mahiwaga

I sit here, not wanting to sleep, not wanting to pack. My clothes are strewn completely all over my bed, so I can't sleep without packing. How clever my subconscious is. An attempt at negative reinforcement, perhaps. Self-sabotage, more likely. Despite all my soul-searching and impatience, I think there is a large portion of me that actually likes being in limbo.

Have I been really thinking all that deeply, these past few days I've been traveling down the Mother Road? Or have I been just chewing on ragged ends, obsessing over decisions long ago decided, digging up the corpses of my fantasies long ago interred? In other words, a lot of mental masturbation without the money shot. (How lovely, huh?)

Now, I don't know how to unravel this knot tied tight in my head. So we'll go chronologically. Not always the best, definitely not always the clearest, but you've got to start somewhere.

I'm not entirely sure what to do with the statement: "Wow, everybody is getting married and having kids." Obviously, the amount of discomfort elicited depends on entirely who is stating this. In of itself it is completely innocuous. But, clearly, the atavistic part of my soul recoils in horror at the implied meaning and the insinuated algorithm that I should follow.

I am, perhaps, just batting away at the flies in my eyes again.

Which gets me to start thinking about the nature of my solitude. Like, how much of it is self-imposed, and how much of it is the fact that, while, objectively speaking, I'm not repulsive—by which I mean to say, I don't look like Quasimodo, or Sloth from "The Goonies"—I am also clearly not hot.

Definitely not as hot as the women I tend to lust for.

Attractiveness mismatch. Wonderful.

I gravitate towards situations involving unrequited love lust whatever the way that moths like to fly right into open flames and immolate themselves.

So I could drown myself in self-pity like I've been doing for the past, oh, I don't know, decade of my life, but, frankly, it's starting to get a little boring.

I think one of the things that I have learned in these past few years is the notion of futility, and how you should stop bashing your head against the brick wall after around the third bash, and definitely before you lose consciousness.

But, as usual, I digress.

So, instead, we will continue to slide down the mental staircase:

The egotistical side of me insists that, while I haven't succeeded in getting any of the really attractive girls I've liked to like me back, surely there are some perhaps, ah, less attractive women whose attentions I've managed to snag. (Like I said, this is the egotistical side of me. Not very well acquainted with reality, unfortunately, so forgive my presumptiveness.) This is clearly not a thing that I have managed to prove, so it could all be coming out of my ass academic, but a man has got to have some hope, right?

I suppose even this presupposition could be wrong, and I am simply ugly and unlovable, but, like I said, I just don't want to go down that road again right now, so we'll take another tack…

Anyway, we eventually get to the idea of settling (however completely hypothetical.) Which, at this juncture, is a big "no way," regardless of how superficial this makes me. (I'd like to try to temper this with the rationalization that I don't make these kinds of judgements based purely on appearance. Big cynic that I am, I tend to think that pretty exteriors tend to harbor decidedly ugly interiors, but, like with many things, I am hoping that I am wrong.)

Long story short, these days I find it quite easy to imagine myself on my own for the rest of my life (which may not be that unbearably long in any case, but that is another neurosis to tackle.)

Hmmm. This insomniac ramble through my brain is quite entertaining.

Which brings me back to my tendency to sabotage myself.

Like putting myself in the friend zone immediately when I realize that a woman I like is too attractive for me.

I suppose there is such a thing as being prudent.

But then, this begs the question, why even bother?

In the end, I think it sucks to pretend that you don't want something because you know that you can't have it. And yet, it's just as equally sucky and even more stupid to continue to go after something when it's clear that you can never have it.

I fear that I have taught myself to not know what I like, for fear of never getting it.

What a bizarre little non-dilemma. I reiterate: there must be something gravely wrong with me.

I suppose the real question is: what is the best way to cope with failure? Should I choose complete surrender and abdication, fold my hand, give away the rest of my chips, and call it quits forever? Or should I choose denial? Should I just slam the accelerator all the way to the floor and see how quickly I can crash into that brick wall known as rejection?

Decisions, decisions.

I'm definitely not packing tonight, so I wonder where exactly I'm going to sleep….