THE MISADVENTURES OF AN ESOTERIC INVESTIGATOR

Ourangutang.

I spelled it wrong.

YAWN>

::sigh::

I'm not going to tell you everything to type, she said.

Especially if you spell things wrong.

When do cliches become cliche? When is it cliche to say something is cliche?

When does novelty become novel?

How long until parody and satire are immediately applied to everything?

She is a cricket on my shoulder and I cannot shoosh her.

I did it again, she said.

But no one will know because I fix it.

But she knows.

And my eye smelled my finger as it wiped away a crumb and it smelled like garlic.

Everything had garlic.

I cut up garlic and ginger.

Mary Ann was nice and begged for her life.

I said no one will get it.

But she got it.

I bet you think I'm high but I'm not.

Not even drunk.

But I'm blah and that's like a drug too.

She said it's worse.

I have a bad Seether song in my head and I am not happy about it.

She said that's cliche.

Haha, Sayid said.

Ok, it's just for breathing and my neck is cramped.

So good night and new year and monkey love.

She said it's a sad post.

I say no one will read the whole thing anyway.

But she read it because she watched as I wrote it.

Does that count?

I am a horrible person.

I am an intellectual spider. I will trap you in my web and you can never argue your way out.

Even if you're right.

Because the truth is:

I am not a smart man. I am clever and quick, but I am not smart.

Generally, it takes a while for me to process new information, to incorporate it into my cosmology. Occasionally, and usually only with grand revelations, is this process instantaneous. Mostly, I have to let it sink in, turn it over, ponder it, play with it, like a newly planted tree, allow it to root and grow.

But I can't lose face, I can't ever be wrong.

So I use my almighty powers of argument, my lightning cleverness to refute your points, like temporary road blocks, momentary doors to hide behind. I leave you trying to climb up and around, to somehow get around these traps to give my people, a.k.a. my intellectual processes time to digest.

While it may be frustrating and seem that I am not open or accepting to what you are saying, it is actually the opposite. I am just too embarrassed at my idiocy to allow you to see it. Astrology would describe it as Saturn acting in my natal third house, instilling me with a fear of appearing unintelligent. It's not an excuse, just a description.

What I must remember is that it is like emotional vulnerability. People don't really want stoic people who are never perturbed and hide their emotions behind closed doors. No one likes a perfectionist. To be accepted, to be liked, to be truly human is to show vulnerability, to admit flaws and fractures within ourselves.

And such I must learn to do in this aspect of my life.

I offer my apologies, especially to John and Jacquelyn who have suffered the most from this.

Though I say, no one likes a perfectionist, I still aim to be perfect. Learning and adapting to these lessons about myself and how they affect my life and the people in it is a major part of this path.

Let the light shine in.

Ok, so maybe I'm not horrible, but I'm not perfect and I have a lot to work on.

And it never stops.

In The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera speaks of poetic memory, that aspect of our mind which records everything that charms or touches us, that makes our lives beautiful. He also warns us that metaphors are dangerous. After all, love begins with a metaphor. Which is to say, love begins at the moment when a woman enters her first word into our poetic memory.

Reading this passage last night brought to mind the very beginnings of my relationship with Jacquelyn. When did I know I had fallen victim to that prickly trickster known as love? Milan should have warned me earlier; it began with a metaphor.

In June when Jacquelyn first arrived in Madison, and I met her for the first time, I played the role of good friend, helping her to adjust to her new life here. However, there was something below the surface, tugging, or perhaps something high in the sky beckoning. I saw her occasionally throughout the summer, titilating chemistry percolating, the winds of affection swirling, though we denied everything. And then she was gone, a research trip and visits to her family. For a month, I did not see her. We spoke only once, and when she called, I must admit, I was surprised, as if I'd forgotten about her.

After this long absence we met, prepared a succulent dinner together, drank copious amounts of wine, and finally opened that repressed vault of emotion which had simmered over the summer. In the early hours of morning, when the sun still casts long shadows, a hazy glaze of white on stark surfaces, I drove her to work. As we sat in the car, saying our good-byes, basking in the glow of this new development, Bright Eyes played on the radio and the moment froze.

If we are lucky, each of us gets but a handful of perfect moments in our lives. The very lucky, or perhaps the very wise, realize that every moment is absolutely perfect, but let's say for the sake of narrative, that this frozen moment, the perfect tone of the perfect music for the perfect time in the perfect light, eye to eye, our souls spilling secrets back and forth, was one of those rare perfect moments. The kind Kodak can only dream of. It was then that Jacquelyn wrote her first word in my poetic memory.

The lyrics which played during this perfect moment, the metaphor which forever emblazoned itself into my psyche, infecting me with that virus of Eros?

Did you forget that yellow bird?
How could you forget that yellow bird?
She said this one will bring you love...
You're the yellow bird that I've been waiting for.

It might not be what Conor Oberst meant when he wrote that, but it's mine now, and I will do as I please. These lyrics were the dangerous metaphor Milan warned me about, three months too late. I have a yellow bird, which I have long been waiting for, who fluttered out of the ether and into my heart.

As you may have noticed, I've been a bit absent from the Land of LiveJournal for a few days and I have quite a good enough excuse. What, you ask, could possibly keep me away from LJ?

I've spent the last five days in almost constant company of antarcticlust and we've decided to create a sort of exclusive club, with just ourselves as members. What kind of club is this, you wonder? Well, I'll tell you...

It may sound a bit strange, but it's called a "relationship." Now, I know some of you may be unfamiliar with this term, so I'll try my damnedest to explain.

Remember when you were just wee little children and someone gave you a note that said, "Do you like me? Circle yes or no." And you circled yes and then held hands at recess? Yeah, it's a bit like that but we're all grown-up now and there's a bit more snogging and fancy dinners.

So yes, after all my whining and lamenting over the lack of activity in my love life, and my fear of commitment, et cetera, et cetera, I'm giving a monogamous relationship a go and will see how it develops.

I'm quite fond of her and we get along famously. There's immense amounts of intellectual, emotional and physical chemistry that's hard to argue with. Our past histories and future plans merge into a cohesive whole, like two planets that suddenly find themselves in parallel orbits.

I'm entering into this with as few preconceptions as possible about where this will go or any future plans. At this current moment in space-time, we seem to be almost exactly what the other is ready for. If the Universe is a massive learning tool, we are the teachers we need right now.

This is actually quite difficult for me, and not because of any doubts about my feelings. The difficulty arises from the fact that I've basically been uncommitted and single since January 1st of 2001. Yes, that's over four and a half years of sporadic dating, unrequited crushes, and unresponsive flirting. Nothing even remotely approaching a serious and committed relationship.

In a way, I'd begun to think of "single" and "whole" as synonyms. So the idea of committing feels wrong in a way, because of the fear of again submitting myself to the needs of another. I don't want someone to need me and I don't want to need someone. I just want to be whole and live my life, but with a companion, someone to share this journey with. And right now, Jacquelyn seems to be that person.

In order to prevent emotional static to those who may find this news most distressing, I had originally planned to filter this post. Or whether to post it at all, but alas, I'm either a masochist or a sadist (maybe both) or just lack tact (which I call blunt honesty) so here it is for all to see.

So feel free to comment with your congratulations, lamentations, curses, well-wishing, tears (whether for joy or sadness), exuberance, pity, scorn, criticisms, critiques, love, hate, compliments, endorsement, or eulogy. After all, I was blunt (or tactless) enough to post this, so you can, at least, be as equally blunt in your reactions.

Tootles!