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Sometimes I wish I could freeze a certain moment and save it to relive it again in the future. I do my best to relish the good stuff while it’s happening, but you can only savor something so much, and once it’s gone, it’s gone. In an attempt to preserve such a moment for future savoring, I will now relate a tale from my life.

On Tuesday night I went out with four friends, Chris, Teddie, Barrett. We were in Berkeley, moving from bar to bar, drinking, talking, dancing, and generally making merry. We eventually made our way to Manny’s Tap Room in Berkeley, which is an unusual destination for us, but we were on a shuffleboard kick and they have a table. While playing, we heard the bartender ring a bell, and turned to see a guy standing on the bar chugging a glass of beer. Except he couldn’t do it. He stopped a few times, before finally finishing. Twice more, the bell went off, and other guys tried, and failed, to pound a pint.

Later, while out front, we were laughing at the fact that the guys couldn’t even chug one glass of beer, and I said something to the effect of, “I ought to get up on the bar and show them how to do it.” Teddie scoffed, insinuating that I couldn’t do it, so I told him I could drink a glass of beer faster than him. He hesitated for a moment, then backed down from my challenge, and instead said “I know you can’t drink faster than Chris.”

Now, Chris drinks a lot. I mean, a LOT. And he’s from Michigan, so… I wasn’t sure if I could drink faster than him, but I said I thought that I probably could. Now that it wasn’t me vs. Teddie, Teddie was of course all about getting us up there, so we approached the bartender. He informed us that if it is someone’s birthday they have to stand on the bar and chug, but when we explained there had been a challenge, he agreed to let us try. Up onto the bar we went.

Everyone stared as the two of us climbed onto the bar and picked up our pints of Guinness. The bell rang, we chugged. I finished, turned to see Chris still getting the last sip down, and raised my glass into the air in victory. The entire bar was cheering, and I leapt down from the bar, landing directly in front of this Miss Unnamed, whom I did not even know was at the bar, and on whom I currently have a big crush. She was smiling at having seen my glorious victory, and silly though it sounds, for that moment I have to say I felt pretty damn awesome. Sure, I was chugging a beer on a bar, not saving the whales or curing cancer, but whatever. Ferris Bueller’s got nothing on me.

I’m telling you, it’s those little moments in life that mean so much.

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Since MySpace is all the rage these days, here is the latest ridiculous “survey” that I’ve filled out there, saved here for posterity. And for future embarrassment.

9 lasts.
last cigarette: I don’t smoke, but I had my last pretend cigarette whilst getting air outside at the Chinese Hospital casino bash
last beverage: coffee at Fenton’s
last kiss: friendly? Chloe, unless I kissed Josh tonight. I think I only bundled him up. romantic? Tzuen.
last cd played: actual CD? Brian Jonestown Massacre. Last song, Joy Division is playing now.
last bubble bath: at the Madonna Inn in October of ’04 with She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named
last time you cried: this morning :/
last time you laughed: Moments ago whilst foos-balling with a super-stoned Josh

8 have you evers.
have you ever dated one of your best friends: no
have you ever skinny dipped: no. wait, yes. forevs ago
have you ever kissed somebody and regretted it: boy howdy have I ever
have you ever fallen in love: yes
have you ever lost someone you loved: yes
have you ever been depressed: consult previous blogs…
have you ever been drunk and threw up: *nod*
have you ever ran away: no. but ask me again in a couple weeks.

7 states you’ve been to.
1. Alaska
2. New York
3. Michigan
4. Arkansas
6. Hawaii
7. Texas

6 things you’ve done today.
1. got drunk
2. ate cheeseburgers, plural
3. listened to music
4. read comics
5. wilded in the streets with Teddie, Bronson, Kevin, Josh, and Nick
6. sent a fax

5 favorite things in no order.
1. my friends
2. being massaged
3. cooking
4. her, but not the her you think I mean
5. film noir

4 people you can tell [almost] anything to.
1. Teddie
2. Kathryn
3. Chloe
4. Diane

3 wishes.
1. to be happy again
2. to trust again
3. to love again

2 things you want to do before you die.
1. spend time in at least 50 countries
2. find out why

1 thing you regret.
1. trusting her, the bad her

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She walks in
beauty like
the night
Discarding
her clothes
in the
plastic
flowers
Pornographic
and tragic
in black
and white.
My Marilyn
come
to my slum
for an
hour
I’m aching
to see my
heroine.

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It’s half past four on Christmas morning and we just finished cooking and cleaning crabs for tomorrow night’s dinner. Someone has been kind enough to adopt me for the holiday, and we’ve been hard at work preparing to make dinner for her parents and relatives. I’ve been looking forward to it, and I know it will be a marvelous Christmas. Of course, I have one Christmas wish, which I know won’t come true. Yet, at the same time, if asked with whom I most want to spend this day, I would say with all honesty there is no one in the world I’d rather be with this Christmas than exactly whom I will be with. I may be far from “over” the past, but the present has been a little bit better of late. I don’t believe in fate in any way, shape, or form, but it is remarkable how things sometimes work out. HHGFF. And ever.

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My first crush came when I was about 10 or 11 years old, which would put me in the 5th or 6th grade. Her name was Heather, and I can’t really recall much else about her beyond that. But at the time I thought she was the greatest thing since sliced bread. Of course, since I wasn’t a popular kid by any stretch, I never did anything about it other than silently admire her from afar. Our sole interaction came in a class project during which her hands became messy with some sort of clay or paste. She asked me to roll her sleeves up for her, as my hands were clean. It was the highlight of my week, but for her it was surely just the dorky kid doing her a meaningless favor.

I’d like to think that as I’ve aged I’ve become more sophisticated, or at least more able to express my feelings to members of the opposite sex, but that moment has pretty much repeated itself with every crush I’ve had since then. From age 10 on into adulthood I periodically crushed on various girls, never finding a way to express my feelings. I usually found myself in the role of the uncool outcast with whom they would not associate. When I was able to initiate a relationship, I seemed forever relegated to the role of the platonic friend who occasionally does a meaningless favor.

All the ridiculing and teasing, ostracization, and outright abuse was painful of course, but for the most part it rolled off my back like water from a duck. I didn’t have enough of an emotional investment in anyone to give them the ability to truly hurt me. But that eventually changed. I met Fizzy.

We spent nearly two years courting one another before we became a couple. After that came a long period of absolute bliss, and without a doubt the happiest time of my life. For the first time I was content and confident about my future. My older blogs are peppered with tales of happiness and love, and even a cursory glance at my older posts demonstrates how important she was to me. In short, Fizzy turned my world around. I dropped my guard completely, and let myself love and trust her unconditionally. Had someone asked me six months ago if she would ever lie to me or hurt me on purpose, I’d have staked my life that she wouldn’t. I knew that the same way I knew the sky is blue…she was my absolute in a world full of uncertainty. Or so I thought.

Now I don’t know what to think, because I don’t know where she is. I mentioned last time that I have it on good authority that she is not dead, but beyond that– I have no idea where she is or why she left. I hope she isn’t sick, or hurt, or in jail, or… well, I could go on forever. I really don’t know what happened, but the more that time passes, the more I am starting to realize that she isn’t in any sort of trouble, she’s just gone.

I never saw any of this coming. I didn’t even acknowledge the risk I ran by putting such faith in her, because it seemed so impossible that she could betray that trust. That only made it worse when she did, because I realized that so many years of my life were devoted to someone I wrongly believed cared about me enough to be honest and fair with me when it mattered most. I don’t pretend to have been perfect by any stretch, but I was a devoted, honest, and caring boyfriend/fiance. Am I wrong to think I deserve some sort of closure?

Still, there is something sadly liberating about having had my heart so thoroughly destroyed by Fizzy. I realize now that *anyone* can betray you, and as such I shan’t be betrayed again because I simply won’t trust again. I can’t. She has left me utterly unable to ever trust or love anyone the same way. And while I may never completely heal, I will eventually get past this pain. And then I will never, ever feel this way again, because I just won’t be emotionally capable of giving another person the power to do this to me. See what I mean? Sad, but liberating.

But first I have to get past this pain. And it seems every day I am, one tear at a time.

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Well, if I could tame all of my desires
Wait out the weather that howls in my brain
Because it seems that it’s always changing
The winds indecision, the sorrowful rain

Yeah, I was a postcard, I was a record
I was a camera until I went blind
Now I’m riding all over this island
Looking for something to open my eyes

I have a funny, somewhat paradoxical attitude towards my prowess with members of the opposite sex, and it’s hard for me to know exactly why. Sometimes I feel like I am completely inept at meeting women, and that none ever take an interest in me, while at other times it seems like there is always some girl chasing me, at least when I’m single (and occasionally when I’m not). And while most of the women I meet don’t take a romantic interest in me, enough do that I should be confident, if not downright cocky about my sex appeal.

I know that at least part of my reluctance to admit to myself that I’m attractive to women stems from my first experiences with dating. Ever since my early teens, girls have flirted with me, but I’ve never felt like I deserved it. I think part of that disbelief stems from the way the girls who actually knew me ignored me. Throughout grade school and most of high school I was always the least popular kid in my class, and no girls ever asked me out or agreed to go out with me when I was the one asking. It was only when I went somewhere else that girls occasionally showed interest. Obviously, I attributed this to the fact that the people who knew me well disliked me; strangers were more easily duped into finding me attractive.

Once I got to college, and the slate was wiped clean, and I was surrounded by others with interests similar to my own, I was surprised by how many girls were into me. I just wasn’t sure what to do about it. I’m pretty sure that all those years of being ostracized by my peers taught me to expect to be ignored by others, so I wasn’t prepared for a girl showing interest in me, hence my uncertainty. Even today, all grown up and years removed from being unpopular in any sense of the word, when a girl tells me I’m cute or fun or interesting, or anything of that nature, I don’t believe it. I feel I must somehow have tricked her into thinking so, because I know the real me is plain and uninteresting. No matter how old I get, or how often girls seem attracted to me, I can’t shake the feeling that I’m just a heartbeat away from being exposed as unworthy of such affection. Or that there must be something wrong with the girl saying nice things about me. That sounds really harsh, but it’s true. I honestly feel this way.

There is another aspect to this that I have yet to mention, and while using math to explain love is seldom an effective route to take, I think this time it is justified. So here goes… let’s try to graph love! Throughout my life, there have been a number of girls for whom I was utterly smitten– crushes, or what have you. Let’s plot all of those girls on a line called something like “Girls What That I Like.” Granted, I don’t crush easily or often, so it is a small line, but it is a significant line nonetheless. The other line on our graph is “Girls What That Like Me.” This is a noticeably longer line. Unfortunately, the two lines never intersect. That is pretty much the point of our math exercise. I’ve liked some girls, a bunch of girls have liked me, but none of the ones I liked ever liked me back. Until…

Fizzy was the big exception to that. I liked her, and she liked me. More than that, when she became my girlfriend, it didn’t feel as though I’d pulled a fast one on her; we seemed like a perfect fit. And she became, for better or worse, a sort of badge of honor for me. I extolled her virtues to anyone who would listen (not to mention the entire blogging world), and I guess in retrospect maybe it seemed like I was bragging. In a way, I suppose I was. I never imagined someone so wonderful would ever take an interest in me, much less agree to marry me, and I wanted to shout it from rooftops.

Whenever friends would consult me about problems with their love lives, I’d remind them that true love and happiness is possible. I’d tell them how I never thought I’d find it, but then one day it happened. I never meant to gloat or boast, but maybe it came out that way. Now I feel sort of foolish– I was obviously wrong. True love is harder to hold on to than I ever imagined, and even someone you trust and love unconditionally can unexpectedly lie to you or hurt you without reason. Even when things seem perfect, they don’t always work out.

I have no idea why I’m writing about this. Wait, yes I do. I think it has something to do with the gradual realization that I may very well be single again. I mean, I am not entirely sure that I am, and I don’t want to go into all sorts of personal details here, but Fizzy vanished without a trace (or a goodbye) about three months ago. I have it on good authority that she is not dead, but beyond that I know nothing. So yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s over, which means I no longer have an excuse to ignore flirtatious women. That sounds weird, doesn’t it? Why would I want to ignore them?? I wish I knew. I’ve always been this way– it’s as if I actively try to make women disinterested in me so I won’t feel surprised when it turns out to be the case. At least when I was with Fizzy, I had an excuse to ignore other women. I was taken. Now I have no excuse. But I still find myself doing the same thing. I think it is the lack of closure that has me in this holding pattern. Without resolution it’s hard to move on. Not to mention the fact that I don’t really want to move on. I was very happy for a long time, and the last thing I want to do now is “get back out there” and try to meet girls again, but it seems that eventually I am going to have to do so. Rats.