Crap. I've lost count.

Before I start this particular episode, I have to give major, huge, gigantic props to the RainyDay herself for coming through for me in a clutch. She is my hero. She even experimented with soymilk pudding. I am forever in her debt. Toodles also made the multiple teeth extraction less painful with some QT and a DVD. Y'alls are the best.

I think I am up to #8, but I am not sure. 6 and 7 were both a little fuzzy and I am not even sure if they qualified for numbers, but because I like calling this one #8, let's just leave it at that.

Number 8. Oh number f-ing 8. What an ass I made of myself. I think I am finally beginning to understand why my therapist keeps giving me exercises to help me "be in the moment." I would venture to say that approximately 80-90 percent of my time I spend somewhere outside my body. For example, in a meeting about facilities for example, my brain goes to various places -- my vision of a good elementary school, what my elementary school looked like, that time when my two public school friends threw snowballs at me, the bills I have to schedule for e-payment, that building that 8 owns and I want to turn into a cooperative, etc, etc, etc. I end up missing half the information and leaving a ton of good ideas half-baked in subconscious land.

This, I think, is one of the reasons why I have so recently been speeding up all of my relationships. So when I am with I guy, and he is talking about how he likes me, I am thinking about the things we should see together, the places I want to take him, what I want him to teach me, what clothes he is going to leave here, how I am going to have to hide that giddy smile as I work, etc. etc. etc. It never goes to marriage or anything serious like that -- just those little details that I revel in. Because I envision them, I want them immediately.

Or it could be something entirely different.

One thing that 8 said that hit my most sensitive nerve is something I think I have resisted coming to terms with in all of my other relationships. After our second "date," he said something changed in me. He said that he felt I was more concerned with how I was "performing" in the relationship instead of genuinely being interested in spending time with him. I felt this as well, but to me it felt like I was nervous. I was nervous that he was going to discover that I was not what he expected, less sophisticated, less intelligent, and that he would just leave me. Yes, it was about me. Perhaps I am a narcissist to my core, but that is just completely revolting. I hate narcissism. Maybe I am selfish. I wonder if that is why I cannot concentrate on anything in a meeting, or sometimes in a relationship -- do I really believe my ideas are better or more important than the person in front of me? How terrible.

Looking back now, I think this is where all of my relationships break down. 1 and 2 definitely, and probably 4 and 5 as well. I second-guessed myself, my worth, my entire being.

Perhaps it has to do with self-confidence. The more confident someone is about themselves, the less they have to worry and the more they can focus on the people around them. Perhaps this is why the taken-folk become so much more attractive when they are taken -- they can finally afford to pay attention to others, and therefore become more attractive.

So, I am second guessing what I felt for 8, and what I feel for him right now. Did I really feel like I was falling in love, or was I just falling in love with the idea of him for my own personal gain? And even now, as I sit here wishing he would call, do I really want to talk to him to hear about his trials and tribulations, or do I just want to hear that he has been thinking about me too?

It's a bit of both, I am certain. I do want to hear about his day. I do want to make him feel better, I want to make him laugh, I want to figure out what makes him 8. Only in order to do that, I have to transcend insecurity. I have to get beyond worrying that he might leave me, because the truth is, he might. He might stop talking to me all together. He might hate the fact that I don't like to be "the talker" in a conversation. He might hate the fact that I don't keep my desk spotless 100 percent of the time. I don't want to deal with might anymore. I could might myself into a corner for the rest of my life.

If I am really falling in love with 8, I have to get rid of the "mights." I have to remember that he liked me, before all this, before I was worrying. Not for who I was worrying about being, but for who I was, and who I am.

PLEASE HELP IF YOU CAN...

If you, or someone you know, would be able to sit in the dentist office for about 2 hours while I get my teeth extracted tomorrow, I WOULD REALLY, REALLY, REALLY APPRECIATE IT. The bitches at the dentists office won't start the procedure until I have someone there, and I cannot find anyone to do it. My aunt can't do it because she has appointments. My friends that are "unemployed" are out of town. Please, please, please, I am begging you, if you know anyone who could help me out, let me know.

Fear and the written word

Does it scare us to see our reflection? In writing? In photos? In a window?

For me, when I write down how I am feeling or what is going on, it becomes more real. Like if I don't give a situation the credit of the written word, then it never happened. It can never be immortal, it has no life. I think that is where you can draw the line between responsible journalism and plain crap. Journalists, writers of all sorts, make things, people, animals, immortal. That is why it is scary when our media fails us. It is scary when we see an outright lie on TV "news" or in a quote from a politician. Because that lie becomes more than a lie, it becomes living, breathing truth to someone.

On a much more micro and less significant scale, I suffer from a terrible fear of facing up to the truths in my life. I think I put off blogging because I don't want to face certain truths in my life. One truth that keeps staring me in the face is that I am lonely, and craving something more than the people around me have time to give. I understand that, respect that, I just need to accept my lonliness, and not characterize "alone" as bad. It's jarring though, when people just stop calling, stop remembering to invite you to things, and you have to start over with a whole new set of people. It's not necessarily a bad experience, just exhausting.

I am also afraid of facing up to the task ahead of me, because every day it seems to take a different shape. I try to focus on what I can, doing the best I can with the tiny tasks on my plate. I try to think carefully about my words, my actions, my ideas. But I can't help feeling like I am smashing up against a deceptively hard wall of clay. Sometimes I feel like people are just begging for someone to do something about everything. The irony is though, that if everyone did something about something everything would be taken care of. But men and women are not angels, and you cannot rely on human nature to correct itself.

I am not worried about the change to come, something will come, it always does. I am worried about my part in that change. Will I be an unwilling participant in a gross reshaping of that wall, or will I have the chance to break it down completely? Shit. It drives me nuts.