This Time Around

I do love a good holiday season. I feel like I've been terribly busy ever since Halloween, what with Sundown to plan and then all the projects my friends and I were enforcing on ourselves from there on in. All the things I've always thought of doing but never followed through on have been coming to fruition lately. Not the exact same plans, mind you, bu the plans that now ocupy the space in my head that was once held by little ideas like "take a welding class" and "ask that girl out." While before, those thoughts might have lingered and either festered into a nagging canker of regret or simply faded away are now nourished and suckled and are allowed to bloom into the full fruition of their potential. I've been building lamps, organizing gigs, printing t-shirts and designing elaborate devices to put in the lockers of my unsuspecting co-workers.

In addition, another woman has come into and gone out of my life, without much event this time around. I never really bought into this one, and once it was clear I would no longer be allowed to have sex with her I didn't real feel like I'd lost much. If anything, she had grown a little tiresome and I was happy to not have to worry about her insisting on being near me at all hours of the day. That being said I did manage, perhaps through that clarity of thought, unimpeded by the thick pink haze of enfatuation, to take a few things away from our brief engagement. Maybe I could be more candid with her, not fearing rejection from someone I wouldn't mind losing. Maybe I'm growing as a person and merely didn't feel so reserved. In any case, I feel edified on several scores about the male condition in regards to women.

• I learned they keep the jewelery you give them. The rest they burn.


• I learned that I'm truly not ready right now to be with someone in any serious context. I don't know if I ever was, but I know that now I'm not.


• I learned that refusing to fight, even if out of disinterest rather than maturity, is much easier than winning. However, it is far less gratifying.


• I learned that women will lie to your face and think they are merely omitting the truth. You should always trust your instincts, no matter how much what they are saying is what you want them to be saying. You know what they really mean, most of the time.


• I learned that women will always, always link sex to love, and are unable to have one without the other. Well... unable to have the former without the latter. The other is not only possible, but the standard in most cases.


• I learned that sex is wonderful when both parties stop acting like good Christians and get selfish enough to get get get what they need. At least, it's good for the one that's learned this.


• I've learned that you can say you don't care about her, you can act like you don't care about her, and you can even think you don't care about her. When she asks if you want her to stay with you or go out with someone else, you can tell her to do whatever she wants, to get happy however she can, that you'll miss her but it's alright. You can think you're lying about that last part. But, when you see her with the next guy, it's still no fun.

Quite a year, everybody. Quite a fucking year.