Sometimes, I feel like I could stay out there forever. Not a care in the world. The only sounds, the ubiquitous crickets, and her cat purring at my feet. The only sights, the stars far above, or the occasional car passing by. The cool yet elusive breeze that feels oh so good on my skin that even my minimal clothing seems excessive.

Memories eventually intrude, though. The feelings find me. The regrets torment me. And so I come back inside, and I go to bed. Sometimes, I even manage to sleep.

So Friday, after work, I went to Rich O's. First time in a couple of weeks, I think. I don't really know why I went. It's not like there's anything there for me anymore. My friends have all finished what I started - abandoned the place for the most part. I think we still go there, every now and then, full of some misguided hope that things will be back to normal for a while.

Yeah, that's never happened. Sometimes the past is really the past. Sometimes change is not only for the worse, it's permanent.

I go in there these days and I'm usually the only customer there is in the Rich O's proper area. Oh well, I guess. This is what they wanted, for some stupid reason.

Anyway.

What I wanted to write about was that, when I went there Friday, I started shaking. Like from a bizarre mixture of excitement and fear. I mean, I fell in love in that place. I found hope in that place. I found patience in that place. Then, later, I found other things. Disappointment. Despair. Heartache.

I finally stopped shaking about an hour after I got back home.

It's really amazing to me, how emotions can hide in places, behind memories. You walk into a place and, for a while, you think you're safe. But you're not. The emotions are waiting. They ambush you. They jump into you, and they take over. They run the show that is you.

My friend OddlyFamiliarGirl remembers every word of every conversation she's ever had. She's all smart and shit, that girl. My own memory isn't quite as strong, nor is it made of the same stuff. Nope, I remember emotions. Not to the point where I can easily relive them, just enough to remember that they're there. Waiting, lurking.

Then, as soon as I realize they're there, they strike, and I shake.

OddlyFamiliarGirl's way would be better, I think. It would certainly be easier to deal with. Plus, it would make for a good party trick.

Behind places, and faces, beneath sights and sounds, the memories wait for me to show up. They even welcome me, sometimes. But hiding behind the memories are the emotions, and they always surprise me with their ruthless intensity, and they tear away at me, and I could do certainly without them.

What good have they ever done me?

Testes testes 123...

This doesn't count. I'm nowhere near as loosened up as I'd hoped to be.

I'm going to be so pissed at myself in 40 years, when I go back to read this shit. Such an important and formative time in my life, and I'm staying so silent. It's like I expect to remember all this shit. Fuck, I'll be lucky to remember my own damn name in 40 years, or how to not piss my pants.

But what can I say? What can I say that hasn't already been said a million times, or been censored a million times?

I'm stuck here, you know. Trying to invent a middle ground where none exists. Loving what I hate, and hating what I love. Everything I ever wanted, blended with everything I ever avoided. My life is a grotesque mixture of dread and hope, of fear and desire, of love and hate. I'm trying to muddle through, but really just surviving, and only barely at that.

This would all be so very interesting, if only I could step aside for a while. If only I could be objective for a while. I feel things, and they're not true. They're not even close to being true, but I not only don't care, I refuse to see. Feelings trump facts, every single time. Faced with the absolute worst, I continue to see only the absolute best. Why is that? Why is it so different this time? Seriously, has there truly never been another?

Why am I so incapable of seeing the damn truth when it's been right in front of my face for all these years?

Fuck if I know. It just is what it is. I just am what I am.

Years ago, I wrote that, if I could step back and take a good look at myself, I'd laugh my ass off. Maybe that's still true, but I bet there would be an awful lot of tears as well. I'm just stuck. I don't know what to do, or if I should do anything at all.

Some things never change.

Like I said, this doesn't count. This isn't even close.

I guess my recent blogging hiatus has mostly been innocent. I upgraded my PC, in several stages, from XP Pro to Windows 7 Professional 64-bit, and the upgrades didn't go very smoothly. My computer was down for well over a week.

But it's back now. I was actually very pleasantly surprised by the two different Microsoft support girls I talked to. They were very patient and knowledgeable. I also like to imagine that they were hot.

So now there are no more excuses for not writing anything. None except the usual ones, that is. None of that has changed. Just more of the same old shit.

Tonight, my tentative plan is to go out to my garage, glare at my phone, and drink a New Holland Night Tripper. It's a very yummy beer, and it's 10.8% ABV. So maybe I'll be loosened up enough to actually write something later.

I'm not making any promises, though.

I'm not really sure when I crossed this particular line. Sometime between two years and two months ago, if I had to guess. Sadness became a hard thing to muster, and anger became the easiest thing in the world.

I don't like it, but there it is. Things are, as always, what they are.

The quiet contemplative moments are what I crave and relish, but they're too few and too far between for any semblance of normalcy. There is very little silence within me. I just have to feel something, and feel it strongly, and that's all there is to it.

So I turn my back on the anger that the world expects, and I face the sadness that only I truly understand. Because the thoughts that rise from anger, deserved as they may be, don't fit. They don't fit my heart or my head or the world or the universe. I don't want them. I don't want to think those things about her.

So, I choose to be sad.

Funny, she was right about that. I didn't know it at the time, but she was right. Faced with the choice I've been given, I choose sadness.

The last time CartGirl was at my house, she sat on the couch while I sat on the loveseat. Buddy watched her cautiously from the coffee table, probably in case she had food in her purse. Nugget, of course, hid under the couch and made sure his will was up-to-date. After a couple of hours, CartGirl left, and Buddy jumped onto the couch, curled up right where she had been sitting, and went to sleep.

That was sweet.

I've been wanting, for a long time, to write an entry - or even a series of entries - describing sweet as I see it. Regarding girls, not cats, though the example above certainly fits my definition of the word. Or at least one of my definitions. I seem to have several. I find a different one every time I rummage through my head.

Eventually, I hope to write definitively about what sweet means to me. This is not that time, but eventually.

Tossed and turned all night. Too damn hot. Too damn much second guessing of everything.

The birds and the crickets outside my open windows squawked and chirped their disappointment all night, scolding me. The lightning bugs flashed their disgust. The stars blinked in disbelief at what I'd said.

I needed more time to find words, but there was none to be found. The time was upon me, the questions asked, and I had to answer with the inadequate and jarring words I had. Silence, though, would have been worse.

I would have liked to have been able to offer solutions instead of just problems. I would have liked that very much. But I didn't, and I still haven't. Solutions evade me, if they exist at all. I look for them, but all I find are increasingly-unlikely miracles.

There was a time when I'd simply stay quiet. Then there was a time when I'd just walk away. Those times are in the past. Now is the time to speak up. For, if anything is to be saved, it won't be saved by my turning the other cheek. If anything is to be saved, that salvation will have to start with honest words.

My words have always been honest. I only wish they'd been more tactful.

I kinda feel cruddy this morning. I slept too long, for one thing. My alarm went off at 4:00, and then I reset it to go off at 5:00. I didn't need that extra hour. I also didn't have any particular reason to get up at 4:00, though.

I hope it's just too much sleep that's got me feeling cruddy. I hope it's not allergies coming on. I have, after all, been sleeping with my windows open for the last several weeks.

I also feel bad for venting yesterday. But I'll get over it. Stuff needed to be said, and this is a better place than most.

Talked to StupidGirl for a bit last night. Things are looking much better for her. She's accepted responsibility for what happened, and they're giving her another chance. I'm so glad, even though it means she won't be coming here anytime soon. It really sucked when she was so sad and I couldn't do anything about it or even give her a hug.

Nugget is still hanging in there. Poor kitty is so skinny now.

This is shaping up to be the hottest week of the year so far. Not having air conditioning is pretty rough, but it's not as bad as I'd feared. The whole-house fan really does a lot of good. The main problem is that, because of the humidity, everything in my house feels like it's coated in a layer of slime. Gross, I know.

I guess that's it for now. Time to take a shower and go into work.

I actually managed to get to sleep fairly quickly last night. That was weird, because I'd really been expecting the day's events to keep me tossing and turning.

I had a dream about me and this one certain girl going to some house and breaking in. It was all her idea. Some Christmas thing, I think. The dream turned into a horror/thriller kind of thing. A cross between The Shining and The Blair Witch Project. When I woke up I was creeped out for quite a while. I wish I could write fiction, because it would make an awesome short story.

Another dream I had was more in the sci-fi/action genre. It was pretty interesting to be in the dream, but it probably wouldn't make a compelling story. Something about a house with lots of hidden rooms, and some pod-people with blue blood. Then I woke up right as the big lesbian scene was about to start. So that sucked.