First Date.

I just got home from a first date with a 19-year-old man. Months ago, before I met M, this boy pursued me online. We chatted off and on pretty intensely for a couple months, but I resisted meeting in person. I came very close a couple times and got cold feet at the last minute. Finally, I told him I needed to pull back, that I wasn’t going to see him and didn’t want to lead him on.

I knew that, even though I found him interesting and funny and we had other things to talk about like music and movies, most of my interest in him was sexual, and I had myself worked up into some kind of ethics tizzy about that. You might be thinking, “What the fuck was your problem? A beautiful 19-year-old boy wants to hang out and have sex with you.” That’s pretty much what I think when I look back: What the fuck was my problem?

He texted me out of the blue a couple weeks ago, when I was feeling very low. This time I felt no compunction about making a date.

We met on the pedestrian bridge over Town Lake. Walked up a rusty trestle to some dark train tracks. (He said, “Do you want to go up there?” and I said, “Sure.”) He wanted to walk across the bridge on the tracks. I had to be the adult. We found a dark grassy spot to sit and smoke some pot. Then we drove to another park and kissed in the car. We got out and walked a long way down a path. The moon is a fingernail tonight, so it was very dark, and no one but us was out on this path. We stepped off the trail every once in a while to make out.

How beautiful it is just to be 19. And that’s where you start. Motherfucker wore. me. out. All that unspoiled beauty. I think that’s what gave me pause months ago when I rejected him. I question whether I am a good influence on the innocent. I’m like the uncle who tells his nieces and nephews that Santa Claus is a lie.

We had a sweet time, and I think we’ll see each other again soon.

There’s so much ill feeling in our culture about sexual relationships between older and younger people, yet it’s so common. Most of my gay friends at some time in their teens had relationships with much older men. I did. I liked older men for the same reasons young men now tell me they’re interested in me: older men are more relaxed, smarter, have more interesting things to talk about, and can show them amazing stuff in bed. And there’s something about the quality of attention that older men pay to younger men that can be irresistible and addictive for young men. It must be equivalent for older men and young women.

Heterosexuals denigrate these relationships with expressions like “gold digger” and “dirty old man.” Homosexuals downplay them because we’re always trying to convince straight people that we don’t want to recruit their children.

I think it’s a perfect arrangement. They enjoy our experience and wisdom. We enjoy their beauty and innocence.

Almost Published, Twice.

My last summer at UT, in a class on American Childhood, I wrote an essay about Where the Wild Things Are, reading the book as a coming out fairy tale for homosexual boys. I thought it was original and timely (the Spike Jones movie was about to be released), so I sent it to a couple magazines, and two responded. One wanted me to change it in a way that didn’t feel right to me. The other liked it the way it was and committed to publishing it. It was supposed to appear in the June issue. When I didn’t hear from the publisher by May, I sent him an email. He didn’t respond. I checked the web site, and it hadn’t been updated since the spring. The magazine has vanished, along with the window of timeliness for my essay.

In the meantime, even though I didn’t want to edit my essay for this other magazine, I enjoyed my interaction with the editor/publisher. I sent him another piece, this one about online sex cruising. It would need some work to make it fit this magazine’s profile (it’s a gay and lesbian semi-scholarly journal), but I thought it might be worth it. He was intrigued but had some problems with it that made me think he didn’t “get” it, and I wasn’t sure if that was a problem with the piece or with his reading of it. At any rate, this was around the time of the New York production of Lizzie Borden, other stuff was happening and I let it go.

But a few days ago, he sent me an email. He’d gone back to the essay and found he liked it more than before. He’d done some editing to make the essay flow without the illustrations and he wanted me to take a look. From his email, I understood that he was open to another round of edits. I liked what he’d done, but he had downplayed an idea that was central to the whole point of the essay, so I restored a couple sentences that he’d taken out. Besides that, I made several small changes where he had used words and phrases that I would never use. Basically, I liked the shape of what he had done, but I wanted to return it to my voice. I still think I have something unique to say about the subject, and in the months since I wrote the essay I’ve continued to think about it, to research, and take notes. So I also made some changes to clarify and strengthen my argument.

Well, he wasn’t happy at all. He was dismayed that I’d made so many revisions and that I had restored some of his changes back to my original language. His deadline for having the essay ready for publication is this week, so he suggested we call it a day.

It was an interesting episode for me. These were my first couple of magazine submissions, so I have nothing to compare the experience to. In all our correspondence, he has been generous, appreciative, smart, and interested. But it seems awfully weird to me that an editor would make changes which alter the character of a writer’s work and then be disappointed to get some pushback. We didn’t have time to get into specific changes, why he made them, why I didn’t like them, etc., so it’s hard to assess what happened.

I’m disappointed. This was going to be my first published magazine article.

Mourning Austin.

Okay, sorry if you’re averse to this type of thing, but I’m gonna get all Buddhist on your ass. As you know, I’m a big fan of the writing of Pema Chodron. I want to share this short passage because it’s the gist of everything she teaches. Since I discovered this particular brand of Buddhism about 9 years ago, these are the words I have tried to live by:

Bodhichitta is a Sanskrit word that means “noble or awakened heart.” Just as butter is inherent in milk and oil is inherent in a sesame seed, the soft spot of bodhicitta is inherent in you and me. It is equated, in part, with our ability to love. No matter how committed we are to unkindness, selfishness, or greed, the genuine heart of bodhicitta cannot be lost. It is here in all that lives, never marred and completely whole.

It is said that in difficult times, it is only bodhicitta that heals. When inspiration has become hidden, when we feel ready to give up, this is the time when healing can be found in the tenderness of pain itself. Bodhicitta is also equated, in part, with compassion -- our ability to feel the pain that we share with others. Without realizing it we continually shield ourselves from this pain because it scares us. Based on a deep fear of being hurt, we erect protective walls made out of strategies, opinions, prejudices, and emotions. Yet just as a jewel that has been buried in the earth for a million years is not discolored or harmed, in the same way this noble heart is not affected by all of the ways we try to protect ourselves from it. The jewel can be brought out into the light at any time, and it will glow as brilliantly as if nothing had ever happened.

This tenderness for life, bodhicitta, awakens when we no longer shield ourselves from the vulnerability of our condition, from the basic fragility of existence. It awakens through kinship with the suffering of others. We train in the bodhicitta practices in order to become so open that we can take the pain of the world in, let it touch our hearts, and turn it into compassion.

*

My internet connection was down for a couple days. I got lots of reading done. Imagine! I finished Man in the Holocene, the Max Frisch novella that T is looking at for inspiration for a new theater piece. Not a direct adaptation, but he’d like to collaborate on new work using some ideas in the story. It’s kind of all about memory and aging -- right up my alley lately.

And I started a novel called Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman, who is apparently a popular writer of futuristic fantasy-type books, so no surprise that I’ve never heard of it or him. I’m enjoying it so far. Very fast-moving.

*

J had a big party here on Sunday, I think the purpose of which was to show everyone the progress on the container house. The floor is all built but not much in the way of walls, so it was a great party space. It hasn't been too crazy hot in the evenings lately, and there's a nice breeze. My time now with friends here feels elegiac. People tell me they're sad that I'm leaving. I can't say that I'm exactly sad to be leaving, but I am sad that I had high hopes that were unfulfilled here. I regret so much.

My Body.

Another reason to go back to school is that I would probably have a gym to work out in. When I was at UT, I lifted weights and used the elliptical machine 4 or 5 days a week. Nothing too intense, but I kept my upper body strong and my gut reasonably in check. And I rode my bike, so my legs were strong. After the accident last summer, I stopped riding my bike and going to the gym. By the time I was recovered enough from the injuries to start working out again, I was out of school and didn’t have access to the gym any more. I am not unconscious of how much my body changed in the 7 months I was with M.

Food, Love, etc.

I’ve eaten almost nothing but scrambled eggs for lunch (I haven’t been getting up early enough for breakfast) and big salads with some kind of meat on them for dinner for the last couple of weeks. The meat has mostly been chicken, which I’ve marinated in lemon and garlic and sautéed and sliced about 1/4 of a breast onto the salad. Today, though, I bought a fat sirloin steak on sale at Whole Foods, cut it up into 4 pieces, rubbed one portion with olive oil, salt and pepper, and cooked it in a very hot skillet for about 3 minutes on each side. It was very rare. I let it sit for about 10 minutes and then sliced it and put it on the salad. The salad was simple: romaine, radishes, red onion, roasted red pepper, simple vinaigrette. It was delicious.

Perfect food for my state of mind, my physical health, and the weather.

Later, when J came home, beer and pot and 3 episodes of Strangers with Candy on Netflix streaming. God bless Netflix streaming.

Cooking is still fraught. One, because it still reminds me of M. One of the things we enjoyed together very much was food, and I miss his cooking, and I miss hanging out in the kitchen with him while he cooked. But it was more complicated. When we were together, I would help M prepare meals, sometimes, but he was definitely the cook. That was strange for me, because I’ve been the cook in the family for many years. I love cooking for people, I’ve done it a lot, it brings me joy and satisfaction and comfort. I’m good at it and it’s very tied to who I am, to myself and to others. It gives me a comfortable role in social situations. But I wasn’t the cook, M was. I wanted to insinuate myself into his kitchen, but had a hard time actually doing it. It was another way in which I became passive.

But salads don’t ever remind me of meals with M.

The crying is past, for the most part, though I still have spells of heavy, heavy sadness at odd times throughout the day. I still think we could have been great partners. We could have had a singular relationship. I think that, whatever problem there was, we could have fixed it if he had wanted to. Unless, I guess, the problem was that he didn’t want to be with me anymore. Not sure how to fix that.

I mourn the companionship. I’m lonely. We were together nearly every day for 7 months and now not at all.

Rain.

It’s been raining all day in Austin. I drove to Whole Foods this afternoon because I needed a certain brand of body powder they sell, made with corn starch and tea tree oil.

(When it’s hot, sometimes I get a rash in my crotch. It’s like an allergy to summer. For many years I thought it was jock itch, and I was treating it with antifungal lotions and Gold Bond powder, which was making it worse. But a couple years ago, when I was at U.T., I went to the student clinic one time when it got really bad, and I saw a sports doctor who told me it wasn’t jock itch, just irritated skin. He also told me that he had seen several athletes recently who were using Gold Bond lotion for masturbation and the menthol in it had caused severe skin irritation on their penises. I love it when doctors tell me stuff about college athletes’ penises.)

I still have some funds on my food stamps card, so I bought groceries we needed, too. On the way home, the rain was really heavy, so heavy that everyone on Lamar Blvd. (a crowded 4-lane road) slowed to a crawl. I kind of love that, as long as I know I’m not stuck there for a long time.

*

The two big questions related to moving are, one, what do I do with my car? and two, what do I do with all my stuff until I have long-term lodging in New York?

I don’t have that much stuff. I have my computer and camera equipment. My guitar. My clothes will probably fit in a couple suitcases. I have about 8 boxes of Life in a Box soundtrack CDs, which I should just throw away, but can’t bring myself to do it since I spent all that money to make them. (I suppose I will carry that brand of stupid optimism to my grave.) I have a few boxes of archival stuff from Life in a Box, like hard drives, CD backups, paper logs, the raw tapes, etc. A few boxes of Y’all archival material. And I have a couple of boxes of personal stuff, like old journals and photographs. I don’t keep books and CDs to speak of anymore.

It’s not a lot, but still I have to put it somewhere. If I spend a month or 6 weeks with my parents or my friend MS in Indianapolis this summer, I want to be packed and moved out of here by then. New York is closer to Indiana than it is to Texas.

*

It looks like NYU, CUNY, and Columbia are the top MFA film schools in New York, so those are the ones I will apply to. CUNY is smaller and I think less prestigious, but it looks like the program is more experimental and it’s way more affordable than the others. NYU of course is crazy expensive.

*

M is on a train excursion in Mexico this week with his two best friends. I can’t remember exactly where, but I know they crossed the border in West Texas and the train takes a spectacular route through mountains. He showed me pictures a long time ago when they were planning the trip. I sent him a text to say Bon Voyage. I have to consciously resist typing little kissy-face emoticons. It still feels so right to give him that kind of affection. But of course it’s not right.

Still Trying To Figure It Out.

Soon, I will stop scrutinizing my breakup with M and just let it be. After our dinner together Sunday, a lot more of the whole ordeal makes sense to me. I realize that there were incompatibilities I didn’t see, or maybe that I ignored or denied. And I know now that M was frustrated for longer than I knew, and I understand why. I understand better why things went south for him. Now that we are in contact again and will, I hope, have a friendship that endures this episode, I want to think about the future.

But there’s one point I get stuck on. Let me try to articulate it:

I don’t get how his feelings changed so quickly. Or why it seemed to me that they changed quickly. What made him so sure so fast that he wanted out?

I think I understood him to say that the differences in our lifestyles, our philosophies regarding financial security, etc., were possibly negotiable but the fact that he didn’t want to have sex with me made it impossible for him to want to be boyfriends.

We didn’t have sex every day, but when we did he was … good to go. We had great sex. You can tell when a man is turned on, and M was, until a few weeks ago, turned on. It wasn’t like he had to work up the enthusiasm. So, from my point of view, what it looked like is that less than a couple weeks after we were having great sex, he told me that he didn’t feel attracted to me anymore and didn’t want to be together. That’s an awfully short period of decreased interest to base such an irrevocable decision on, isn’t it?

He suggested that his frustrations with my life, my way of getting along in the world, may have contributed to the waning of his interest in sex with me – maybe that’s the key. Maybe that’s why he’s so sure the change in his sexual response to me is more than temporary. He said that when he started to feel like he had to take care of me (because of my stressful, insecure life), his sexual interest waned. This is fascinating and heartbreaking to know, because I’ve recently started to realize that I have always used my insecurity, my vulnerability as a way of attracting men. I’m like the woman who acts all hapless and girly to get the big man to change her tire. And that’s exactly what turned M off. Maybe.

I wonder if I’m trying too hard to connect the sex with the other problems he had with the relationship. Or maybe I’m trying too hard to separate them.

So … I just needed to get these thoughts down.

I will probably never have an answer to this question, and I’m almost ready to drop it. That’s the hardest thing about love for me, the fact that I will never know what’s in his head. We all have things we don’t tell or can’t tell, things we lie about with various degrees of self-consciousness and intentionality. I’m not likely to change that. Life and love certainly don’t depend on my understanding them. Every day is a mystery.

All Roads, Etc.

We’ve known for weeks, but they made an official announcement today, so now I can tell everyone: Lizzie Borden was selected for the NAMT Festival of New Musicals, a prestigious industry showcase. It’s kind of a big deal. Only 8 shows are chosen each year. In the festival, NAMT presents staged readings of the shows to a crowd of theater industry people -- specifically, people from all over the country who are looking for new musicals to present, for example, producers and directors of big regional theaters. Lots of shows, as a result of being seen in this festival, go on to high profile productions.

I found out about this right in the middle of breaking up with M. It was a big secret until the press announcement, but they told us we were allowed to tell “significant others,” so, because M still sort of was that, I told him. The excitement of finding out was dimmed, to say the least, but this morning I feel giddy and short of breath and very optimistic.

This is one of the reasons I decided to move to New York. I have to be there for a week or two in October for the festival, so I figured I should think in terms of being moved there by then.

I couldn’t sleep last night. I went to bed at 2 but didn’t fall asleep until after 5 and then slept fitfully. I had gone to a friend’s house, a bar buddy from Chain Drive, not a good friend but a sweet man who I’ve had a chatting acquaintance with the whole time I’ve been in Austin. He lives with his partner somewhere in the northern suburbs. It was good to get out of my room/prison cell and hang out with people who are very different from the people I usually see.

The pot was veeeery strong. I got home by midnight but my brain was dancing all night long. I have a stack of scrap paper here on my desk, notes I got out of bed to write down. Some of them have great stuff on them, in particular some ideas for a film I’ve been writing for years called Wall of Angels. It’s a kind of surreal Ingmar Bergman/John Waters-style film about a woman who survives a house fire and goes on a road trip.

Grindr.

I downloaded Grindr again. In the days after M and I broke up, the idea of Grindr was depressing beyond words and it still makes me roll my eyes at how boring it gets to be a man and horny all the time, but there you go. How many millions of years of evolution have led to this moment when I'm advertising on a cell phone because I just need someone to touch my penis?

But, I remind myself that I met M at a trashy gay leather bar. Technically, I met him through a mutual friend, but the introduction took place in a trashy gay leather bar. There are opportunities everywhere.

This is the picture I posted on my profile. I hope I don’t look too much like a leering pedophile.

Summer.

I’ve set the end of this week as a deadline for making some kind of rough plan or timeline for the rest of the summer and my move to New York. I asked J to sit down with me and help me, or probably just listen to me, list and organize all the possible things I could do and all the considerations and contingencies.

How much would gas cost for a drive to Utah and back? I want to go to Utah to see my friends and clear my head. Maybe a week there? It’s at least a 2 day drive, maybe 3. And do I want to spend time in Indiana, with my friend M, or with my parents? Or both? Do I want to go for a long visit with my brother and his partner in Columbus? Will it make my move to New York easier, or more difficult, if I go somewhere else in between?

*

I think I wrote this before, but I’ve been thinking a lot about how this breakup has thrown it in my face how much I really do want to be in a long-term relationship. I think, to, y’know, oversimplify, M was, is, my fantasy perfect boyfriend, he was the boyfriend I’ve mused about since I was in high school: a scholar, an artist, solicitous, handsome, well-traveled, worldly, has sophisticated taste and an ironic sense of humor. He sounds like something out of a Jacqueline Susann novel. Ha! But he is all those things.

When I was younger, that man in my fantasy was older than me, more confident, had his life together. The fact that M is younger complicates my relationship to the fantasy in an interesting way that probably wasn't good in the end. I'll have to ponder that one.

There’s nothing too special about wanting to be with someone. Most people do. I think I thought I was unique. Or I was too strident to admit that there’s a difference between a mindless longing for Prince Charming and a simple human desire for companionship. It's embarrassing to find out how much of my disdain for romance was just a way of protecting myself from getting hurt. Lot of good that did me.

Liberty Bar.

M and I met for beers last night at Liberty Bar and food from East Side King. We talked for a couple hours, and then his roommate and best friend both joined us for a couple more.

It was strangely not difficult. The last 3 weeks have been harrowing for me here in my room, but heartbreak almost takes on a life of its own. Last night I was just having beers with this man whose wishes didn’t happen to coincide with mine but who is obviously very fond of me.

I’m sitting here trying to resist analyzing the evening. I want to let it sit there and be what it was, which was very nice.

School.

I think I’m going to apply to NYU’s graduate film program. I think I’m gonna do it. The application deadline is December 1, to start in the fall of 2011. I just need to forget about the age thing. What does it matter if I’m in graduate school in my 50s? Really, what does it matter? I was reading on the admissions web site of the MFA program a statement by the chairman of the department describing the program and what kind of candidates they look for, what kind of people succeed in the program, and I felt like he was describing me.

So why the fuck not? Why not apply? It’s extremely competitive, but what isn’t? If anyone can think of a reason why I shouldn’t, please tell me.

Saturday Morning Meta.

I wonder if this is something that only artists do, or if it’s common or universal, to move through life while simultaneously watching and mentally composing and memorizing the story for later use. Now that I think about it, I suspect it might be very common now, in this age of Twitter and Facebook status updates; but, then again, maybe these new social networks don’t create, but just provide a convenient forum for, a natural human tendency to crystallize and flourish.

I have to say it has felt a little edgy, writing about my breakup here, immediately making public all the really intense, awful stuff. Live-blogging my heartbreak.

I feel compelled. It’s like when J and R and I were on the road and things started spinning out of control, there was a part of J and me that was like, “Grab the camera and point it this way, some shit’s about to go down.” I just feel compelled.

Besides whatever value it might have for others to read, the writing is where I organize my thoughts. I write down whatever I’m feeling or thinking about, but then I spend a substantial amount of time rewriting and editing, moving stuff around, finding a better word, with the goal of being as simple and clear and truthful as I can be. I’m not just organizing the writing: organizing the sentences and paragraphs is a way of organizing my thoughts.

And it suspends the pain and pressure for a while, too, it really does. I think it’s because when I write I am at a critical distance, a philosophical distance. And the fact that I can sit down and do this reassures me that, when everything is fucked up and I can’t manage my life, at least this one important part of me is functioning.

A couple friends have sent me appreciative emails about this little chronicle; so I feel like it’s okay.

The only thing I’ve been slightly reticent about is some of the specific content of communication I’ve had with M. In the last few days, we’ve emailed a couple times about my bicycle, which I left at his house. I took the opportunity to ask him questions about what happened, and he has shared some of his thoughts, and it’s been calm and clear and nice. We have plans to meet this weekend and talk more. I’ve been reticent to share much of that conversation because for some reason I don’t want to make him feel like it’s his life being scrutinized along with mine. (But actually I just remembered having a conversation with him a couple months ago about the ethics of an artist working in an autobiographical idiom using the details of others’ lives in his work, and M expressed a much more permissive attitude than I did, so I’m probably safe.)

I don’t know if he even reads this. I think he used to from time to time, but I’ve never imagined him as being in the audience. Hm.

Future.

T and I have been emailing and talking on the phone the last couple weeks about Lizzie Borden (the new exciting thing about which coincided with my breakup freakout so it got a little overshadowed but about which I still can’t tell anyone dammit! -- but soon), and also about me moving back to New York, and about the two of us forming a company to do new work together. New theater work, film/video, hybrid performance. I’m excited about the possibility of performing again, and about writing songs again. I haven’t done either in years.

My creative energy kicks in when I have someone to work with, someone else’s ideas to bounce around, someone’s confidence in me, and someone’s expectations of me. I know this fact says all kinds of interesting things about my personality, about non-art aspects of my life, my history with men, my relationship with M being particularly in the news lately, but is it a bad thing that I need to overcome? Can it just be a way of working, and not a disorder? Independence is overrated.

School?

If I’m not going to make a living as an artist, I would love to be teaching college kids -- I think I could do my work and teach, and in fact the two would feed each other, right? That’s like a thing that people do.

In order to teach college, I need another degree or two, an MFA or a PhD, depending on what it is I want to teach. I love being in school, so it’s not like I would mind spending another few years getting a degree. The big question is, is that a good plan if my goal is to change this state of never-ending financial duress? Smaller questions are: what would I study? where? is it financially feasible?

The main reason for going back to school 3 years ago was that I thought if I had an MFA in film I would be able to teach college. I spent 2 years finishing my BA so I could apply to the MFA program here at Texas. I didn’t consider other MFA programs because at the time I wanted to stay in Austin. I was tired of moving around, and I wanted to make a home here. Well, one, I didn’t get into the MFA program, and, two, I haven’t made a home here, and in fact I’m pretty sure I’m leaving.

Do these circumstances add up to say that I should be looking at MFA programs in New York? Should I be applying to NYU film school? What the fuck? Why am I so unsure of myself? I just want to relax and feel like I made the right decision for once.

Thursday.

I’d say I’m doing quite a bit better the last couple days. No crying to speak of (though that’s untested, since I’m good at avoiding the triggers). The contact I had with M yesterday made me feel a bit less crazy. Besides everything else, just the physical fact of apruptly not seeing or talking to him, suddenly spending evenings alone in my room with no one to talk to, was disorienting.

I’m clearheaded enough now to be embarrassed about some of my behavior in the last two weeks: returning M’s gifts to him, driving by his house at night,, unfriending him on Facebook. Embarrassed, but inclined to forgive myself and be glad I didn’t do anything worse.

I spent hours yesterday and today looking up and applying for jobs in New York. And there’s been a flurry of activity with Lizzie Borden. I’m dying to announce some news, but I have to wait for a few days for an official press release before I can talk about it. I’ve also been watching movies for the film festival, so my days have been full.

I’m meditating. Hard to say if it’s helping, it’s such a slow, incremental process. I’m not finding the Pema Chodron book to be, as I thought it would be, what I need right now, but her voice is reassuring and the words are wise. I’m also reading a book by Max Frisch called Man in the Holocene, which is a long story or a short novel and a bit of a slog. T is interested in it as a possible source for a new show. It’s not exactly straightforward.

Reading is a frustrating experience. My glasses -- which are not that old (I got new ones after my accident last summer) -- are for shit. I can either hold a book at arm’s length and the text is clear but so far away I have to strain to make it out or take off my glasses and hold the book 6 inches in front of my face where it’s crystal clear but … well, 6 inches in front of my face. My lenses cost about $8-900. I have bad eyes.

I’m still eating virtually identical salads for dinner every night, though tonight I varied it a bit with my sister’s simple Greek dressing (lemon juice, olive oil, oregano, garlic, salt and pepper). Eggs for lunch, no breakfast. Beer.

What I Miss II

Other things I miss are M’s misanthropic, possibly slightly insane, but very funny roommate and his maybe girlfriend (I never was quite sure), who made me feel liked, and her sly daughter. And M’s roommate’s very sweet and very needy but well-behaved black lab, and M’s two gorgeous, affectionate, and funny cats. And M’s two best guy friends, colleagues from work, whose company I enjoyed very much. I had become an adjunct member of M’s household, and I felt comfortable and appreciated there. I miss that.

M and I have had a couple of emails back and forth the last two days. Until a few days ago, I had forgotten that I left my bicycle at his house. I had to contact him about that, and I was grateful for a reason. I also asked him again if he could articulate some of his thoughts about the change in his feelings. He sent me a long reply explaining some of what he was thinking about me and us and what was wrong. After reading it, I felt like a big portion of the weight on my heart had been lifted. I want more than anything to learn from this.

One thing I’ve learned is that I really do want a partner. I don’t know exactly what that relationship would look like, and I think the parameters are wider now after this experience, but I don’t want to be alone. I feel somewhat relieved to admit that. For a long time after J and I separated, I thought I did want to be alone. I thought I was better alone. At the time maybe I was, because I wasn’t very good at being with someone. I didn’t know how to not lose myself.

But I think I am learning. I think eventually, maybe before I’m too old to enjoy it, I’ll get good at being in a relationship. It doesn’t have to be with just one man -- two or three would be fine with me, but I don’t want to be alone.

Tonight I watched a short doc, one of the films submitted to the festival, and it blew me away, gave me hope for the future and for New York. The subject was a burlesque performance artist and total gender freak and devotee of some Hindu religion making a life for him or herself in New York. I was very moved.

Rain.

Maybe it’s my age, but lately I seem to second-guess every decision I made about my career. I wonder lately if I ever even made any decisions or if I just went along with whatever came at me.

If a return to New York is going to be a fresh start, I need a new way of being. I want to have learned at least some small thing from this time, this experience, not just this relationship with M but the last few years of what has felt to me like trying and trying and failing and failing.

I know sometimes I’m a know-it-all. I profess to know myself very well. I always think I know what’s going on. Sometimes I do. But obviously sometimes I don’t at all. Whatever I’m doing lately, or ever, is not working.

I think I’ve always felt a bit like this, but lately it’s really intense this feeling of “why is it so hard? why is every little thing so hard?” I know it’s all of my own making – that’s what I’m trying to figure out: how it happens. So I can change it. What is the process that gets me here? What can I be doing differently?

I think I need not necessarily to be examining what I was attached to and disappointed to lose in my relationship with M. I need to be examining what I am attached to in myself, what is it about me that I think, “this is who I am, this is the way I am.” What is it I’m doing, what is it I believe about myself that is creating so much friction?

It’s raining hard today. I opened my window. It smells good.

What I Miss.

A couple times yesterday and today I looked at the craigslist mfm ads and at a site called adam4adam.com. I used to check them out on and off, sort of compulsively at times, before I met M, and I very rarely met anybody that way but still looked, just sort of voyeuristically. I guess I like looking at naked pictures of random lonely people. Not that it wasn’t always a bit depressing, but now it seems extra pathetic, guys saying they’re looking for a ltr and uploading close-ups of their anuses. That’s what I’m back to. Yay.

Not that anonymous hookups can’t be fun and hot, but that’s not what I crave, not what I miss. I miss sitting up in bed watching a movie, M’s head on my shoulder. God, that was nice. I miss falling asleep with M’s back against my front. I miss smiling and kissing and his hand on my knee. And fucking, too, yes but only along with all the other stuff.

Mom.

My mom had been emailing lately, asking how I am, and I’d been kind of vague -- that’s a project for another day, taking apart why I’m always reluctant to let my mother know I’m in pain -- but today I sent her a note telling her that M and I had broken up and I was feeling low. She hadn’t even met M, and I guess I was a little embarrassed because I’d been telling her all about him and saying how much I knew she’d like him. (She would.)

Anyway, she said her mother’s intuition had told her something was wrong and she extended an invitation to come stay with her and my dad for the rest of the summer, room and board in exchange for cooking for them. I got an almost identical offer from a friend who lives in Indianapolis. And another friend, in the town in Utah where I lived and worked a few years ago, invited me to come there and lick my wounds.

Of course what I hope will happen is I’ll find a job in New York soon and I’ll move there. But the odds lately of what I want to happen actually happening are not good, so it’s comforting knowing there are people who want me around.