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.