You Know I Dreamed About You...

I missed you for.
for twenty-nine years.

Last night, I worked late, and went to the gym to lift heavy weights over my head repeatedly. This was more pleasant than it sounds. After, I had a Jamba Juice, and then a steak and a glass of wine at The Turf, and then stopped by the Whistle Stop, where there was a book release party and reading, for a whiskey. It is as though I am looking for someone who I should not be, but I need some answers. Life is solidly in the now, without any hooks into or windows looking out on promises, and I need these open roads, to know that I am going somewhere, even if they lead to dead-ends and I have to turn around and come back.

This morning, I finally found the secret yoga hideaway and saw my favorite hot yoga instructor for the first time in months, and while stretching and sweating in a room full of beautiful, lithe women while a one of them leans her body into mine and bends me in ways that I didn't think possible can feel like a new road opening, it is not. That one, is blocked off at the beginning and I am unsure of my willingness to walk down it, should it ever open.

Cravings

This weekend, tired of becoming sick from working out too hard, I started to do something very uncharacteristic: I counted my calories.

No. I'm not trying to lose weight.

I just couldn't figure out why, at 19, I could run 80 miles a week and lift weights for two hours, three days a week, and maintain a college student's schedule and pace and now, I can't workout 6 days a week for more than a couple weeks without getting sick.

I'm older now, I know, and I recover slower and injure more easily, but I also get more sleep and am generally less stressed out. I build into my workouts slowly-- I started way back at the beginning of the summer with two to three days a week. What was happening? I snooped around online and this is what I found:

The daily caloric expenditure for a man my age, hight and weight is approximately 1600 if I never even get out of bed. Add about 500 more for just getting up and having a normal, exercise free, day in the office. Add another 500 for getting a little bit of exercise. That's probably about what I eat in a normal day. In order to sustain myself while working out the way I like to, I needed to find room for another 500 calories-- more if I actally want to build any muscle. This is harder than you think.

Do you know how many calories are in a salad without dressing? Less than 30. I need my veggies, but on this caloric schedule, how can I possibly spare the room in my tummy?

It's been an interesting experience-- and one that I hope not to do for more than a few weeks. Once I get a sense of how much food I need, I'll stop and take it from there.

FUUUUUUUCCCCCCCKKKKKK!

Fuck!

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

Fuck.

1 fortnight= approximately 14 days.

Fuck.

Fucking fuck fuck fuck.

Yeah.

Fuck.

You Know I Dreamed About You...

For twenty-nine years before I saw you.

I feel like this sometimes. Somewhere out there is a dark haired girl. Somewhere north, I feel, though I don't know know why. She's calm and strong and full of life. She makes me laugh. I can feel her in the back of my mind-- I always have. Maybe someday I'll meet her. Maybe not. This doesn't matter now.

I've been drinking (and can you tell?). I've been trying to get over a cold all weekend and today, feeling a little bit better, and a little bit cooped up, I decided one drink at the bar on the corner couldn't hurt. That one drink was so good, I had it three times. Don't worry, I mixed and matched a bit. I chatted up the bartender. I chatted up the cocktail waitress. I made eyes at the pretty ladies. I spoke, briefly, with the women beside me when they asked me why I was out alone. I came home by myself. This is best. My dark haired woman was not there.

Today I

Attempted to find a hidden yoga class and failed.

Called it off and worked from home again

Counted my daily caloric intake for the first time ever (turns out I don't eat enough).

Insulted a friend by accident, albeit with something I had said deliberately, some time ago.

Shuffled a lot

Listened to music

Wondered

Fretted

Had some tea

Wrote this list

and now I'm going to bed.

I am standing now, on the edge

And here, on the edge, a little tickle that formed in the back of my throat last night has become a deeper scratchiness and my body can't quite decide what temperature it wants to be, and all manner of horrible things are threatening to happen elsewhere, but mostly I'm together. I feel OK. Cracks are forming along the ledge and soon I will tumble down, down down, but for now, I am standing on the edge.

Here on the edge, if one looks over into all that blackness, it is unclear what will be on the other side. The only certainty is the fall, and that it will be cold, and sometimes scary and uncomfortable. It is not horrifying. I have, after all, been to the edge before, many times. Sometimes I have fallen and sometimes I have turned around and wandered for a while first. It's merely something that has to be done.

I am standing on the edge. Soon I will wrap myself in blankets and sleep for as long as I can, and when I wake, I will have fallen.

When I first moved to San Diego

I was lost under it's endless sky. I met a woman here and fell in love, but this is not that kind of story. Let us get back to that endless sky...

Falling Out of Touch With All My

Friends are somewhere getting wasted
Hope they're staying glued together.


Who needs a drink?

I do, I think. Actually I don't know what I need. Week two (or is it three?) of the 6 day a week workout schedule. Didn't I used to do this all the time? Wasn't it twice a day most days? Sometimes three? What happened? When did I become such a weenie. Is it the full time job that's f'ing me up? Maybe I'm not eating enough. Lately, I don't know whether I'm not or cold, hungry or full. I know I'm tired though. I know that.

(I'll sleep on the floor if I want to. You can't stop me. It's my floor. I'll sleep on the kitchen floor even. I'll do it. Just watch me.)

I used to finish a run and go eat and shower and then sit up in my dorm room on the couch and feel just... powerful. I felt like I could run through the fucking wall. Now I feel like the fucking wall ran through me. Subtly different, yet worlds apart.

I got back from yoga class and, for the first time, felt more constricted and sore than when I went in. Maybe it was the new instructor. Maybe it was my bad attitude. Nah, fuck that. I'm blaming the instructor.

Incomprehensable to Me

Now, I'm not a sports guy, let's get that straight. Eight years ago, at the start of the Superbowl, I asked my friends "so... what exactly is a 'down'?".

Right.

Not a sports guy at all. As a result, those friends of mine, mostly female, who are also not into sports often feel it necessary to express their disbelief-- and often mild disdain-- at how into sports some people can get. These are people I respect, mind you, but what I find quite a bit more incomprehensible than how involved some folks can get in their teams, is how some folks can be so completely out of touch with the rest of humanity to not have an inkling as to why this might be. It doesn't put you ahead of the masses to not share their sports mania, it puts you aside and, perhaps, behind.

Sorry. I'm not a sports guy, but I'm a people guy, and if you can't understand the desire to become a part of something bigger than yourself-- the joy of sitting on the edge of your seat at the bottom of the ninth, one run behind with two outs, two strikes and one man on base; hearing your whole neighborhood go nuts while your QB runs 65 yards for a touchdown; watching a three-pointer fly through the air as the final seconds run off the clock-- then I just don't know what to tell you.