Cyber Hobo

Okay, so it’s been a long, long time since I last posted anything but.. hey, nobody reads this anyway.

Reading back at some of my posts, all I can think is, “Holy crap! I was so fucking whiney.” Yeah, I know, and I’m sorry to anyone that had to read that shit. I suppose sometimes everyone goes through a shitty patch of life.

Anyway, things seem to be looking up now. I know, I know, nobody gives two squirts, but I thought I should write this for myself, to show myself that there really has been a rather dramatic change.

Right now, I’m doing what I love, each and every day. Sure, I’m not getting paid for it as of yet, but I am actively moving towards my goal. Somehow I managed to move away from the crippling fear that was stopping me from doing that. I’m writing! I’m working on a novel! I’m following my dream! The story I’m working on has invaded my mind like an army. It’s blossomed into this whole world that is slowly taking form in my head and on the page. It seems… incredible to me. When I sit down to write, it’s like I’m moving myself into this secondary world. Sure, some of the places in this world are still a little foggy, but each day they get a little clearer. Each day, my characters get a little stronger, a little more realised.

I’m not sure when this process started exactly, but now it has a hold of me and I can’t see it letting go until the story is finished. Right this second, I don’t care if I live my entire life as a pauper if I can weave a story that will capture people’s hearts and minds. That’s what I’m working towards, something that will outlive me, something that people will still be able to pick up and enjoy long after I’m gone. This will be my legacy.

I know that anyone reading this is probably thinking something along the lines of, “Yeah, everyone wants to be an author, but it probably won’t happen.” Well, to those people, I say… You’re probably right, but by gods, I’m not going to give up. This is what I’ve wanted to be since… well, ever since I can remember. I remember reading the Narnia books when I was… hell, I must have been eight or nine years old and I remember thinking, “Wow, this person crafted this whole world for us…” I want to do that. I want to create a place that people can go to when they need to get away from their humdrum lives. I want to create a place full of magic and myth that will enchant and enrich people’s days when they step into it.

The next book I can clearly remember reading was The Hobbit. And if C.S Lewis put the idea of being an author into my head, Tolkien cemented it. These men, these… wonderful, wonderful men had created something amazing that had endured long after they were gone. Their worlds still exist on pages all over the world… but more importantly, they still exist in imaginations all over the world.

I’m not looking to make a lot of money, (Thought that would undoubtedly be nice) I’m not looking to be famous, I’m not even wanting the whole world to read this story. But if one person reads this book and enjoys the world I’ve created, if one person bonds with the characters I’ve breathed life into, then I will consider myself a success.

I suppose, if I think about it, it really would be nice to be world renowned, I do crave some sort of recognition, but it’s only secondary to my desire to make that one, unknown person smile… and laugh, and cry.

So, that’s my life right now. I’m following something elusive and unlikely, I’m almost entirely happy. There is one thing though, that could make it better.

I do still wish for a companion to share my thoughts, and my heart, with. I miss that companionship. I love my friends dearly, I do, but I’m not sure if any of them understand this… compulsion I have to write, to follow this seemingly impossible dream. They are the best friends one could possibly hope for, but they are not really readers.

I would very much like to meet someone that shares my passion for the written word. Of course, I’m also talking about someone who could be… more than a friend. It’s very hard to explain this… I suppose what I really want is someone that is both a lover AND a friend. I miss having that… special connection. Granted, my last relationship of this nature was… dysfunctional to a mad degree but… I don’t think I’ve totally given up hope of finding someone that fits that criteria.

Although, for an ugly bastard like myself, that might be as unlikely as becoming an author. No, no, I’m not going back to the mopey nature of my previous posts, I promise. In fact, I had a little chuckle as I wrote that line. Perhaps I’m developing a sick sense of humour about impossibilities.

After all, to someone that writes fantasy, what is an impossibility but the perfect basis for a great story?

Okay, wow, been a while since my last posts. I suppose not much has really happened since then… just day to day living. I’ve been getting by, I suppose. My heartbreak has all but subsided by this point, so everything that gets posted will not be tinged with self pity. About that one aspect at least, there is still a lot that I can find wrong with myself.

It has become clear to me that my life is completely static, horribly, depressingly static. This is no doubt due to the fact that I… well, don’t get out much. This is an incredibly annoying habit I’ve gotten myself into. There are a lot of things I could be doing, day to day, but overall it seems like far too much trouble.

I’m not a productive member of society, by any means. I have long since found the root of this behaviour though. I don’t see the point of doing anything. We’ve got… only so many years on this world. As much as I tell myself that I am immortal and will live forever more, the fact is that I am going to die at some point. Could be tomorrow for all I know. I find it very hard to motivate myself to do anything in the face of that.

What’s the point of building a life if, or even begining to do so, when, in the very next moment, it could be taken away? That’s the question that plagues me, that makes me hesitate. I don’t understand how people can just ignore that aspect.

Have I become too focused on my mortality? Before the little crisis that shattered my mind into tiny pieces, I was a lazy layabout for a much different reason. Back then, I didn’t see the point of making myself suffer through a job I hated, as many of my friends were doing, because I enjoyed enjoying myself, I took too much pleasure in the simple things life had to offer to… concern myself with becoming an office drone or subjecting myself to the… distasteful nature of the “Real World”.

Back then, I was so full of hope and optimism. I don’t understand why this one incident, however painful it may have been, managed to suck all of that away. I am obviously a much weaker person than I thought I was. Regardless of why I allowed that to happen, it made me hyper aware of my mortality for some reason and I now find myself paralysed by fear.

I used to be as sedentary as I am because I thought I had all the time in the world to accomplish things, but now I sit here every day and do nothing, because I’m too damned afraid to try and fail. It’s pathetic, I’m pathetic, I know I am, but I can’t seem to break free from this fear.

Looking over my previous posts, I have come to the conclusion that this site has become a “How not to live your life” guide. I know that I have gotten a little better over the past months, mainly thanks to support from friends, but I am still a wreck, plain and simple. I’m not sure there is anything I could do that would make me feel that life was worthwhile. I don’t know if there is anything that could make me want to take a chance on it.

For now though, I’m trying to take joy in the little things again, like I used to. It’s harder than it sounds, especially considering that not even little things happen to me anymore. I suppose I should be thankful that I wake up, that I’ve got an internet connection, that I’ve got food… but… these things seem hollow to me. Perhaps I am simply… spoiled and not worth the air I breath. I don’t know about that, but the more I think about it, the more likely that seems.

I wonder if the people around me would be better off I had never come into their lives. I don’t mean to sound all dark and tortured, but honestly… sometimes it’s really very hard not to think that way. I suppose anyone needs to feel wanted, needed, and… I don’t know if I am… or if I ever have been.

I’ve been wondering something lately. To what degree have my experiences shaped me? If my mind was suddenly wiped clean, if I remembered nothing, not language, not memory, nothing, how much of me would still be me? Would my heart still be the same? Would my soul remain intact? Would I still feel the same way about certain things? Would my sense of justice still be as it is?

I suppose it all comes down to that age old question of nature versus nurture… that is the basis of my current musings but… that isn’t all it is. I wonder how much of who I am now is tied to my experiences, my memories, to my connections with other people. I’d like to think that, no matter how I was taught, or how I was raised, the core of who I am would remain intact. I hold my values, my sense of morality, my principals, very close to my heart… as… twisted and abnormal as they may be.

I don’t like the thought that if I somehow lost all of my memories, all of my past experiences, I would be a totally different person. At the same time though, I am somewhat envious of people who find themselves in that situation, terrible as it may be. There are certain traits, certain behaviors that I can identify in myself that deserve to be wiped out. I am not a happy person, not at all, and I wonder if that unhappiness stems from these traits that vex me so drastically.

It is difficult to erase or modify these behaviors, these traits at the moment. No doubt due to my age and the time they have had to establish themselves in my psyche… the time I have allowed them to run unchecked through my life. Overeating, pessimism, shyness, procrastination, laziness. These traits, these characteristics are ruining my life and I lack the ability to change them for the better. Or is it something other than a lack of ability? Is it perhaps that as I try to change one of these negative traits, the others hold me back, trip me up… I don’t know, I wish I did.

Perhaps some learned expert on the subject of human nature could enlighten me but for the moment, for now… all I have are my own musings on the matter. Heh, perhaps the fact that I allow my mind to wander so drastically, so deeply, is another of the traits that I need to address. Perhaps I think too much for my own damn good.

Going back to the original reason for this post. I am… afraid of losing myself but at the same time… I wish I could. I wish I could wake up with the slate wiped clean, with the ability to become a new person. Perhaps not completely different, but… better.

This desire to change myself is terrifying in a way. Am I truly that bad of a person, am I truly that much of a lost cause that I wish to be someone else? I’m not sure. There are a lot of aspects of myself that I like, but at the same time it they appear to repel people.  Am I looking in the wrong places for friends, for companions? Or am I simply so odd that the number of like minded individuals are so very rare?

I don’t know, I don’t know the answers to any of these questions that seem to plague me and this worries me, it worries me to my core. I am not nearly so arrogant as to think that I am the only one that has these thoughts, I just wish I could answer… one, two… I hate feeling like I don’t know anything, I hate being out of my depth like this. To be honest, I’ve never liked that feeling, but I doubt anyone does.

Why am I always in my head like this? Why can’t I just… live without questioning every single thing that happens to me until it becomes… yet another obsessive meandering of my stupid, overworked psyche. I could almost laugh about it if it wasn’t so damned sad. I am truly pathetic… well, pathetic or clinically insane, the coin is still up in the air on that one… and if I know my luck, it’s gonna come down on it’s edge.

Well, Christmas is here again and it’s prompted me to post once more. If you’re averse to melancholy, you might want to stop reading now.

What is it about this time of year that brings out both the best and the worst in people? It can be a time of great joy, of warmth, of sharing and caring, all that wonderful crap that people can find in their hearts. If you can’t tell by now, I’m not one of those people… well, at least I’m not this year. Last year was another matter entirely. I was happy, for the first time in remembrance I had a truly happy Christmas. There was someone out there that took notice, that cared about me, no matter how far away she was.

This year… well, this year is shaping up to be one of the worst. I’ve gotten over her… for the most part, I still care about her a lot, I still consider her to be one of my best friends, no matter how rarely I get to speak to her. Hells, I even made my piece with her current boyfriend. This melancholy bomb that has descended upon me isn’t related to her, or if it is, it’s only in the smallest sense possible.

No, this is about being alone during this time. It can break a person, quite easily, especially when all of your friends are in happy relationships, when everyone around you is joyfully celebrating the holidays with someone that is special to them. It’s about feeling completely and totally out of place when you’re surrounded by that. It’s not a pleasant feeling, especially when you can clearly remember how good you were feeling during the same time last year.

It’s no wonder that suicide rates climb through the roof during this time. Nobody likes feeling alone. The thing is… those same things that make this such a wonderful time of year for some, make it a terrible time for others. Everyone finds a little extra joy in their hearts, everyone finds it in themselves to express themselves more in that direction. Love and hope and joy… all those things gush to the surface… and for those of us that are alone, it just highlights how alone we are.

Is it jealousy? I suppose it is to a degree but, at least for me, I am truly happy for those of my friends that have that joy, that have someone that loves them, I really, truly am. I just wish with all of my grubby, broken, much duct taped heart that I had that too, that I had someone to heap love and cheer on during this time. Someone to… put up decorations with, someone to laugh with as I try to find that one burned out bulb on the lights.

I watched a scene the other day that made my heart swell and sink at the same time. I watched a friend of mine and his girlfriend playfully arguing about seeing her gifts. It was… very special and once again, I was so happy that they had found each other, that they had found someone to play with like that. He’s a damn good bloke and he truly deserves every happiness that the world can give him. At the same time, though, it reminded me of how alone I am.

This… melancholy can very easily turn into… hurt and anger at that hurt. Not at anyone in particular, or, if it is directed at anyone, then it’s at myself. What the hell is wrong with me? I ask that all the time of late, but more so now that the holidays have rolled around. Why am I alone? Why am I always alone? Do I have some major character defect that completely repels women? Or is it the most simple answer of all… because I’m overweight… yes, I think that is it. Or at least the main cause of why I seem to repel the opposite sex. I am… quite obviously not attractive.

*Rubs a hand over his face* I don’t think I have an… unlikable personality. I seem to make friends easily enough. I don’t think I’ve ever come across someone that just doesn’t like me… Of course, I tend to be quite dense as far as that goes. It’s entirely possible that I’ve met a lot of people that don’t like me and I just haven’t realised it.

Is it really possible that I am that… unwanted though? That all of me, every aspect of who and what I am is so completely unattractive as to actively repel the affections of women? It seems that way.

To be honest, if I was to disappear from the face of the planet, just… vanish, I’m not sure if anyone would even realise that I was gone. And that, above anything else, worries me greatly, that I am so ephemeral, so insubstantial that I could just drift away unnoticed.

Yes, I realise how “Emo” this post is. You’d think that they would steadily become less so as time went by, as I manage to get over the heartbreak of the past few months. I suppose it’s just unlucky that the holiday season blindsided me like this, bringing up all of these unpleasant emotions.

I suppose the fact that I am alone all the time is my own damn fault when it comes down to it. Every woman I fall for is… unavailable, uninterested, or on the other side of the world. Wonderful habit isn’t it? It seems that, as soon as I get even slightly interested in anyone, they either hook up with someone or are interested in someone else. That’s just the way my luck seems to run.

It’s times like this that I just think… “Fuck it… maybe I’ll become a monk or a hermit or something and just fucking give up.” Honestly, I couldn’t have any worse luck in the relationship department if I was miles away from anything or anyone.

Maybe that’s the thing to do. Not to that extreme maybe, but… just giving up. I’m never going to find someone that makes me happy, someone that I make happy, so why fucking put out all of this effort into finding someone like that? I get a lot of joy out of making people happy, out of making one… special person happy, I love making that special someone smile, but if nobody wants to give me the opportunity to do so then there’s really nothing I can do about it.

So, I’m just gonna get on with getting on, the business of living, of dying, it makes no difference to me right now.

Okay, I’m not sure how some of these slipped my mind when wrote out the first post on this topic, but anyhow.

Okay, back in the day there was a club that my little circle of friends used to frequent quite regularly. It was called… Tequila Rock. Nice enough place, had a little faux beach part… no pool though, and a little outside place where you could sit and trip balls if you so chose. (In all honesty it was quite nice to sit out there and stare at the stares regardless of how high and or drunk you were.) Anyway, one night we had all piled into Craig’s white Toyota, (As usual) and zooted off to this place. Fast Forward a few hours and there I am, drunk as all hell, stumbling out of the club to get some fresh air. I sat on the pavement outside for a little while until I felt well enough to go back in.

Unfortunately, the bouncers decided that I’d had a few too many and refused me access. Muttering curses under my breath I decided to go and sit by Craig’s car until I was either sober enough to go in or everyone came out. So, I stumble about and eventually find this old Toyota, right where I remember Craig parking it… or the general areas anyway. The grass around the car was wet with dew so I decided that I’d sleep on the bonnet of the car for a little while.

There I am, sleeping merrily, when I hear people approaching the car. I thought one of my friends would poke me and tell me it was time to go. Nothing happened for a little while so I opened my eyes… only two find four very confused strangers looking at my in horror, keys to their white Toyota in hand, clearly wondering if it was safe to approach me. After drunkenly apologising to them, I then remembered that Craig had left to pick someone up halfway through the evening and had obviously found a different parking spot. Sure enough, I found his car a few minutes later and then had to relay the entire embarrassing story to my laughing friends.

There is another story that involves that particular club but I’m hesitant to mention it since it involves projectile vomiting.

What else… Oh, right! When I was… much, much younger, my friend Vito and I had a… childish rebellious streak. We caused quite a lot of trouble around our neck of the woods. One time comes to mind quite clearly.

They were busy laying new pipelines or something around the neighbourhood so there were these huge trenches dug into the pavements. One of these trenches was directly in front of his house. So, one night while all this was going on, we cooked up this huge batch of luminous green slime by combining… all sorts of crap we found lying around, nothing dangerous, but it was gross as hell. We creeped out of his house in the dead of night and started… pouring this shit on postboxes and welcome mats and… just about anything we could get our hands on.

As we were doing this, a car came around the corner, a neighbourhood watch car, a cop car, something, I swear that I saw blue lights but he doesn’t remember that. Anyway, we bolted, scared out of our wits and just before this car’s headlights hit us, we dived in spectacular fashion, slid across the wet grass and popped into one of those holes. We slammed our backs to the side just as this car pulled into his driveway, a mere meter from the hole.

I can remember looking over and seeing terror in his eyes, something I’m sure he saw in mine too. After what seemed like hours, but was probably closer to two minutes, the car pulled out and drove away, after which we vaulted out of the hole and scarpered back into his house.

That was rather scary, but the worst one followed soon after. Having forgotten our recent close call, we stayed up quite late one night designing these… silly little notes. Drawings and such, “Smiley says fuck you” was a particularly funny one to our minds. This was… instigated by a previous attempt at the same thing but with nicer cards that we called “Hauxmark” (Very droll back then, I’m sure, but now it just seems silly).

Anyway, these… angrier cards were soon ready and we set off to deliver them all over the neighbourhood. I remember going down one street and posting a few. There was a car way down the road that, for all the world, looked like it was parked and empty. As this one note dropped out of my hand into the postbox, I swear, the exact moment it left my fingers, the headlights of the car blazed to life. I screamed something along the lines of “FUCK! RUN!” and bolted, keeping to the shadows as much as I could, Vito close behind me.

The car followed us for quite some time. We were sure it we had given it the slip by the time we got to my house but it roared around the corner soon after. I dived into some shadows, forgetting that I was wearing a white shirt. Vito, who had a black jacket on, had the foresight to jump in front of me in an attempt to hide us both. Well, it failed, the car stopped right in front of us, this huge bastard that looked like the bastard offspring of Chuck Norris and a packet of cocktail sausages just sat there glaring at us until we quickly ran past him and into my house.

Neighbourhood watch and with a shotgun on the seat next to him. Rarely have I been that terrified. Heh, in hindsight, I’m surprised he didn’t just shoot us then and there, South Africa being what it is. We got up to a lot of similar pranks, including, but not limited to, the classic Tok Tokkie, and wandering around the streets at all hours of the night for no damn reason, (One time stopping a woman from being dragged into the veld and raped, so it wasn’t all bad.)

I sometimes miss doing those things… but then I remember the fact that kids doing those things is kind of obnoxious but a grown man doing that is… well, creepy.

It’s very hard for me to wrap my head around the situation I currently find myself in. If I think about it, I’ve been unhappy for a significant portion of my life. I know why, obviously, I’ve got very poor self image and this colours all my life. The way I percieve myself is… very uncomplimentary. Because of this, I’ve been afraid to take chances that could lead to me getting hurt. Of course, this is mainly due to… years of people reacting poorly to my appearance. When you have something pounded into your head for years on end, it becomes quite hard to dispute those things, even in your own mind.

I’m not completely blaming “Society” for this, but it did play a significant role in my slow descent into this… very specialised form of madness. Yes, I said madness, for that is surely what this is. My rational mind comprehends that these things are wrong, that I am a fairly like-able person, but still I let these past encounters cloud my sense of self worth. Perhaps if I was a stronger person, I’d be able to ignore all of that, but I’m not and I can’t.

Back then… back when all this scar tissue was being built up, I learned how to do something to protect myself. I learned how to be empty, or at least fool myself so completely that I might as well have been empty. To, shield myself entirely from anything like hope or dreams. That way… that way you can protect yourself from disappointment, from pain.

I made a huge mistake though, I let someone in, I… allowed myself to think about the future, to hope… to dream. That was… stupid beyond belief. I should know by now that good things rarely happen to me. It was good for a while, but then… then I got another taste of why I let myself sink into that state in the first place. If you’ve read this silly little blog at all you know exactly what I’m talking about. If you haven’t, then feel free to go back and familiarise yourself with the train wreck that is my life.

I’ve only laid out my thoughts on the matter so that you can understand the way my mind is working right at this second. I find myself… incapable of returning myself to that state. It came so easily before but now it’s like grasping at mist. Why can’t I get back to that? It’s a hopeless, pointless way to exist, but at least it’s safe.

Have I grown too much as a person to be able to do that to myself anymore? Have I… in being allowed a taste of how sweet life can be… made myself incapable of entering that state again? This scares me… badly… because… as unhappy as one is in that state, it’s infinitely preferable to this… constant, gnawing pain that assaults me again and again, just when I finally think I’m coming to terms with all this. It’s maddening.

Is this the price of personal growth? Is ignorance trulybliss? Or, if not bliss, perhaps something as simple as survival? Or is this simply a metamorphosis? Is this pain associated with the change? I wonder if the caterpillar in it’s cocoon suffers pain like this. I wouldn’t be so vain as to suggest that I will become something as beautiful as a butterfly, but perhaps a moth of some sort, drab and grey but… serving some purpose at least.

It seems that the more questions I ask the fewer answers I get. Maybe this… all of this… is just the price of knowledge. I didn’t know what life would be like with someone that loved me and I was… if not happy, then content with what I was. Now that I do know… now that I have some knowledge of this… everything is more difficult.

I know that I am moving on, I can feel… something happening… some change in myself. I hope that this feeling is associated with moving on and not some… further descent into madness. Once again, this feeling just brings on more questions.

What does my future hold? I know that… after this, there are certain things that I want. A wife, a family, children… I’m just not sure if I’m… worthy of these things. Heh, like I said, my self worth is down in the crapper, so how can I expect someone else to see any worth in me if there even is any.

I like making people happy. I truly enjoy seeing people’s faces light up when I do something for them. I’m under no illusion that this makes me a selfless person. I like seeing people happy, but do I only like making people happy because it makes me happy? I wonder if there’s even such a thing as a selfless act.

 Gods, how on earth did I become this jaded? I can see it in myself… like a corruption that has seeped into me over years… a corruption that is now so deeply ingrained that there’s no hope of removing it. It makes me sick. Am I too jaded to be worth anything to anyone? *Shakes head* I don’t know why I torment myself with questions like this. Once again we come to the price of knowledge. Or perhaps… I’m just too stupid to stop asking these questions. I doubt I’ll ever know for certain.

I really wish that I could stop. Things would certainly be a lot easier if I was able to that. I just keep seeking insight into my emotions, my mental state, and it’s destroying me. I believe that there is a fine line between intelligence and stupidity and I am constantly unsure of which side I fall to.

Perhaps I should just say “Screw it” and give up. I’m tired, exhausted and completely lost as to what to do. Why can’t the answers be simple, easy to understand?

In the mean time, while… whatever is happening to me happens, the only thing I can hope to do is to take my mind off of the crushing loneliness with whatever I can get my hands on, be it games or TV or what have you.

Well, enough of this, perhaps someone smarter than I can unravel my twisted thoughts… if anyone like that happens to read this crap, that is.

It’s been a while since I posted anything new. I guess I neglected this for a while as I slowly attempted to rebuild the tattered scraps of my heart.

I’ve got something to say now though so I might as well say it here. The decision about whether or not to talk to my ex was taken out of my hands it seems. It’s been… nearly two weeks since I’ve even said two words to her. On some levels, this makes me very sad, because I truly hoped to remain friends with her, she is a wonderful person and a hell of a lot of fun to hang out with. On another level, I feel… happy? No, that’s not the right word, because I’d never be happy that she’s not around but… relieved? Refreshed? I don’t know what it is exactly but it’s not a negative emotion.

I guess in some ways I should thank her for doing what she did. I’ve known a lot of heartache in my time, but this… this was the first time that something effected me this deeply, hurt me this badly. I know that sounds like a stupid thing to be thankful for, but it opened my eyes to a lot of things, made me do a lot of growing up, allowed me to make a lot of changes that I truly needed to make. Her and I… we had a pretty spectacular relationship, the good was spectacularly good and the bad was… spectacularly bad, like, explosion in a fireworks factory spectacular, you know, beautiful, stunning, breathtaking… if you can get past the screaming and the burning people running all over the place.

We had chemistry, a lot of it, but so does dynamite. I loved her like I’ve never loved anyone else, but we couldn’t work. Maybe we could now, now that I’ve changed, now that I’ve done all this soul searching, but that ship has sailed off into the horizon. Now, now I find myself single and I’m not really good at being single, despite a lot of practice. I’m good at being alone, sure, or… I was good at being alone. It’s very hard to truly understand how empty life can be when you’re alone if you’ve always been alone. Once you’ve known that simple, sweet joy though… well, it’s hard to get back to being happy by yourself.

It’s not impossible though, I will, eventually, make peace with what happened, I will move on, I will be okay. It’s taken a lot of crying and a lot of time curled into a ball in bed to realise that, but I have. I am going to make some lady very happy some day. I may be an ugly bastard, but I think I’m funny and smart and attentive enough to make up for that. I’m not a bad bloke, all in all and some day someone will see that. Until that happens though, my life isn’t that bad, I can deal with this for now.

Okay, prepare for another whine fest about my pathetic life, just skip it if you don’t care.

Okay, so, I was laying in bed this morning, watching the beam of light that had broken through my curtain as it made it’s way up the duvet towards my face. It was mesmerizing in a way, this intangible beam creeping up the bed, biding it’s time until it could blind me when I was too weak and lethargic to move my damn head. It made me realise something, I am so far beyond caring that it’s scary.

My life, while fairly comfortable, is completely devoid of anything that means anything. I had all these big dreams at one point. Grand visions of being some famous writer, sitting in cafe’s in Europe with my laptop in front of me, sipping on expensive coffee and smiling politely at all the people around me as my fingers tapped out a tale to enthrall minds and capture hearts. I imagined owning a big house full of bookshelves, bookshelves stuffed with expensive first edition books, a house that my dearest friends would visit all the time.

For the last two years there was someone else in that picture. An amazing woman that was my wife and confidant, a woman who shared all of my strange little ways. As you know, if you’ve read… any of my previous posts, I lost this woman recently… and my life came crashing down around me. That carefully woven lie I had told myself came crashing down around me, leaving me to pick through the broken shards of my dreams with my bare hands.

Still, while she was the catalyst for this… destruction, she is not the sole cause of it, as much as I would like to imagine otherwise. My life is empty… because I let it get like that, because I lived in my head for so long that I forgot to make an effort to change it into something I could be proud of. Now though, I’ve had my eyes forced open, whether I liked it or not… and I most assuredly didn’t like it. No, now that I’ve realised just how humdrum and boring real life is, I find that I can’t even manage to muster one iota of interest in it.

I used to be a lot of things. I used to be a dreamer, a hopeless romantic, and even, though this may come as a shock to those of you that knew me, an optimist. Yeah, I put on this… stupid facade of pessimism in order to avoid anyone seeing the soft squishy side of me sticking a knife in. I even managed to fool myself, but the fact remains, I was always optimistic, it’s a bit hard to be a dreamer and a hopeless romantic without being an optimist, quite frankly. I was always looking for some great love story to be a part of, always looking for some magical world that would let me in, always being… pretty damn sure that if I stuck with it long enough I’d get those things.

But the truth is… there are no happy endings, there are no real romances, there is no true love, there is no magic in the world. All of the things I always hoped for, dreamed about, wished for… none of it is real. Which… pretty much makes my entire life a lie, a horrible, deluded lie. I’m… not an attractive man, look at the photos to the right and you’ll see. All I’ve got to offer anyone is… a sense of humour (Dry), a… love of good movies and good books and… well, that’s about it really.

As you can see, I’ve got nothing to offer anyone. I’m sure that… for all the pretty people, the beautiful people, there are happy endings, there is magic, but not for people like me, not for ugly, boring men… without a lot of money. See, I realised early on that I was not “One of those people”. Or, rather, I had that fact ground into me ruthlessly by the ones that -were- those people. Hell, I wasn’t even really fat back then, just a bit chubby, puppy fat at the best, I’m sure you don’t believe me but… there it is.

Of course, kids are cruel little bastards and they never really let me forget that I wasn’t stick thin like them. It didn’t really phase me at first, I had some pretty amazing support at home, so I didn’t really care what the other kids said about me, that didn’t last though, not past the inevitable advent of the “Girls arn’t icky anymore” point. That’s when I really did start to eat, I suppose at some point I figured… If they already see me as fat, what’s the point of watching what I eat? And what was once puppy fat turned into… well, fat.

So, that’s the point where that horrible little “Play” began. I say play because it was all an act, it’s all just acting. You put on the unmovable mask of “The Jolly Fat Man” you make yourself funny, you make fun of yourself… it’s all a defensive measure of course, you pretend that none of the razor sharp little remarks don’t cut you to the bone, when they really do. At first, it’s just that… an act… but before you know it, it’s all too real.

You’ve changed, you’ve become the mask that you put on… except, you’re not really jolly, not deep down, you’re still acting but you can’t stop anymore. The really sad part though? Beneath that facade there’s a whole lot of construction going on, you’re building walls around your heart, propping up your emotions, trying your damnedest to make everything secure so that one day, you’ll be able to take off that mask… but you never do, by this point your self confidence is so low that you can’t find it with a big shovel and a lot of sweat and… you just don’t have it in you to slip it off anymore. Or, or… you somehow find out the courage to do it… I did… but that doesn’t make things any better… any better at all.

No, in actual fact, it makes things a lot worse. Cause now, you’re not the jolly fat man anymore, the one people can laugh at, the one that makes fun of himself in order to be liked. No, now you’re just… the fat man, usually surly, shy, awkward and… woefully jaded.

I built up so many walls around my heart that I just couldn’t function in normal society. It’s incredibly hard to open up to anyone at all when you’re scared stiff that you’re gonna be hurt. Under it all though, I was still that dreamer, that romantic, searching for someone to share my heart with. Inevitably though, I was shot down again and again, I was still naive, hopeful, I still believed that if I was persistent and showed people that I was friendly and a really nice guy, someone would look past the… fat.

It didn’t happen though, nobody could see past that. I… can’t even remember how many times I opened up a little crack in my heart and showed some girl… and then had her laugh and make a nice, deep slice before walking away. The worst though… was opening up quite fully and telling someone how I felt, having her accept, then… refusing to so much as hold my hand… only to find out that… the only reason she agreed to go out with me was because she was actually interested in one of my best friends and just… didn’t want to hurt my feelings… Yeah, because my feelings would be so much better off when I eventually found out. Well, I did… and it hurt even worse… So thanks for that.

Even after all that though, I was still that dreamer, that… hopeless romantic, that… optimist. Sure, I’d… developed a lot of resentment towards women as a whole, resentment that I buried pretty deep and forgot about, but I surfaced on the other side… beaten but… a lot more whole than I should have been.

It took… not a whole plethora of women,  not a whole slew of rejections to kill that side of me, it took… one woman… one mistake… one monumental fuckup to do that. It took… watching her walk away to do that. So, like I said, she wasn’t the one that caused this destruction, but… she was the catalyst for it. I did something I never should have done… I let her in, I believed her when she promised she’d never leave, I listened when she said she’d stick with me forever. I was a fool, I let my guard down… more fully than I’ve ever done before… and she didn’t just add another scar to my heart, she cut it out and showed it to me, Temple of Doom style.

So, there we go, the whole sad story of why I am… now… completely empty inside. Why I am no longer that dreamer, that… hopeless romantic, why I am dead inside. The funny thing though? Even though I realise all this, I can’t do a damned thing about it. I don’t know how, I don’t have the strength to change myself again… So what do I do?

*Shrugs* Fuck if I know. Maybe one of you does though, assuming that anyone actually reads this crap, so if you have any suggestions, let me have it.

Hey, look at that, a post that doesn’t involve my sad excuse for a life.

So, I’ve been thinking a lot about the games that I’m playing lately. Probably because I’ve been playing a lot more thanks to my sad excuse for a life. (Oops, okay, just one mention)

Anywho, it seems like they’re getting shorter and shorter lately and I’m having a hard time figuring out why this is. I thought that maybe it was because I’m getting older, more focused, better able to use my mind, or just plain more skilled but… the thing is, I tried to test this fact by playing an older game, namely Baldur’s Gate, one of my all time favourite games.

You know what I found? It took just as long as I remember it taking. Sure, the graphics are dated, but man, it was still as enjoyable as I remember it being too. That was when I realised why they were getting shorter, because game designers take a hell of a lot more time on the graphics than they used to.  Mainly because they’re ABLE to make the graphics better.

See, back when they made Baldur’s Gate, the graphics they used were pretty damn good. I remember marveling at them to be honest. How good the trees looked, how smoothly the characters moved, how shiny the magic effects were. When I replayed it recently, as much as I adore the game, I could see how wooden the movements were, how flat the terrain was, how “Shiny” the magic effects were. I was honestly pretty crushed during the first hour or so, I thought that my holy grail wasn’t as good as I had built it up to be.

After that initial hour had passed though, something strange happened. See, I was very aware of that first hour, painfully so, but once the story got going… the next thing I knew, it was six hours later… The story that the designers had crafted was so compelling, so engrossing, so utterly thrilling, that before I knew it, the graphics didn’t matter anymore. What I saw onscreen was far outclassed by the imagery that was suddenly brought to life in my mind. Black Isle (R.I.P) had created a story that sucked me in and whisked me away to the Forgotten Realms in my head.

Games like that… man, they don’t come along too often anymore. Sure, the graphics now are… utterly amazing, but… I can’t help but think that ten years down the line I’ll look at games like Mass Effect and Neverwinter Nights 2 and think the same thing I think about Baldur’s Gate now, that the graphics weren’t actually that good. The thing that sets the Baldur’s Gate series apart from Neverwinter Nights and Mass Effect, is how good the story was. The latter two had good stories, don’t get my wrong, they were really a lot of fun to play, but if they were books, it would be like comparing Lord of the Rings to… No, not Twilight, cause if Twilight was a game it would be… probably a flash game where you catch babies thrown by Michael Jackson or something…

Wait, where was I? Insulting the utter drivel that is Twilight derailed me, (Remember Kids, Vampire’s do not sparkle.) Oh, right. Comparing Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter Nights 2. Now, Baldur’s Gate is obviously Lord of the Rings, whereas Neverwinter would be… The Sword of Truth series? Both are excellent, don’t get me wrong, I adore both of them, to a fault, but LotR is just on another level entirely. It has, like Baldur’s Gate, transcended the medium of words or code and become something… magical.

Anyway, now that I’ve gotten the fanboying out of my system… It seems that somewhere along the lines, game developers started taking their customers for granted. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciated pretty graphics, I really do, there’s nothing wrong with a game that is good looking, but I really wish we, as gamers, didn’t have to sacrifice a good storyline for good graphics, or vice versa. It seems that that is inevitably the way it goes though, developers take forever and a day making their games pretty but then skimp on the storyline or craft an amazing story and forget that being able to distinguish a male character from a female character is important. That being said, I much prefer the latter.

And that’s the end of my rant for now. I’m working on something else game related too so watch this space.

Emerald eyes glint dully in the soft moonlight. He can’t help but sit at the entrance to his cave and watch the silver orb rising into the sky each and every night. As it gets higher and higher, he pulls his head further into the cave, not wanting his burned, scarred face to be visible this night.

He used to be a proud wolf, with midnight fur and eyes that shone with strength. Yes, he had had his share of scars before, but none like this. Now he was something else, something broken and wretched. His fur was all but gone, seared away in whatever conflagration that had covered his body with thick scar tissue. Here and there a forlorn patch of black fur somehow survived between the knotted tissue. His ears were tattered nubs, most of their shape having been lost to the flames, his eyes no longer shone with strength, they were simply dull and dead. He was little more than a walking corpse at this point, struggling to hold onto the flimsy scraps of life that were left to him.

He whined pathetically and closed his eyes, the light from the moon getting to be too much for him. He was dying, he knew that much, his heart was just as broken as his body and the poison from the slowly rotting organ was seeping into the rest of his body, corrupting and destroying.

He felt the moonlight on his face and swallowed back the bile that rose in his throat. Unable to shift out of the light without getting up anymore, he slowly rose to his feet, his legs shaking painfully, and hobbled deeper into the cave, pain shooting through his body. The hard stones at the entrance of the cave had opened up some of the scars on his chest, letting hot blood leak down his legs. As he wandered aimlessly to the back of the cave, he left bloody paw prints in his wake. It had happened before and it would happen again. He rose every evening to watch the moon come up, even though it caused him more than just physical pain.

Eventually he came to the filthy, pathetic den at the back of the cave and flopped down onto the soiled furs that served as his bed. There was more than a little dried blood on them already and the leaking wounds on his chest only added another layer as he curled into a ball, his scarred, hairless tail snaking over his muzzle. He tried to resist the call of sleep, but his body was tired and eventually he slipped into unconsciousness, fear of the dreams that would come making his body tremble.

In his dreams he ran through the forest atop his mountain home, in his dreams he was whole and unmarred by the seeping burns. The dreams were pleasant for a time but then… then they shifted into something more akin to memories. He had just made a kill, a mountain goat, a species common here. He had just settled down to feed, his muzzle full of hot blood that steamed gently in the cool evening air.  That was when she had appeared. Her coat was as white as moonlight and shimmering just the same. He was shocked, surprised, he had never seen another wolf before. He didn’t even know how he had ended up on top of the mountain in the first place. Only that there was no way down.

She was beautiful. He had sat there, stunned, as he watched her get closer and closer. instinct kicked in then and he carefully pulled the goat’s heart out and placed it on the ground next to him. A clear invitation for her to join him at his feast. She approached carefully and lay down next to him, her snowy flank touching his midnight paw as she leaned down and licked the bloody organ.

The scarred wolf sat up quickly, coughing up blood onto the furs. The dreams always came, no matter what he did. Tears streamed down his face, mixing with the blood on the furs. It never got any better at all. He cursed himself again and again, cursed his foolishness, cursed his naivete and his inexperience. There was nothing left for him anymore, nothing but memories and shadows. He longed for death to sneak up on him and take the pain away and yet… it never did, he just clung on for dear life, unable to let go, unable to throw himself off of the mountain, too scared to take his own life. He was a coward, he knew it. If he had any strength he would just do it, release himself from the pain of his broken body.

He hobbled over to the natural basin in the corner of the den, where water dripping from the top of the cave collected, and drank as much as his scorched throat would allow. When he lifted his head he watched drops of blood swirling lazily in the water. He was close now, nature would do what his cowardice could not. There was no use for a creature that had no purpose in life.