HOLD ON TO YOUR FRIENDS

TACTICAL

If I was to describe myself (and I did so way back near the beginning of this journal) I would make use of the term “social introvert” to do so, with the emphasis on the “social” and less on the implied “introversion” of the other half of that description.  I have had a very high value on my time to myself, and one of the things that I am going to get back into is reading (but that is dependent somewhat on my schedule of activities next year), and maybe writing better (which is a constant thing) as well.  I want to get both Madison and Doug (my bikes) tune-ups before the New Year, and that is about that with that.

Since I have been on my own it is has been far easier for me to negotiate life and cope with the things that force me to prove my desire for what I want.  I cannot overstate how much of a pleasure it is to know that when I am running around multi-tasking and pushing my envelope that there is peace and stability waiting for me when I get to my apartment.  The only intrusions that I have in my life here are mostly pleasant ones.

Princess and her two boys went with me to the viewing party on Saturday night.  They were the only children there but I think that was even better for them, to be in that kind of environment and have the space of “the youngest in charge” all to themselves.  I was surprised at how shy they were, but they ended up having a decent time.  The youngest beat me in a game of foosball, and the game was… ah, the game!!

I am a fan of Wisconsin football.  Maybe I should say that I am a fan of the style they play and of “Madtown” and the Dells, more than I am a fan of their football team.  But like their very successful basketball team, the way that they play resembles the way that they ALWAYS have played over the last 30 years.  Though I went in my white Husker hoodie, my heart was hoping that the Badgers would win the game, and that is what they did and HOW!

What makes both the football program and their Men’s basketball program iconic in my spirituality is that they make absolutely NO bones about what they are going to do.  Specific to the football team, what they say is, metaphorically, “We are going to run the ball straight at you and see if you can stop us.”  Saturday, Nebraska could not “stop them”.  Another way to describe the Badgers style is to say that they “hit you in the mouth”, that is, they are going to play to their strength, which literally their strength.  They have a big offensive line, big running backs, and even the wide receivers tend to be big.  And if you are not strong enough to hold up…

When Nebraska’s quarterback Taylor Martinez took a broken play and ran for 74 yards for a score, I still thought that the Huskers were going to get beaten up.  If you are relying on your opponent to make mistakes and not being able to influence that on your own, I do not think that is going to be reliable plan for victory.  For Nebraska on Saturday night, it wasn’t.

YOU ONLY CALL ME WHEN YOU’RE FEELING DEPRESSED…

…when you feel happy I’m so far from your mind… my patience is stretched, my loyalty vexed…

I am getting set for the New Year and clearing out the things that are in my “cache” and optimize the space on my mental “disk drive”.  One of the things, actually the MAIN piece from this year that I want to get a handle on is my relationship with Nebraska.

One of the quirks that I have is how I still maintain positive regard for a person even when their feelings about me are murky at best, and antagonistic at worse.  I can’t say with any degree of certainty how she feels about me… my best estimation is that they are primarily negative at this time, which I understand completely.  I do not necessarily agree with her, but that we don’t is not that surprising.  Our biggest problem is a lack of compromise and understanding for the other’s perspective or goals for our relationship.

I have spoken to Princess about her as a “friend”, including my designs for our relationship.  So should Nebraska decide to respond to my entreaties and act in as friend with and to me as well.  The bigger question is one that I have to answer of myself, and that is “Why?”  Why should I pursue a relationship with someone who has no interest in having a relationship with me?

Along with my introversion, is apathy towards the people who were in my intimate past as my friends or lovers.  Though I will always care about the people that I once was in love with, I have come to see moving forward as the shedding of old skin.  You can never go back and reclaim the cells that made for your casing, no matter what your affinity for it is.  Just like Bradley’s hat in the Pete Holmes set, “…it’s gone, Bradley… your hat is GONE!”  And any argument that you would have with the person who broke your heart and/or hurt your feelings (which oft times are the same person but not always) is one that you will lose.  There is no need for you to be competitive or get motivated to be determined that you are going to stem the tide of time immemorial and win this person over… this argument has been lost by people like you forever and it will be that way as the arrow of time moves forward.  And it is in the face of this that I even ask of myself what do I think that I am doing?

One of the things that is way different from my being 25 from being 45 is that I AM FORTY-FIVE!!  The egocentric desires of wanting someone or something just because I have not had it before are set aside… I am way more fragile than I ever thought I would be at this age.  I cannot stop thinking of myself as “prey forsome beast” and that makes me want to kind of have someone near to me who I have an established relationship with that I could call on (sometime maybe?).  And, I would like to shake the “I moved to Omaha and all I got was this T-shirt” feeling that I have with the dissolution of relations between us.  Dollars to donuts, if we are not friends before her next birthday, we are likely not to be friends, ever.  This is not a swipe at her as much as it is an acknowledgement of whatever it is about ME that makes keeping in contact with people such a dodgy proposition.

Both Hutch and the SFC rarely email me or call.  Neither are a part of my Face Book and I have no intention of asking them to add me.  Because this has been de rigueur for relationships, I have only the slightest bit of a “spiritual protuberance over the state of our friendships, the overall trending of my personal relationships does lead me to wonder what is going to become of Nebraska and me.

Here is where the existentialist in me begins to ponder the complexity of my life, and my life alone.  This is a question that I have asked myself a number of times throughout my adulthood and that is this—Am I really meant to be friendless? 

Again, this is not a plea to the fates for me to avoid my term in this plane of existence and as the commander of this vessel without making an enduring and lasting connection with anyone.  If I did not worry overmuch about this in high school, for me to writhe in spiritual agony over not having a friend to do things with or to help move their old refrigerator, or even for them to help ME get a new loveseat into my place or take me to the grocery store, there is no real reason for me to worry about it now.  This is something that I am “jus’ wonderin’’ about, with no real expectation of a definitive answer and no real intentions of trying to discover a conclusive end to my personal quandary.  I just find that it is an odd dichotomy that I possess the traits to engender the affection and passion that is required of a committed friendship, but I do not have anyone other than my internet friends that I have even felt those emotions returned to me.

Somewhere in all of this is the reason that I would like to know if Nebraska would like to be my friend.  I feel a little nervous about the possibility, it is kind of exciting to me if you must know.  It feels like a scene from a book or a movie where two little kids who are brought together through either circumstance or location, decide that they are going to be “friends” and then manage to do just that for the rest of their lives.

 But I will get my sleep in should nothing come of my extensions of a peace between us.  I think that when it comes to wanting an “us” between her and I did what I needed to do for that to happen… I brought my a**!! So sure, we don’t get to be friends, I will be touched with a sadness but not so much that I will be pining for her.