistic expectations. 

And in the words of strangers, I've recovered something I thought was long lost. 

New is good. New is distracting. New never lived up to the hype. 

I feel this great big lonely swimming in an empty sea where my heart and guts should be. I believe it's both to do with a fixation on an idea and the spiral toward obsession, however brief. This is complicated to me, to want something you know nothing about and not be able to define the parameters of your desire. Is living in fantasy that much more interesting than plainly breathing air? The complexity of existence in itself should be wowing enough to keep me dumbfounded throughout the day without adding my own intangible complications to the layer cake of melancholy I've been baking for weeks now. 

And why do I choose to say the things I say the way I do? I don't care to sound smart, I just don't want to be bored with my vocabulary but I'll still repeat "on fleek" like I'm suffering from Tourette's. 

My brain is on fire and I don't know if it's the caffeine or if it's been too long since I held a pen in my hand and let it purge through that rusted faucet I call creativity. 

Throttle down, cowboy. 

Then I think about you, Braille-Reader, out there. I wonder if you know I exist yet. If you ever will. Will we meet or will I build you up into this amazing fiction that real life will never know how to recreate? But that's all I have, isn't it? The idea of you. I've thought I knew you a thousand times over, but the closer I feel I am to you, the further away you are and the less I know from the idea of you. Whatever the truth of it is, I hope you sleep well tonight, while my brain burns piecing you together only to deconstruct myself in your wake, knowing I'll never be good enough. 

Goodnight. 

I found you in my thoughts tonight, Braille-Reader. I wonder how you feel when all your plans fall through and disappointment finds you before the night's really begun. Maybe in the next few years it'll happen to you, but right now - I think you're still always surrounded by people who admire you. That's what you're used to. Either way, I'm curious how the cogs inside you turn. I'd love to watch them move behind your eyes just once as the sentiment connects with the sentences just before you blow your veil of smoke across the faces of strangers. 

I'm driving myself crazy again with questions that will never be answered. There's no way of knowing what's going on in someone else's brain. But instead of accepting that, I run through constant what-if scenarios, all the while entertaining further hypotheticals by trying to anticipate every possible outcome of any situation that would lead me to a resolution that I feel like I need and am owed, knowing that I have to own what I have because this is it. This is the way things are and will be. They don't change. Things rarely do once they've been committed to and whatever I do to fight it, the crazier I am to resist. 

When will I get over the fact that things don't fit into a box. The world doesn't revolve around what I want. I'm a speck of nothing in mountain of heavy sighs. That's the world as it is. This whole self-aware human thing isn't all that great as everyone spends the years telling you it will be. 

There's always just one thing I never tell anyone, but it's not a secret. 

I feel helpless, just when I feel I've got a grasp on this I find myself swimming deeper and deeper into thoughts about how everything falls apart around me. I have hope, but hope is hollow. Hope is weak. Hope isn't everything I've lead myself to believe it is. I remember this feeling, it's been rattled around inside of me a lot. Lost. That's how I would describe it. Tired of talking about the problem I can't get passed, not that it would be this difficult had I been wearing the boots made for walking away.

This is the downside of dating. The uncertainty and lack of closure. I'm all for the chase... or rather, I used to be. Often now, I'm too tired to chase a pretty face around the glowing lights of neon bar signs. I only want someone that I can look at and listen to and not want to kill myself around. Maybe that's still too picky. It wouldn't matter anyway, it'd be a few months and I'd be bored like always and find myself in the same spot with the upper hand on the situation instead of desperately grasping at delusional thoughts like they were pockets of air in the deep, black ocean of depression I'm currently overwhelmed in.

And to track it all down to just one person, one person I didn't sleep with. I didn't makeout with. I just felt comfortable and wanted to spend the time knowing more about. What did it all change? The routine. The straightforward, unabashed snide asshole that got what he wanted. What did I even want from her? Was I just lonely? Fuck if I know. I can throw out all the questions for miles and still come no closer to knowing myself any better than the five minutes before when I started down the good cop/bad cop routine with myself in a dark room with the dim light of this monitor.

I think what's truly terrifying is just how close it all came to being real again. That feeling. I don't feel things, I'm a robot. I've built and steeled myself to digest and process the human condition, and weed that annoying shit out to the best of my ability. And here I am, depressed because a girl up and disappeared on me after putting in two months of 'getting-to-know-you' time. It should be nothing. It should be a flash in the pan, cool - thanks for your time, see ya around, done. But for some reason it isn't, and it's fucking killing me not knowing why...

It's probably just that I didn't get the final say. It likely has nothing to honestly do with me having a heart, just me having an ego.

Where did you go?

Lost again. This time in thought. This time it doesn't feel like plunge a dull knife into my chest. More like spoons into my eyes. So in that aspect, things have improved. 

Why is it that every time I take a second to slow down, I’m just thinking about the things that I could’ve done better with her? Then I just admit to myself that I’m depressed and though things will inevitably get better as time glazes over the feelings that I’m having right now, even though I can barely acknowledge that I was already having doubts. From the beginning, there were these glaring doubts and I chose to ignore them. Now that I’m on the rejected end of the spectrum, I’m too busy feeling pity for myself to revisit things that I wrote-off as my being shallow or self-absorbed and close-minded, when it’s very possible that these were red flags all along. The fact still remains, though, that of all the dates and faux-dates and whatevers I’ve been on in the past year, she was the first one that got a hook in me. She kept me coming back because something in my brain liked what was going on in her brain. I liked looking at her. I liked her words. I liked her. Now, I just like the fact that I breathe, sometimes. I’m a person that needs communication, and she was busy a lot more than not. That left gaps that grew a needing to be filled. Instead of tending to myself, I let her run the gauntlet over my emotions since I like to believe and pretend that I have none. Turns out that I actually do. It gets exhausting being wrong a lot.

And so it is... just like I'd hoped it wouldn't be. But better now than later after my ankles were wrinkled and my waist was wet. 

I write to you a lot, but I rarely write about you. 

Sifting through memories like old photographs, at least the piles are less cluttered. What's more amazing is the dull hum of the television I've left on in the back of my head, it's just static. This buzz of white noise as I pull and plug the faint noises of voices I used to recognize. Now they're just garbled garbage mouth talk with some recording echo effect like they bounce off brick walls.

And I've listened to "Nothing Compares 2 U" at least three times today. Honestly, it gets better, just like everything else on repeat just before your patience collapses and you hate it all over again. I can feel the support beams bowing as I remember the smell and the way that she twisted her hair out of her face. What's weird is that first date, I didn't give a shit - I was too nervous and didn't think there'd be a second or third - and so on. Now I'm floating along this empty space just curious about the closure aspect of it all. Everyone likes a good mystery, except when nothing gets solved. And I'm a ground zero.

You'd think getting older solves a lot more problems, but it doesn't. Even steeling myself against occurrences such as this didn't prepare be very well except in the land of make-believe. I have the face that I wear and I wear it well enough. But when I close that door and no one's looking - it feels so good to fall apart before I have to put myself back together. And everyone always has to put themselves back together. I'm just wondering how long it'll be before the tremors in my fingers become so violent they can't hold the pieces.

I think that's enough free-flow thinking for now, developing ideas can be dangerous.

Do you ever feel like... fuck it, the microwave just announced that my breakfast burritos are well past overdue for munching. 

Would you like to know a secret?

Tonight I sleep with my mind crashing against itself with waves, muttering the same thing under my breath just before I lock my eyes shut.

War never changes, Braille-Reader. 

Sometimes I feel like I'm gasping for air when it's a little too hot in my room and I'm running scenarios through my mind. Irrational things, yes, but still they exist in my head-space - all full of turmoil and that anxious cinder block sitting on my chest. That's what it's like in the time between your name floating on my lock screen, when the hours get longer and there's nothing but empty space wandering through the crooked wrinkles in my brain. I probably just have an insanely overactive imagination, but then again - you haven't said anything in the greater span of two days.

Ah, despair. There you are again, my old friend. With you strings at the end of the toxic feelings swirling around, like the perfect storm, in my chest. 

Fuck. Just... fuck. 

I know the difference and see the raised letters like goosebumps down my arm. It's in the eyes and the words and the cadence of a voice. Carrying charisma like a viral strain. 

And to think, in all this time I could've been getting down to some... Sick. Beat. 

When we have the ellipsis to divide the things we say so... dramatically, I wonder did we create such things to appease ourselves or have a whim to bend to. 

I'm not trying to be clever, just mundane and less educated than people think I am. 

Are you around me? I know you are. I can see you and hear you whenever it suits me. Call it paranoia. 

Braille-reader, do you see me now? Is there a hair, at all, standing up at the back of your neck when you see this stranger's name?

I haven't cared much for a while, but in the past couple of weeks, an anchor cast of your mettle has sunken through the pit of me and I find myself drowning all the other thoughts out. I just don't want it to get quiet. Then my fingers will find you in some fashion or another and wrap themselves around an invisible future full of toxic fantasy. A house made of tarot cards tempting fate to lash out swiftly and leave nothing in its wake. I'm sure you feel the same. 

It's always the things that are just out of reach that keep my mind reeling for another day to think and obsess over those what-ifs. Like happiness and hope. Daydreams laced with pipe bombs or pipe bombs laced with daydreams, I can't really decide. But I've fought this feeling every time it's come around, this shell's crowded enough with paranoia and sun-blistered fantasies masquerading as imagination, and the older I get the easier the win. Now, though, my stomach's bottomed out and I find myself twisted over the ideas of a person I'll never know in a life I'd never want to lead. 

I've been inside my head much too long today. Every day, probably. 

I was supposed to be asleep an hour ago. Am I not already sleepwalking through life?