hm. i'm finding myself in an odd position. i mean, not literally, like i'm stuck in a particularly complex yoga posture or anything like that. i mean that, for some odd reason, i'm gettin' all kinds of play from da boyz. i mean, guys i've know for months and years all of a sudden are being uber attentive and solicitous.

don't know how i feel about that.

hm.

*sigh*

enjoy the ride, i guess!

(oh, yeah, by the way, one of them in particular left me a kind of adorable voicemail message, and i keep playing it over and over and over and over and over...you get the idea.)

i'm a dork. i'm titillated. i'm nervous as hell.

it's been a bad couple of days -- not because anything untoward has happened to me, but because i'm going through one of my keenly lonely phases. i don't know if it's 'cause i've started dating regularly which has only underlined the difficulty of finding someone you really connect with, or if it's because there's something hormonal happening with me (always a possibility when you're a woman); maybe it's 'cause i still don't have a job and am lacking a sense of purpose, a sense of worth.

i'm so fucking lonely. i cry, and i sleep on it, and i'm still lonely. if it's hormones, i can't wait for this to pass.

i think some other contributing factors are the recent conversations i've been having with exes.

my first love, and the only man i ever tho't i would marry: we've been having pretty intimate conversations online -- not sex conversations, but the kinds of things that you talk about with someone you feel connected to. we talk about where we want to live out the ends of our days, what it means to have a family, why it is that being out in the natural world feeds our souls, the hopes we have for the other to be happy and fulfilled, and so on, etc., ad infinitum.

and then there's re-friend. the other night, we hung out for italian food and monday night football. we drank three bottles of wine -- well, he mostly drank; i helped some -- and had a really candid talk about why it was that he was so cruel to me six years ago. he asked me to sing him a lullaby. i did. he cried. i stroked his hair. he asked me to stay the night so we could keep talking in the morning. i told him i couldn't. he said, "you can trust me." i said, "give me time." he fell asleep. i kissed his temple and left.

*sigh*

i don't know; was it simpler at some point, this life thing? i wish i could remember. i wish i could do it that way again, all forward motion and no fear. i have a vague feeling i was once fearless. i wonder what that was like?

peace, babies.

so, i had my first online "date" blow-off last night. totally took me by surprise and confused me. i tho't we were getting along exceptionally well, and even if there was no in-person chemistry, i was really looking forward to making a good friend.

but, when i tried several times to contact my friend about our plans, when i tried to figure out what time and where we were supposed to meet, i was met with silence.

nothing.

nada.

not even a simple little, "hey, i changed my mind. sorry!" or perhaps even an, "i'm not really interested in meeting in person; can we stay pen pals?" or even a, "your last picture you posted? yeah, i think this is done."

i don't get it. i mean, why is it so hard to just say something? just as a common courtesy. and, y'know, i'm sure i'm overreacting 'cause i'm so disappointed. but, still! can't you just SAY IT ALREADY?!?

man sakes alive!

*grrrrrr*

now i'm crabby. tonight's gonna be a whiskey kind of a night, i can tell. hm, altho' ... i do have SEVERAL bottles of wine that are just sitting there. maybe i'll crack one of those bad boys open.

*sigh*

boo! BOOOO, I SAY!

so, i know i suck as a blogger, 'cause i really only post when i am in a boy quandary. sorry, kiddies. my bad. and today is not unlike those other days.

here's the thing:

i finally caved into the persistent nagging and hounding of a couple of my friends to try the whole online dating thing. my feeling about online dating has always been:

EEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

and, honestly, now that i'm doing it, i'm not sure my gut reaction was not the more accurate and appropriate one to have.

but, y'know, i'm clearly not meeting the man of my dreams the old fashioned way, even tho' i've met plenty of Good Timers. but the bottom line is that i'm competitive and jealous, and not a little self-important, and i want ALL of my dalliances to be enthralled by me! which, by the way, is (1) completely ridiculous and narcissistic, and (2) completely hypocritical, 'cause i sure as hell am not enthralled by them!

so, to be as fair as i can be when it comes to my lustful wantonness, i decided that, yes, all right, i'll actually date.

hence, the tepid willingness to try online dating.

i've been doing this now for about, eh, let's say a week and a half, maybe two weeks. i've met a few men, but only two have really stuck (read: i've made actual plans to go out with them).

the first one is everything that my dalliances have not been, including age-appropriate. he's actually nearly two years older than me, and lemme tell ya -- it's been a while since i've gone out with someone my own age!

our first date was at a tea house. the conversation was easy, and covered everything from the psychology of stuttering and lisps to favorite childhood memories. he was easy to talk to, was dressed nicely but not metro, was a gentleman (rarity!) and soft-spoken, looked at me when i talked, and actually encouraged me to talk. it was so ... nice. i mean, he's a good looking man; i could definitely see that he'd be a sensual lover. but there was no There there, if you catch my drift.

even so, i tho't that maybe it was just a first-meeting-jitters kind of thing, so we made a second date to go to an outdoor music festival. i figured, if we like the same kind of music, this is something that will be great, right? right??? wrong. turns out, he doesn't really like the kind of music he had intimated he liked. he just liked the one band that was playing the festival who happened to be of the genre of music that he had intimated he liked.

*sigh*

and then, to top it off, i had a sudden realization: in the SEVERAL HOURS that we'd ended up spending together, i had not seen him laugh out loud once. not ONCE! hell, he barely smiled at all! i mean, what's up with that? i'll have you know, i'm a very charming companion, and adorable! surely, you'd smile wide around me! right? right!

SO done.

so, that's one guy down. ready for the next one? here we go:

to start with, the dating site says that we're 94% compatible. that seems crazy-high to me, and is encouraging. second, he likes to drink. BIG plus for me! and he's a coffee addict. even BIGGER plus for me! he's a gamer (c'est moi), literally has the same taste in music as i do (we ran down our pandora radio lists), and is funny as hell. we laugh all the time. i feel sexy as hell with him. so what's the problem? lemme 'splain; there are three:

(1) i've never actually met the guy. we've IM'd a LOT, and texted a lot, and e-mailed a lot, but have yet to actually get together.

(2) he lives about an hour away, and doesn't have a car. yikes. that means i'd have to do all the work. (i mean, he's offered to come up to where i am via bus and train, but c'mon, i'm not that much of a selfish bastard!)

(3) HE'S 17 YEARS YOUNGER THAN ME! i don't know how to feel all right about that one. i mean, honestly, this is the biggest problem i have with the whole sitch.

perhaps the scariest part of all of this, tho', is how much i really, really, REALLY like this boy! i haven't felt this way since ... well, i guess since i was his age. it sucks. it sucks big, hairy monkey balls. or maybe it doesn't? hm.

anyway, we have tentative plans to get together either this saturday or next. i'm sure i'll be letting all y'all know how it goes. dear god, help me!

peace.

it seems that every single emotion i'm having today runs the risk of The Superlative. i'm the happiest; the most restless; the horniest; the laziest; the most fucking freaked out. i'm not anything in moderation, and everything to the nth degree. it's fucking annoying -- yes, yes, the MOST annoying! (sure, why wouldn't it be?)

and, of course, there's always a boy to add to the mix. this is a new boy, a boy that i know is a tease, but at least he's age appropriate! that's a step in the right direction, right? sadly, while i was trying to be coy with the new, exciting boy, there was another, self-adoring, attention-sucking, buttinski boy who would weasel his way into any conversation i was having with i'm-too-shy boy.

DAMN!

but lovely boy e-mailed me that very same night, mere hours after our confab. he sent me some music that he tho't i'd like (he was correct in his thinking) and said that he was glad that we got to talk more than we usually do -- exclamation point, exclamation point.

and knowing what an overeager idiot i usually am, i chose not to respond 'til the next day -- early afternoonish. i don't know; what's the rule now? i mean, i know there used to be a three-day rule, but i'm getting on in years and don't have much time to waste. besides, at what point is it nobler to just be the freak you are instead of the cool chick you're so obviously not?

so now my point is that it's been a day, and i haven't heard back.

and now, just having typed that, i realize how ridiculous i'm being. o.k., mini-panic attack/sense-of-desperation-'cause-a-good-thing's-slipping-away is over.

oh, and ps: this guy is adorable, but -- as i've already said -- a tease. if i were to get my hopes up, i know that it'd be nothing but mind games and waiting to see who made the next move. UGH! what IS it these days? maybe i could just be the one to say, hey, what are we doing? are we friends? are you gonna ask me out? 'cause i'll say yes!

peace.

i'm ten shades of anxious right now:

1) i am obsessively listening to a song that i'm co-writing with a friend over and over again, and that i really love, but i want to be able to play it myself and make some changes. i think my voice will sound better on it than hers does, but i don't know how to lovingly tell her that.

2) my father is coming down tomorrow to talk to me about money. when he tried to talk to me on the phone to schedule a time to meet, i began to cry uncontrollably. i don't know if it's because i feel like i'm nine years old again and am in serious trouble, or if it's 'cause i'm so bone-deep embarrassed at my financial state, or if it's 'cause he wants to know my plan and i don't have one.

3) i have run out of money, EDD wants to do another phone interview -- but not 'til july 9th -- and i'm still unemployed with no promising leads. i have no guarantee that EDD will come to a favorable conclusion over the course of our interview re: my unemployment insurance, and if they decide to discontinue payments (which, by the way, i have not received any payments since mid-May), i honestly have no idea what i'm going to do to survive.

4) i'm faced with the very real question of whether or not i can keep up my contractual obligation to pay rent through the end of september (which is when my current lease expires). if i don't get a job or get my EDD unemployment insurance payments reinstated, how am i gonna pay rent, much less utilities, or buy food, or toilet paper?

5) i have a job interview on monday. it's for a part-time job with a really exciting company, but it only pays $15/hour for 20 hours a week. i'm hoping that there's some rule with EDD that this will be just crappy enough of a pay rate that i'll be able to accept the job and not lose my unemployment benefits. but if i DO get the job, what do i do when my unemployment runs out in march of next year? will i have to quit an awesome job to look for full-time employment, or will i be able to morph this job into something more?

6) i'm feeling more alone than i have in a very, very long time. part of this is because it seems as tho' the ghosts of relationships past are coming back to haunt me with a strange insistent ferocity. these men that i once adored and continue to adore want to see me and be around me and talk to me and learn about me, even more so than when we were together, and yet one is married and the other is in a serious relationship. and then, of course, there's a new boy who could be lovely and amazing, but he's a good friend of mine's old obsession; if they never actually dated, would it be breaking the girl code for me to date him?

i need to drink.

i recently realized that i get turned on by taiko drumming. seriously. as in, full body tingling, blood rushing to my face and clitoris, butterflies in my stomach turned ON.

*sigh*

i have to join a dojo. there's one here where i live that's actually famous. they're pretty hard-core, though, and i'm not sure i'd be up to it. i was watching an interview with the sensei, and he was saying that the students there do 500 push-ups and sit-ups a day.

seriously.

i mean, i'd like to think i'm a woman of great determination who'd do whatever it takes for her art. and taiko -- as with a lot of asian disciplines -- is beyond an art form; it's also a spiritual way of life kind of thing, with a mind/body philosophy tied to the way you perform the music, hold the drumsticks, stand or kneel or lie before your drum.

have i mentioned that this shit turns me on?

*sigh*

yeah, i gotta figure out a way to make this happen.

so, ex-friend has somehow become re-friend.

i'm not sure exactly how this happened. i think it was probably a combination of wanting to be polite and wanting to have my friend again. that being said, i'm really, really not sure this is a good idea. i mean, we've hung out a total of three times now (once by ourselves), and i gotta say: OUCH! it hurts -- i mean, really hurts, so much so that i am semi-desperately trying to find a way to not see RF anymore.

*sigh*

anyway, i have to run, but i just wanted to state what i, well, stated so i can have some sort of record, some proof of accountability. i'll fill all y'all in later when i know more.

peace.

i've known my best friend, gina, now for 27 years. she's married to this guy named aaron. one night, they were watching "the fountain," and she saw that the director's name is darren aronofsky. for some reason, that just struck her as completely and totally funny: "aronofsky! aw, who are you, honey? you're my little aronofsky! yes, you are! ar-on-of-SKY!"

you get the picture, right?

and, what makes calling aaron "aronofsky" even more fun is just how much he hates it. i mean HAAAAAAATES it! so, we get a couple of scotches in us, and suddenly we're, like, "hey, remember when you started calling aaron 'aronofsky'? that was funny!"

"aw, aronofsky! who's my aronofsky? YOU are!"

"ar-on-of-SKY! ar-on-of-SKY!"

"hey! only gina can call me that! no one else, damn it!"

*snicker, snicker*

so, sunday night (two nights ago), a couple of us were hanging at gina and aaron's place, sittin' on the balcony, drinking, smoking, listening to awesome music, and i mentioned that darren aronofsky had a new movie out ("the wrestler"), which i felt gina and aaron should see, since it's, y'know, aronofsky.

this led to a general discussion about movies we were excited to see. i mentioned the new star trek flick. aaron tried to make the vulcan salute, but accidentally did the boy scout salute, which turned the conversation to the fact that aaron was an eagle scout.

in a fit of brilliance, our friend, jae, said:

"aronofsky, the eagle vulcan. live long and be prepared."

i just about lost my shit.

peace, babies.

once again, the saga of EF rears it's at-one-time-hideously-ugly-but-now-just-needs-a-good-pore-refining-treatment head.

as i mentioned in a previous post, i'd gotten word from EF's roommate (and a friend of mine) that EF misses me. i, naturally, pooh-poohed the notion, since i think that, not having seen each other in two and a half years and not having been friends with each other for almost five years probably falls somewhere under the category of Having Moved On And Forgotten All About It.

but then, on friday afternoon, i got this text from EF's cell (names changed to protect the truly innocent):

hey do you wanna play laser tag for my brother's birthday on Sunday? lemme know

um, HUH?

i was confused. i couldn't comprehend that EF had invited me to his kid brother's birthday gig, especially since history told me that these things usually just consisted of the siblings and the parents, and maybe one old family friend. why me? had [jujubees], EF's kid brother, asked if i could be there? if so, how could i find out without sounding paranoid? i mean, if the kid specifically wanted me there, i would maybe go. but if it's just some oddball idea of EF's, well, no thanks!

after some further consideration, i tho't that perhaps it wasn't really EF who had texted the invitation to me, but his sister (using his cell phone, obviously), since she and i have remained good friends all this time, and it's exactly the kind of thing she'd do. so, thinking it was her, i wrote back:

Ur bro [jujubees]? What day?

to which EF rather brusquely -- and rightly so, since (a) he only has one brother and (b) he'd already told me what day -- replied:

sunday

i immediately felt sheepish. my bad.

i also realized, based on the terse answer from EF, that it WAS EF who had contacted me. immediately, warning signals started flashing. i mean, don't get me wrong; [jujubees] is a fantastic kid, and normally i'd love to go and celebrate his birthday and hang out with EF's sister and their dad, who i also really enjoy. but the event itself was too personal, too intimate. i mean, really? really??? who does that? who invites an ex-friend to their little brother's birthday party?

so, i lied. i wrote back:

BUMMER! Alas, this Sunday is spoken for. Thanks for the invite!

*sigh*

i hate lying. HATEHATEHATEHATEHATE IT!

but the Truly Gutless -- c'est moi -- often must lie in order to avoid potentially painful situations.

but wait! there's more!

the next day, i got a missed call from EF. this time, he didn't leave a message, so -- against my better judgment -- i sent him this text:

what's up?

to which he replied:

not much hey are you still blogging

me:

Some, but not much at the [insert name of political blog to which i contribute] lately. Are you thinking of writing?

EF:

just started something if you wanna check it out. [name of EF's new blog]

o.k.

o.k.

weird, right? i mean, SO WEIRD! and now, a day and a half removed from the whole thing, i find that i can't tell if i'm glad, or if i'm dreading any potential fall-out from the whole thing.

ultimately, tho', what i really think is that i'm thinking too much about it. that is to say, now, as i'm writing this post, i'm thinking a lot about it, and my stomach is churning. truthfully, tho', i hardly tho't about it at all today.

huh.

so, then, maybe this is all just a bs post and there's nothing worth mentioning after all. well! who knew?

*sigh*

how old am i? oh, yeah, that's right: TOO FUCKING OLD! ;-)

peace, babies!

It's strange. Aside from a kinda shitty job where I am made to feel like shit and do shit work for a cheap-ass shit organization that is doing amazing, important, world-changing work, life has been unusually forward-moving lately. I mean, the social life's been crazy-good, the home life is getting good, the family life remains good, and the creative life has been really, really good.

Hm.

Should I be worried?