Sometimes, I get myself into the perfect mood.

That's why I go there after work, to search for that mood. To search for myself.

It didn't start that way. I used to go there after work for a stupid reason.

But now, it's to find myself, and to remember who it is that I truly am.

Because even if I'm a selfish asshole, I'm still me.

A couple of hours ago I got a rather unsettling email.

"Yikes!" I exclaimed.

Then I had 15 heart attacks.

Luckily for me, I thought to ask for clarification, or the heart attacks might be ongoing still.

Anyway, I'm wondering about the etymology of the word "yikes."

I know I could just look it up, but that would be hard and stuff, and the answer would probably be boring.

I'm wondering if there's such a thing as a single yike, or if it's like pants and only exists in plural form.

---

I like puns. The punnier the better.

Today I thought of a really punny pun. Now all I have to do is wait for an opportunity to spring it on some unsuspecting soul.

Do you think they have puns in other languages?

They probably have them, but I might not like them as much. All those damn foreign words sound alike anyway.

So two freakazoids just rang my doorbell.

I don't know what they wanted, because I didn't answer the door. I just glared at them through slitted blinds as they shambled away, on foot.

Boo Radley's got nothing on me.

I used to notice this totally stupid and juvenile thing, play this stupid and juvenile game.

The first time was when I was in basic training. Every Sunday we'd go to chapel, mostly because it was something to do. We'd get to basically dick around for a couple of hours before returning to the discipline and the rigors that made up our normal itinerary.

This one time, I was sitting in chapel, and for some reason I turned around. My hot girl radar, perhaps, but I'm not sure I even had hot girl radar back then. I mean, I was an 18-year-old, a walking bag of hormones, stuck with 49 other guys for almost 24 hours a day. Every girl was hot.

Anyway, this one Sunday I turned around for some reason, and I saw her. The most beautiful girl I'd ever seen. And she was a black girl, which was weird to me back then. Not that she was black, but that I found her so attractive. And attractive wasn't even close to the proper word.

I remember thinking, then and there, that girl is the most beautiful girl I've ever seen.

Then, about six years later, I was at the rec center at Offutt AFB shooting pool with my friend Paul. This girl came in. She had blonde hair, and she had a little baby with her. She was wearing sweats and no makeup and her hair suggested that she'd just arisen from a nap.

But she glowed. Oh, how she glowed.

I remember thinking, then and there, that girl is the most beautiful girl I've ever seen.

A few years after that, it was a girl I saw at the mall in Omaha. A few years after that, it was a bartender in Seattle. Next was a girl pumping gas in Louisville. Each and every one somehow outshining the ones before them. Each and every one becoming the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen, up to that point.

Ahem.

It was almost five years ago, the last time I mentally crowned a new beauty queen. Since then, it's always been the same girl. Each and every time I've seen her, since the first time, she's managed to outshine my memory of her. Each and every time, I've thought to myself, that girl is the most beautiful girl I've ever seen.

That particular stupid juvenile game is over. It was pointless and silly to begin with, and now it's even moreso. What's the sense in playing when the winner is predetermined?

This entry is going to get me into trouble, even though I say nice things in it. Even though I say true things in it. But the situation is already fubar, and I'm getting a little tired of tiptoeing around.

This blog is supposed to be my outlet, dammit. Well, I'm outletting something right now.

One of the really fun* things about being me, being in a mood like I'm in tonight - not sad, not happy, resigned is probably a good word - is trying to imagine some scenario wherein all this ends well.

I used to be able to come up with such scenarios, and sometimes I'd even manage to cough up a smidgen of hope. But that was before and this is after.

Also, I seem to have lost the ability to predict, with any accuracy, my own reactions to certain events. This really blows**, by the way. I envision certain events happening, I'd guess, at least three or four more times. Each time will be tough, to be sure, but what I don't know is if they will be easier or harder than this time. Harder would suck, because I'm barely surviving this time. Easier would still suck, just not as hard. I worry about this a lot.

Man, I'm in a weird mood. I wish I could write instead of ramble.

Remember that damn kite? I'm like that tonight. But last time it was a good thing, this time it's not. Last time it was strength that made me that way. This time it's fear and denial. It's necessary denial, if I want to get through this. But the fear is pissing me off, because I don't know what to fear. If I fucking knew what to fear, well then maybe I could wish for something else. Sacrifice a chicken*** or something to help it happen.

I guess if I really were that kite, I'd want my string back. It may have been an anchor, but it was also a lifeline.

Man, I'm in a weird mood.

But seriously, if there's a way out of this, I'd really really love to know what it is. Because I can't think of shit.

* - That was sarcasm.

** - That wasn't sarcasm.

*** - I'd never really do that.

First, about my last entry - I've decided that I shouldn't write shit. So I won't.

---

I said today, in an email, that I rarely get angry.

That was the truth. I don't get angry very often. Oh, I wish I could get good and pissed* at times. I think it would make life easier for me. Sad is hard to do, day after day after day after fucking day. Anger would be easier to deal with, I think.

But, anger is usually beyond me. Except when it's directed at me. And I don't want to write about that. I think I've done enough of that over the years.

What I want to write about is being irritated.

I've got that down pretty well, I think.

The thing that I'm irritated about right now - or I guess it was last night but I'm thinking about it right now - is that simple expressions of simple affection are denied me. Not, I don't think, because there's nothing to express. Nope, I'm pretty sure that there's some affection there. Boring platonic affection, but still pretty fucking awesome, considering the source.

But that same source won't give me a hug. Not unless I force the issue. And it always feel like force. Like I'm doing something wrong. Taking unwanted advantage of simple boring platonic affection. Copping a feel or getting some perverted thrill or something.

I'm not doing any of those things, but I know why the concern is there. The concern is there because of these more-than-friends feelings that I have. The concern is there because of that sobbing wretch down in the dungeon of my mind.

Well, the thing is, that guy can barely breathe, let alone participate in a hug.

Anyway, that's what's irritated me lately. And now, by writing this entry, I'm only going to make things worse.

* - American meaning, not British meaning.

Still trying to absorb last night, and still trying to figure out what I can write and what I should write.

I think it's perfectly safe to say that it was the best night I've had in a long time.

It usually hits me at night, like most things. I'll be downstairs shooting pool and it'll hit me, and I'll nearly drop my cue. I'll be out on my swing and it'll hit me, and my swing will coast to a stop. Or I'll be reading a book and it'll hit me, and I'll read the same paragraph a dozen times.

I am so incredibly blessed. That realization hits me, and I can think of nothing else.

It might seem like an odd thing, to have a best friend that you've never even met. I suppose it seemed odd to me, back when I first found her. She has become such an integral part of my life, but if I saw her walking down the street I might not even know her. If I spoke to her on the phone it might take me a few seconds to recognize her voice.

It might seem like an odd thing, but it doesn't. Not to me. To me it's as natural as breathing. And just as involuntary.

Three years ago today, that's when I found her.

---

Just got an email from her.

Told her that I'm trying to write this entry, for our anniversary, but that I'm experiencing writer's block.

I think the problem is that nothing I could ever possibly write would be enough. Not enough to even come close to describing how important she is to me. I don't have the words, and even if I did, I don't think I have the strength to put those words together.

I know that whatever I write will fall short of the mark. Trivialize the emotions. Marginalize the gratitude that I feel when I think about her being in my life.

I needed something, three years ago. I needed it so badly that I was dying from the lack of it. And she gave it to me.

Understanding.

Not pity, or doubt, or advice. She didn't try to rationalize what I was going through, and she didn't try to make it all better, and she didn't judge, and she didn't mock.

She understood.

And I went from feeling completely alone in this world, to having an ally. A kindred spirit I called her. And that knowledge, that wonderful knowledge that I wasn't alone, that I wasn't a freak, that I wasn't any of the things I'd been labeled as...

Wonderful.

I began to heal, three years ago on this day. I stopped waiting to die, and began struggling to live, three years ago on this day.

---

Sometimes I think that we take each other for granted.

I relish those thoughts, because they're absolutely true. We take each other for granted because that's exactly what we are.

We will always be friends. We will always be there for each other.

We are granted to each other.

---

Happy anniversary, my dearest friend Teri.

For some reason I just dreamed that I'd bought another house. Same house that, a couple of months ago, I'd dreamed that I'd looked at with a realtor.

I didn't even like the damn house very much. It was way too white, and there was no basement. And there was a weird front patio that didn't even face anything except a rock wall. And you had to go through a tunnel to get from the driveway to the front door.

But, in this dream I just had, I bought the damn place. Possibly because I'm retarded, though that subject didn't come up in the dream. What did come up was that I was totally unmotivated to move into the new house. The thought of packing up all of my shit, renting a truck, recruiting helpers - it was all way too daunting a task.

So I decided that I wasn't going to move at all. I was going to keep living right where I was, and also have another house. One that was way too white, but that I'd never go into.

Good thing my dream self is so damn rich, I guess.

A couple of weeks ago - right now, it feels like it was a couple of thousand years ago - I guess I said something weird.

"It's weird that you remember that," she said.

Well, guess what?

I remember every single time.

Just don't ask for details, because I was in a daze, every single time.