IT IS WHAT HE DOES WHEN WE PLAN

AND I BET HE IS LAUGHING HARD AT ME AND MY PLANS, NOW!

Still, proper planning prevents poor performance. This was a well planned and executed process that has brought me to where I am today.

I am where I am supposed to be. Headed to where I am supposed to go. Not where I thought I was going to be setting a course to, but still it is where I am supposed to be going.

But I didn't know it. Or maybe I did?

DARKHORSES

"Most men are stubborn of the path they have taken, rarely the goal."

Soon, I am going to do a post on some of the language that I use to communicate with myself. Until then, readers are going to have to bear with me.

For me, it had always been a simple risk assessment that had kept me from ever asking someone back out again. There were reasons that caused us to part ways, and no matter who was at 'more fault', those issues would need to be addressed. That was something in observing relationships that I felt people would overlook.

Men are dogs ... women are gold diggers. And on and on. Many of the problems in the failed relationship were usually related to one of those problems, and you can add a layer of financial stress that would aggravate things as well.

Even if the 'usual suspects' weren't at the root of the problem, whatever issues that were at the root, the problems weren't only because of fail due to one party in particular. It was something that BOTH contributed to and were responsible for the fail happening. Example, I don't know what Mookie's side of the story is, because she isn't here to tell it. Therefore, her case is unknown, and perhaps she had justification for wanting to be rid of me.

Same thing with Tee Jay. I try to respect that, and not let too much bitterness show and move on from there. Being fair to them isn't necessarily what I am after, but being fair to me is. If I have to change something, be better at whatever, then I need to try to figure it out and work at it.

Makes no sense when someone has acted in the manner that a Mookie has, to wonder why she didn't want me. Why ask why Tee Jay didn't want to give a cat who did her the way that I did, another chance? Accept it and move on, because there is something out there for me, and I kept on going.

Periodically, I would check the validity of purpose of the direction I was headed. The goal was still there, even if I could not clearly make it out in the mists ...

Sitting down with Ken & Beth ... of course I would have liked to have spoken to them more at length, was another sign that I had chosen my course wisely. I spent time in formulating my course, and never lost sight of what I was doing and why. Though there was some twists (Mookie instead of Tee Jay, or Pecan Sandie) and some other assorted bumps, it still held up to inspection.

One of the things that I had known, and Donald Rumesfeld actually explained pretty well, is that there are 'known unknowns' and there are 'unknown unknowns'. There were a lot of things that I didn't know when I considered what I was doing. For instance, when did 'The Ex List' morph into the 'Nebraska Concept'? Did NOT see that coming. But it did do that, didn't it?

And with the change over issues that were cropping up (and they fall under the 'known' part of this), the most difficult thing wasn't dealing with the changes, but remembering that there was a purpose to all of this, indeed a goal.

The goal never changed.

"The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it." - Michelangelo

Value judgements in relationships change when you place the appropriate value on the combined involvement in a relationship. They change because something that you had once thought of as 'no go' items, say smoking or style of music, can be negotiated and dealt with for the insignificance that they really are.

After all, if they compromise the integrity of the relationship, are they worth keeping? And are they the problems so offensive that there can't make an exception made?

One of the things that I hadn't spoken of is how I really envisioned my life out west. I KNOW that I would have been a good friend to Nebraska and that I would have been an asset in her life. I know how to let someone be to themselves and keep busy with my own individual pursuits.

We are all grown folks in here, so I will talk about how I have been 'practicing' with maintaining my profile as far as trying to sleep with people. Because my life spent falling short of my goals have been mainly been due to a lack of discipline at critical times in the area of interpersonal relations with women. Also, no matter what gets said or agreed to by those involved, emotions always get attached to that act. An attachment get made, understandings breeched, and feelings get hurt.

So do not want to be a part of that fandango. So unless Nebraska had said we were going to really give us a go, and since I wasn't here to lead AKA on, I chose to 'get off the merry-go-round' (the word 'celibate' carries baggage and I am far to opportunistic to remain in that mind set indefinitely). There'd be no one thinking that because they did 'this', it meant that I felt 'that' (okay, I will give that a rest for today!!) at any time on this journey. Can't do the things that you know hurts that will hurt your chances to get what you really want. Especially when those things are contrary to the things you should do if you want something.

When you place your emphasis, and let your priorities make 'the list', rather than getting lost in listing of your priorities, things tend to happen and eventually things will work themselves out and the path will become clear. Getting laid was not a priority for me. Finding my happiness is. Chasing panties did not bring me any closer to that goal.

Being disciplined in the pursuit of my goal has.

THEN THERE ARE THE 'UNKNOWN UNKNOWNS'

That is what 'darkhorses' are all about. They are the unknown things that are acting in their own environment, spinning in their own uncharted orbits, crossing and intersecting where they do. They can appear random because they aren't on maps or charts, but they are on a larger chart than the one that I have.

And I have acknowledged that I am trying to play my part, not that I have all the answers. What I was supposed to do was find my path, and that is what I have done.

Believe me when I say to you that me and the SFC never were physically intimate, but other than that, I don't think I have been as close to any person in my life. It has always, always been that way for me, that I don't need someone to necessarily return my love directly. But I always 'knew'. When I mentioned the relationship to one person, she was regarded the SFC as 'sainted', said tongue in cheek. I guess it was to highlight how out of the realm of the Mark that they knew, that kind of relationship was.

What ever the SFC has seen in me, has stayed with her over twenty years. That alone says it all. And as soon as I heard her voice, the same emotions I have for her rushed to the front. They are all there, ready and hers to claim.

And now she has.