And now, a poem from my good friend Sam:

Happiness is a warm smile,
a pleasant compliment or
a kind look.
How many have pierced
the side of good nature
to see the rapture of
loveliness? And tried
to find a way to bottle
it up, so people could
have something to rebel
against; or maybe just
to prove that it's there.

Sam. :)

I am feeling really pissy and brash today. Keep me away from sharp objects, and certain folks.

I AM MANIC-DEPRESSIVE

I think.

Ok, I dont' know, but I'm feeling dizzily happy here for a moment and I don't think I should, nor do I think it will last. Actually, I should be rather pissed as Dining Services is screwing over my club's fundraising dinner by not letting us provide our own food. They are gutless, money-grubbing bastards they are. Anyway, I think I'm doing better, despite ripping my own heart out a second time just to live life. I am making a manifesto here shortly of how I will survive now. Because it's possible. Because I should have learned alot from all the living I've done in this accursed month. It will involve keeping very very busy, lots of physical labor, and perhaps a meaningless relationship or two if I'm lucky. I mused today that I wanted a boy toy. Wouldn't that be nice? Something pretty I could have to snuggle and lead around. It's nice to dream.
Nice.<---insert myriad of dream sequences here.

So what happens next?
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, NEVER ASK A RECENTLY MADE SINGLE PERSON THAT QUESTION. It is death in a single sentence. It's the absolute most horrifying part of this.
It could be that this was the best relationship I will ever have, and from now on it's nothing but jerks and losers until I drain myself dry of humanity. Could be that I'll go on to have many great and wonderful adventures, discover myself (heh) and even find someone who is perfect for me. Or maybe I'll become an aging spinster with five million cats as my legion of doom. Or maybe a tree will fall on my head tomorrow and I'll die.
Oh Hell.

Whoever gets Dave, you better thank your lucky stars, and you better be good to him. Otherwise your ass is mine.
Love,
-Amber-

Song for this entry: Ben Fold Five, "Evaporated"

Yes, here I stand, sad and free. I guess, well, I guess that some things can't be rebuilt. Some things we can reach towards forever and never find. And sometimes, sometimes we feel like we've got the best chance at happiness of anyone, and sometimes we are wrong. There are alot of songs running through my head, like Evita singing "Where do we go from here? This is not where we intended to be." There is also an entire marching band of Ben Folds Five songs stuck in my head. Fuck, I watch too much Ally McBeal I guess, what with all the musical hallucinations that are running wild.

Anyway, Dave and I tried. ..I guess. .. but it just didn't work out. I wasn't ready to love anyone anytime soon, and he wasn't ready either I'm guessing. We just felt miserable with eachother, sometimes. Sometimes we forgot and it was. . . well, it was heaven. But mortals, we're not meant for eternal paradise in our lifetimes. It just isn't going to work. And in the end, I let him go. I was strong and I did it, because that is how it has to be. It has to be. I'm holding on to this certainty, tight enough for white knuckles if my mind had any. I'm thankful for my good friend Nick, who is being nice and supportive. I'm going to stay away from letting my urges get the better of me--I don't feel like running out and making my life more complicated. But I'll probably do it any way. A girl's got needs you know.

SO, here I am. . . feeling like a helium balloon some kid let go of. Flying up up and away from everything. I just used another metaphor in chat: Like going down a steep hill in a rollercoaster, and your mind screams that you're going to crash, you're going to fast!!! But you KNOW you won't. You know you'll make it to the bottom and back again, and you'll probably get in line to do it again. And I will. And it took me a long time to get to be ok again, and I guess I'll retrace my footsteps. I'll get there. It will happen.

A week has passed. A lot has happened.

My weekend was an adventure in Columbus at the Arnold Fitness Expo--I went with my Jiu Jitsu class to see the martial arts competitions and such. My feet where itching to kick all weekend. I know that the majority of people there, including the kiddies, would have royally kicked my ass. . . but I'm starting to develop that masochistic joy of being beaten but beaten well.

I'm back with Dave now. Tried dating other people, but they just weren't ready to move on, an inevitably we decided we were better off where we started. So relationships have realigned. Things begin anew. I'm working to rebuild my burnt bridges. The circle of life and all that crap, yes. It's hard to mend a broken heart, especially when it's yours.

Friday was one of the longest, most surreal days I've had in a long time.

My mind can't bear to go detail by detail--how can so much happen in one day? Yesterday felt like sitting in the window seat of a 747, seeing many destinations, but not being anywhere but in flight. Aimlessness. Up in the air. feeling like I was going somewhere, but I didn't know quite where. And now today feels like the final descent--put your tray tables up and your seats in an upright position. I still don't know where I'm going, but I'm getting somewhere fast. Ok, enough abstract rambling.

Friday wasn't really a bad class day--I still had trouble paying attention, but it being the first day of single-dom in two years, I wasn't expecting focus. Jiu Jitsu once again lifted my spirits--I got to toss Jason around, and Sensei seemed genuinely impressed by my doing so (there may be hope for this wimp yet). Back in Henry, another Taco Bell run was planned. It wasn't altogether a good trip. There was just alot of uncomfortableness, maybe just on my part. These are Dave's friends more than mine. Oh well, came back to The Lounge and watched "Carrie" with Sam & Barry, Justin, and Jason. We were all thoroughly disturbed by that movie. Then the AIM's began, between folks. This is always when the problems are confronted, the troubles are started. To fast forward to much later that night: there was another breakup in our circle of friends.

So now that's two couples out of three. I feel like we're some fellowship of the ring slowly falling apart (Tolkein has invaded my brain) It makes me think of alot of songs, like "The Space Between" and other such things. All and all, it has been a horrible event, from which hope springs eternal. . .I hope. Today I let myself listen to Ben Folds Five--a group I will not allow myself to listen to when depressed, because the songs are mainly sad and relationship oriented. Today, I came to final grips with the ending of things, the beginning of new things, and the general presence of the unknown. This could be for the better. . . and God, do I hope so.

Did you ever get hit in the head? I mean, hit so hard you came back to reality thinking: "What the FUCK" just happened here?

Dave and I have decided, together, that we should break up permanaently. It's rather due to something I suspected all along--he saw me as a really really good friend, even a best friend, but that's really about it. That actually covers alot of stuff, including love and happiness. Deep down, we still have love for eachother. It's just not that kind of love. It's weird. The very thought of doing this last week would have killed me, or something similar to that. But I'm ok. Not just ok--we're both rather relieved. I'm not going to curse the situation by saying I feel things are settled now. But I do feel better. I didn't know that I could go back to him after all this, and I was right to doubt. But I haven't lost him, indeed maybe now we can be better friends. Probably will be weird, but hell, that's not anything new. My advice, on this day after Valentine's Day, is to never grow complacent in any situation--confront your problems while you can, and remember being the "perfect girlfriend" doesn't garauntee happiness, but being honest can get you close enough to touch it.

Back to being single--Pray for me.

I feel like I owe it to myself to keep writing here. Honestly, it doesn't seem like my entries are especially well formed, or understandable to someone outside this circle of anguish (wow! that sounds angsty). Maybe its just one of many different therapies I'm indulging in, trying to restore what is a very sore heart. It's alot of hurt to take in over less than a week. I wish I was a filmmaker, or a novelist, or maybe just a writer for a soap opera--In a way, all this is so surreal, all of the things that have been said and done (or not done) I don't honestly think anyone could have guessed.

Where do Dave and I stand now? Well, in the end I'll have all I hoped for: I get him back after the month is over. I'm not sure how exactly that's going to be. I mean, I know he didn't mean for me to go through such hurt, but I did. There are alot of issues I can't bring up here, because they are not my issues alone, so if all this sounds like a big hubub over nothing, believe me it's not. I told my friend Mary Beth (who is also a part of all of this mess) that all I can do is keep wishing that we're at the end of this mess, not the beginning of a new one. She told me that ever time she thinks that, something new comes up to complicate matters. I think that has been what is worst about all this: it was one complication after another. It was infidelity, and lust, and suffocation, and, I think, it was growing up, just a little. I like to think we're at the end. I like to hope. It's all I've got.

What has been most suprising has been how it seems to be ending--Dave and I are going to start over again, as are some other folks. But he still wants some time off. God, but I'll give him anything if it will make him happy and ready to come back. But I have to admit I'm jealous of those who get to eat dinner with him, go to taco bell with him, and hang out with him, while I'm not there. I'm finally ok with other people dating Dave during this time (although supposedly nobody is), but it doesn't mean I'm thrilled about it. But hey, it's not the deadly sort of jealousy, so venomous you poison yourself with envy. No, I've somehow managed to not feel that way--a tremendous effort on my part. There were times when I have felt quite protective of him, but maybe that's me being protective of myself. I guess this will be my new trial: sharing him with another girl, even if it's just as friends. But I've got to be fair: I'm supposed to get him for the rest of my life--perhaps I should not be so selfish?

What is more unsettling, the calm before the storm, or after?

Friday, I finally began to feel better, after that great old "numb-in-the-gut" sort of feeling I had all day. I was starting to work things out in my head, trying to make sense out of what seems like the biggest knot of troubles I have ever seen in my short life. I went to Jiu Jitsu, managed to endure all the "where's Dave?" queries, and even had a really good time! As I walked back up the hill of death I found myself thinking "I can do this. .. I really can do this." Jiu Jistu is great for making you feel like a badass, in many respects.

I had a nice, sedate evening watching TV in the Henry lounge and reading up on plant care (I'm now working at the greenhouse). Then I made what may have been the mistake of getting on AIM and talking to Dave. He told me something else, which I can't reveal here, suffice to say that I was back to my old situation of being confused and hurt. I went and stared at my wall in the dark for about 20 minutes. **WARNING: EPIPHANY PENDING** In what literally seemed like one moment, all the things that had bothered me suddenly didn't and suddenly I could see clearly what was really bugging me, and what actually wasn't.

On Saturday, I took Dave and my parents out for dinner at Rockne's, and had a really marvelous time. Dad was having a particularly witty day, mom was relaxed. . . apparently they've been partying with their friends every weekend since new year's. That's a welcome change! Anyway, I had a really great time, and it wasn't weird for Dave and I. He'd talk to me and treat me just like he had before all of this, and finally I new that all this had not changed the way he felt about me: he didn't see me as boring or cloistering at all. I had been so afraid he was just tired of me, and that he was probably going to let me go. But he wasn't. He just wanted an opportunity to feel "free" again. I detest the way that sentence sounds, but there isn't a better way to put it. And now I'm kindof excited, because I can be free too.

In the end, I realized I was most upset because I thought this would shut me off from Dave, and from his friends who were starting to become my friends. But now I realize neither is true. Dave and I have worked out getting together every once and awhile just to hang out. Dave's friends have asked me how I'm doing, they've offered support even though they have their own troubles right now. There is a lesson to be learned from all of this, but I can't claim to know what that is. Except, maybe, never underestimate the value of thinking it over. Don't accept the emotional roadblocks you THINK you have. Sensei has said many times that when you say "I can't" you're really saying "I won't." I thought I could not handle this situation, but I wanted to, and now I know I can, and I will.

Well, I may not get to date anybody, and I may not be 100% ok if this all happens again, but I think I will survive (cue inspiring disco tune)

Ok, so let's get this thing started.

First off, with my parents coming to visit this weekend, plus a field trip for Chinese New Year. . . things generally start infringing on my weekend, of which I already have stopped counting Sundays--they usually involve as much schoolwork as the weekdays. But perhaps it is good that I will be busy, as life has decided, once again, that things were too boring the way they were. In a way, it makes me feel downright *young* again to be in a personal crisis ( I was beginning to think I had outgrown them). But all the same, the past entry rather summed up the theme of these two days well: YUCK.

Because I don't know who the heck is reading this, I'll avoid some tender details, and give you a nice overhead view of my situation: My boyfriend is having a quarter-life crisis. But as to what is really the problem, I'm not getting into, as that's more his area of expertise. This page is here for me to vent, and dammit I will.

What it all boils down to is this: we're taking a month off from eachother.

When I younger, my dog Pepper would sometimes get to come inside during a thunderstorm. She'd curl up in a corner and just look at you with these concerned, coon-hound eyes. And when the storm was over, you knew it was time to let her out. . you would open the door, and she would just look at the outside, look at you, look at the outside again. She would just stand there, trying to figure out what to do next. Take this tender metaphor and transfer it to me like a bad temporary tattoo. It's how I feel. I'm rather relieved we've settled on some sort of action considering the situation, really.

But now what? Dave's e-mail basically tells me he knows he's being dumb but he'd like a month off and during that time, for me there will be no questions asked. it's about 25% exciting, and still 75% numbingly weird. All the sudden, for a month, I have no boyfriend. And there have been times I have wondered what that would be like again. But unlike Dave, who is seeking some personal freedom. . . I have no desire to go out and "find myself" or be wild and crazy. at least, I don't feel I need to go very far for any such thing to happen. The only possibility is dating other people. . . but for one thing the dating pool here is pitifully low here at Hiram, and for another in the back of my head there is the voice yelling "They aren't Dave." I'm just staring out the open door. I'd rather just stay where I was.

Yuck.

Yuckyuckyuckyuckyuck.
This is not a funny yuck-yuck. Ohe well. I haven't decided how I feel about today. Want to know more? Ask me in person or over e-mail or something because I can't sleep and, yeah. YUCK