Truth or Consequences

This above all: to thine own self be true.

-Polonius: Hamlet Act 1, scene 3 

We’ve all heard variations of this piece of advice over the course of our lives.  Whenever we question something about ourselves, or feel unsure about what to do, we normally hear someone tell us that we need to stay true to who we are. That if you’re not honest with yourself, you’ll never really find any measure of happiness. It is a sound piece of advice, because I think we’ve all felt that moment when you realize you’ve been lying to yourself, or have ignored something that was really important to who you are, and realized that it was causing you great emotional pain.

However, historically, there have been a few exceptions.  If part of who you really are is considered “deviant” in any way, then society at large will demand that you keep that part hidden.  The problem is that what society considers “deviant” is subjective, but nonetheless, that part of you still exists.  It’s especially a problem if that part of you is in no way harmful, whether physically or mentally, to anyone else, yet society still wants you to suppress it.

In our current society, we are in a struggle with the concepts of homosexuality and transgender people.  For some reason, at least in my experience, it is mostly tied to religious belief, and it would seem that a lot people have a problem with both of these traits.  There exists a belief that homosexuals and transgender people choose to be that way.  That somehow, they have decided that they want to behave in a way that would get them shunned, persecuted, ostracized, oppressed, attacked, hated, and any number of actions that would cause them great harm. 

What I have to wonder is, of the people who believe that they would choose to be homosexual or transgender, what would cause them to believe that anyone would choose to be something that would garner so much negative attention?  There is no logical reason that people choose to put themselves in a situation that would bring great distress and pain on themselves.  And for those that would call them masochists, realize that masochists derive pleasure from physical pain, the complete opposite of someone who is being hurt emotionally and made to feel that they are worth less than what they are because they are just trying to be who they feel themselves to be.

It’s an important distinction to make, and to understand.  Choosing to be something means that you can also choose to not be that something, at any point.  There is no inherent connection to that choice, aside from the attachments you make.  However, to be born as either homosexual or transgender, is an essential part of the very core of your being.  To deny something that is an important part of who you are, especially when it is due to coercion by outside influences (family, friends, society) causes such strife, such pain, in your very being, your soul if you believe in such things, that a lot of times, people can only free themselves from that distress by ending their own lives.  If it was simply a “choice,” then people would not feel such self-loathing if they were to “choose wrong” so to speak. 

Identity issues are difficult enough, even if you don’t have societal pressure trying to crush you into conforming.  I’m ethnically Chinese, but I was born in the US.  Anyone who is born a second generation immigrant understands the difficulty in trying to balance the different cultures that you grow up with.  Many want to honor their heritage, but at the same time, they have to live in the society that they were born in.  If you don’t assimilate, then you feel separated from your community.  If you do assimilate, you drift away from your family and cultural history.  Trying to be both is admirable, but nearly impossible.  There’s a great deal of compromise needed in order to keep both sides happy, and a lot of times, despite so many people going through it, it’s not a shared experience.  So imagine adding on top of that the idea that you’ll be hated by the world at large if you want to be yourself.  Your whole life, people tell you to be honest with yourself, but when you are, they come down hard on you to bury it away, to deny that part of you.

Which brings me to the whole point of this entry.  The courage it takes to come out, and to claim your homosexuality, or your gender identity, is immense.  To know that just by proclaiming who you are, you will face great hatred, persecution, violence, and even threats to your life, requires greater courage than many of us can ever fathom. 

People will try to co-opt that bravery, by claiming that somehow, your ownership of your identity somehow infringes on their existence.  That being true to yourself will damage the very fabric of society, and that they are somehow courageous and righteous by standing up against your right to be who you are.  There are those who would attempt to negate your courage by saying it pales in comparison to people who put their lives on the line on a regular basis by being soldiers or police officers, as though somehow finding employment, knowing full well what the hazards of the job are, immediately raises you to heroic levels. 

If that were true, why does no one hold up loggers as heroes?  They have the highest per capita fatalities, and they work hard to provide fuel, raw material for nearly every aspect of your life, and they don’t even get paid all that much.  Or fishermen who help to put food on your table.  They travel to remote locations, risk being thrown into the merciless ocean, freeze to death, drown, or any other number of horrific ways to die.  Yes, you can say they do it for monetary gains, or to better their own life situations, but can you really say that most of the people who go into the military or into law enforcement aren’t doing it for the same purpose?  Can you really say that the majority of them are people wanting to do those jobs for noble reasons? 

Even then, even when held in comparison to these jobs that people take willingly, knowing that they may lose their life, it doesn’t change the fact that coming out requires massive stores of will and courage.  To know that the possibility that you may lose friends and family over your choice to come out, that you may lose your livelihood because of unfair labor laws, that you may be looked down upon by your community, would make the decision against coming out seem almost like a no-brainer.  However, the fact that living a lie is so painful, where the only choices they have are coming out, living in misery for the rest of their days, or ending it all, should tell you what kind of courage it takes to come out and be honest with yourself, and to be true to yourself. 

Ultimately, the point I want to make is that it shouldn’t be a matter of competition on how brave something is in order for it to be validated as being worthy of the label.  Everything has its challenges, and to dismiss one thing because your personal measure of bravery lies in something else is terribly narrow-minded.  Identity issues are never simple, and we’re all struggling to find out who we really are, and what our place in the universe is.  Don’t stomp on someone else just because their journey takes a different path than yours.

Back to Life, Back to Reality

Tomorrow marks my return to the workforce.  It’s been over four years since I was last gainfully employed.  It has been a surreal experience to have been away for so long, and even stranger to be able to go back to what is essentially a promotion from my former position, despite the large gap in time.  I’m definitely excited, but the weird thing is, while I think I should be nervous, it isn’t anywhere near as bad as I  thought it would be.  I suppose the experiences I’ve had these past four years has changed me more than I realized.

Prior to starting anything new, whether it was a new job, a new hobby, or just anything that would cause even the slightest amount of pressure, I’d be a complete wreck in the days leading up to whatever it was I was going to do.  I’d routinely be unable to sleep until the wee hours of the morning, I’d feel butterflies in my stomach, and I’d be worried about completely screwing up and making a complete mess of things.  Now… I just feel like I’m going back to the office after a long weekend.

There might be a couple of things in play.  One, is that I’m basically returning to my old job,  I was fortunate enough to be able to go back to my old place of employment and find a job that was a perfect fit for me. While I won’t be working with the original group of guys that I was with, I’ll still be in the same general building as them.  Being in familiar surroundings definitely helps.  It also helps that I know basically everyone that I’ll be working with from before as well, and they’ve always proven to be incredibly supportive.  It was their faith in me from before that helped me to get the job in the first place, so it makes me feel like I have someone at my back.

The second thing is that after having been a stay at home dad for a couple of years, I don’t think there’s a lot of things that would phase me anymore.  When you someone else’s life is in your hands, and they’ve grown up to be a happy and healthy child, it kind of shows that you can be capable of anything, no matter how unprepared you think you might be.  Juggling the myriad number of things required to take care of a child, keep the house in order, make sure everyone is fed, and keeping yourself from going crazy really gives your ability to multi-task a good workout.

The only thing I’m worried about is the possible bad habits I’ve picked up from not having to deal with adults on a regular basis.  You can get used to speaking to kids in a certain way, and that normally passes over to how you speak to your spouse or significant other.  Avoid enough adult contact, and your day to day conversation can sound pretty strange.  I just hope I don’t suddenly announce that I have to use the potty in the middle of a conversation with a colleague. 

Also having to wake up in the morning.  It’s different when you’re woken up by your kid and you groggily take the time to prepare breakfast, or clean up a mess.  It’s another thing to have to commute to the office, and figure out some technical problem when your brain is in a haze.  My sleep schedule has been kind of screwy lately, especially with being away from my family for the last two months.  A lot of late nights and late mornings.  I’m hoping I can settle into a regular diurnal mode of sleeping, just to avoid being a total zombie for the first few hours of the day.

Aside from all of that though, it is a return to what could be considered a more traditional configuration for a family.  I’ll be working while my wife will be home with the kids.  While I was happy with the time I had with my daughter, and the time at the beginning with my son, I’m glad I finally have the opportunity to going back to a situation that is ultimately more comfortable for me.  I like planning things and having them come together under my direction.  I like getting a paycheck twice a month.  I like feeling like I’m contributing the way I’m comfortable contributing.  You can call it old-fashioned, or patriarchal, but honestly, I think it just works better for our family unit.  At least I sure hope it does.  Time will tell.

On that note, tomorrow promises to be an interesting day.  First day back in the saddle. Here’s to hoping it leads to greater things.

Coming Home

So here I am on a flight out of Hungary (actually out of Sweden, but really who needs all the details?), and I'm stepping forward into the next part of my life.  It's been almost 4 years since I last lived in the US, so I can say I've got a bit of a different perspective than when this whole adventure began.  When I was on my way out, I was full of anxiety, apprehension, and confusion about my future. Now that I'm on my way back I'm... full of anxiety, apprehension, and confusion about my future.  The more things change...

The big difference is that on my way back, I'm actually more hopeful of how things will end up.  When I was leaving the US, I was worried about how I would adapt to life in a completely different country.  Moving to Japan wasn't necessarily a hard decision, because it was a move to be with my wife, and to support her.  The difficulty was in the leaving the familiarity of the life I had, the security of a job (albeit a job that I felt was leading to a dead end), and of leaving the only home I've ever known. 

There was one thing that was playing through my head though as I boarded the plane and flew away from New York City.  That old saying of "If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere."  Let me tell you right now, that saying is utter bullshit.  I think before I left, I was living a rather comfortable life in NYC.  I had a couple of solid jobs, I was making pretty good money, and there wasn't much that I wanted that was really out of reach.  Moving to a foreign country where I had no grasp of the language, and honestly wasn't all that thrilled to be there, left me floundering for quite some time.  When the only jobs available to me at the time were variations of an English Instructor, it soon became clear to me that being outside of the US was going to be much harder than I originally envisioned.
 

However, I did end up having a job that I would need to devote all of my time, energy, and mental abilities to.  Anyone who tells you that being a full time stay at home dad isn't a job needs to be shot in the face.  Especially when you're a rookie, and you get thrown into the deep end before you realize what is going on.  I've already gone into some detail about the trials and tribulations of being a first time stay at home dad.  The constant worry that I was going to screw up my daughter, the feeling that I wasn't doing everything I could to raise her right, or that I was going to just outright kill her because of some bonehead mistake.  Ultimately, I think I did alright with the time I had with her.  She's been an absolutely sweetheart.  I feel fortunate that our daughter has turned out to be the kind-hearted, sweet, funny, goofy, strange little girl that she has become so far.  We're in the middle of the terrible twos with her currently, so she has her moments, but even then, she has been an absolute joy to my wife and I.

The other side of that coin with being out of the country the way I've been is that I've felt completely isolated for quite some time.  This is something else I've spoken about in some detail, and I've felt possibly the worst depression I've ever had in my life.  I've withdrawn, lashed out, put up walls, shunned my loved ones, and basically been a real piece of crap at times because of how I've felt, and I'm lucky that my wife has put up with as much as she has.  I hope not too much of it has rubbed off on my daughter, since I was her primary caretaker during these last few years.  Only time will tell I suppose.

The sad thing is that in our final year in Japan, I was starting to put together some sort of life again.  Finding friends with mutual interests, having the occasional social gathering, and just doing things that I enjoyed on a semi-regular basis was starting to get me feeling like my old self again.  I think I was beginning to break out of my funk, and was more loving, attentive, and just generally a better guy than I had been the previous couple of years.  Then of course, the year ended, and all that I had built had to be left behind.  And thus we embarked on our journey to Hungary, where we would try to make a go of it there.

I'm not going to lie and say I had a good time.  If nothing else, I think it was worse than my time in Japan.  Whereas I felt isolated in Japan by our circumstances, I felt like a complete outsider in Hungary.  In Japan, I could at least blend in and not get a second look from people.  The only odd looks I would get were from people who found it strange that an able-bodied male was walking around with a baby girl strapped to him in the middle of the day instead of being at work.  However, it was more of a curiosity than looks of disdain.  Never in my life have I felt more alienated than I did while I was staying in Hungary.  The worst of it was when I was just out at the park with my daughter, and I had two separate parents pull their kids away just because they were playing too close to us.  I don't exactly know what the reason was, as I didn't understand what they were saying, but the looks on the parents' faces made me feel like I had two heads, or was wearing a sign that said "PEDOPHILE MURDERER" written in blood across my face.  I won't say that was representative of my time in Hungary as a whole.  For the most part, the people are rather benign.  However, they don't know how to handle non-white foreigners, so it just felt like I was on display for the most part as an oddity or some for of an attraction.  By the end of my time there, I had finally just decided to say screw it and dyed my hair blue (although it turned out more green) and assume people were looking at me funny for that, as opposed to for just being born a different ethnicity.  To be clear, the actual reason for dying my hair was to celebrate the birth of my son, but I probably wouldn't have done it if I didn't feel like I stuck out so much anyway.  It was both frustrating and freeing at the same time.  It also didn't help that I just couldn't seem to find work, no matter how many resumes I sent out, or leads I would follow.  I would seemingly be on a decent path, with the right qualifications, just for it to suddenly fall apart and find myself back at square one.

So now I'm heading back to NYC.  I go back feeling as though I've been a complete failure at providing for my family.  I go back with a near 4 year gap in my work history.  I go back not knowing how well I'm going to adapt to living in a city that has moved on without me, and where I'm not even 100% sure I fit in anymore.  When I express these concerns to my friends, I generally get one of two responses, on the extreme opposite ends.  The majority of it has been "Everything will be fine. I'm sure you'll find something soon, and you'll settle back into your life here.  Once you find that job, you'll be able to bring your family back and live a happy life here."  (Did I mention I'm going back by myself, because without a job, my kids have no healthcare?  My wife and kids are staying behind until I find work, so there's the added stress of that to contend with.)  The other response, which is far less frequent, but which plays in my mind much more, is "Man, life is expensive in NY.  You sure you want to come back here?  Have you thought about looking elsewhere?  Is it really the best place to raise a family?"

The first response I'm not comfortable with because I'm a realist.  I don't KNOW that everything will be fine just because people say it almost reflexively, and without any real care for that four year gap in my work history, which has been a real problem for me to find work, at least overseas.  The other response just plays to my paranoia, and makes me more worried about the decision to come back.  Neither one really helps.  I know why those two responses are given, as people want to reassure me, or help me realize that things may be tougher than I imagine, but they both play to the bad parts of my psyche.  I'm grateful that people care as much as they do, but sometimes it's hard to deal with things when I feel like there are expectations placed on me and what kind of success I'll find just because I'm coming back to NY. 

All that being said, I am glad for one big thing about coming back.  To be near my friends and family again will have a hugely positive influence on me.  I'm hoping being in my old stomping grounds will have me feeling like myself again.  The last few times I've been back, I've wavered between enjoying my time, and not feeling comfortable because things were so much harsher than I remembered.  Some of it was because of comparison to the life I was leading out of the country.  I just hope that this being my full return, I'll be able to settle in and be myself again, for the first time in a long while.  I'm hoping that the funk I've been in has been due to the circumstances, and not because that's just who I've become.  I haven't been the best husband and father the last few years, and I constantly beat myself up for it, which only leads to a deeper depression.  It's a vicious cycle, and I hope by returning to comfortable ground, I can break out of it.  Hopefully, that other saying that people tend to go by is wrong as well.  Maybe I can come home again.  We'll see. 

Where’s the Worth?

Now that my family and I have completed our time in Japan, we’ve begun the next phase of our life.  We are currently in the home country of my wife, Hungary, and we’re living with her dad while she continues with her pregnancy.  Our time here is primarily for her to experience life here once again, and to verify or contradict the feelings she has had for this country since she left here some 16 years ago.  She wanted to see if her memories of this place were all justified, and that it really is where she’s wanted to be all this time, or if it was just a sense of nostalgia that clouded her mind, and that life here is way more difficult than she remembered it being.

What this means for me is that it is now my turn to re-enter the workforce after a near 4 year hiatus.  To be honest, I couldn’t be happier to do it, since I’ve been sort of champing at the bit for quite some time to get out of the house.  While I have loved having the time with my daughter these last 2+ years, I’ve discovered, in no uncertain terms, that I am not cut out to be a stay at home dad.  I maintained well enough, and my little girl seems to have grown up happy and relatively well adjusted (she is still my kid, so she’s going to be kind of weird), but I never thrived and I don’t think I ever could in a home environment.  Mentally, I’m just wired to work, and collect paychecks, and feel like I’m contributing monetarily to my household.

Of course, there is hesitation when thinking about returning to work after 4 years.  There’s the question of whether or not I’m actually ready to go back.  My readiness may not be equal to my desire, and that could lead to some pretty bad failures when I go back to work.  How much will I miss my family during the day?  That’s a big one, because I’ve known nothing but time with my daughter during all this time.  And of course, one of my biggest concerns is whether or not I’ll actually be able to find some meaningful work after having been out of the industry for 4 years.  The world of IT is ever evolving, and I’ve been out of the game for what might as well be a whole era.

Job-hunting can be a soul crushing experience.  You’re reduced to your accomplishments and how well you can state them on a piece of paper (or in a Word document as the case is nowadays) and you send out hundreds if not thousands of them, knowing that you’re going to be rejected time and time again.  You may feel as if you are a shining star in a sea of darkness, and that you should be easily picked out, and picked up, but in reality, you’re just another point of light in an otherwise packed sky, and you just have to be lucky enough to be picked by that one company that will take a chance and check you out up close.  Meanwhile, you sit there, and wait, and wonder if you did everything right to feel like you shined as bright or as interestingly as you could, but feeling as though you screwed something up royally, and they’re huddled in their little HR cubicles, looking at your resume and laughing at your inept attempt to look employable.  It’s enough to make a person lose it a little bit, and honestly, it can kill a person’s self-worth.

And that got me thinking about the last four years, and what my worth has been.  After a couple of rejection letters from a few companies in the last month and a half, I’ve begun to wonder just what I’m worth now, and what I’ve been worth the last few years that I’ve been without work.  Internally, I feel as though I’ve been a kind of paperweight to this family.  I have a function, but it could really be accomplished by anything of sufficient weight and size, and in most cases, you don’t even really need it.  There were times I honestly thought things would be better if I weren’t around, instead of being there and just taking up space.  This feeling has been even stronger lately, since my wife is now no longer working, and actually has time to be the stay at home parent to spend the time with our child. 

I’ve expressed these feelings to my wife, and some friends, and time and again, they’ve told me how awesome I am, and that things will work out, and that it’s just a matter of time.  Of course, I’ve always been the impatient type, and hearing platitudes has never done much to placate my worries.  However, it does make me examine myself (big surprised huh?) and brings up the question, how do you quantify your self worth?

Is it based on how much money you bring home?  How much time and effort you spend cleaning the house, washing the clothes, bathing the kids?  How good the food you cook tastes?  How much you can make your kid laugh?  How much you make your spouse laugh?  I’ve struggled with this question for much of my life, because when I think back on it, I can’t really say that I’ve ever felt that I’ve been worth much.  There have been moments where I’ve had little triumphs along the way that gave me a sense of joy and accomplishment, but they never had any lasting effects on my feelings of self-worth. 

These last few years have really been testing those feelings.  I don’t think I’ve ever felt quite as low as I’ve felt these last few years.  However, there’s always a need to soldier on, to take care of my responsibilities, so I put those thoughts as far out of my head as I could.  I just did what I had to, and spent my spare moments losing myself in hobbies, video games, and esoteric thoughts.  But going through the job-hunting process has put a lot of my insecurities into sharp focus, and it’s one of those times where confrontation of those feelings had to happen, or there would be negative consequences.

So how does one go about judging their self-worth?  The only thing that has had any sort of meaning for me is how happy the people around you are, and how much of an effect you had on that happiness.  From speaking to my family and friends, I’ve discovered that I’ve surprisingly had a positive influence on their lives, even without really noticing it.  My existence on this planet has helped to impact people in a positive way, and that is really the only thing that I can say, for myself, has a lasting effect on my feelings.  If I wasn’t here, than the net positive effects that I’ve been able to have on people’s lives wouldn’t be there.  It may not be anything tangible; I can’t exactly hold other people’s happiness in my hand and count it, but when I know that people miss me, and want to be around me, that’s as good a way as any to know that you’re loved and wanted, and it tells you something about your self-worth. 

Does this mean that I’ll be able to go forward without feeling any insecurities about myself again?  Probably not, and I’ll backslide into depression again, because that’s always been my cycle.  But it’s important to keep the good things in mind, or it ends up being a fight that you’re just beating yourself in.  I’ll likely question myself over and over again, and feel worse until I finally find work and feel like I’m legitimately contributing again (even if I’ve been contributing all this time).  Even then, the job would just be a bandage to patch up one tiny cut in my admittedly beat up psyche, but at least it would be one less thing on my mind.  Until then, I have to keep doing what I can to do good by others, and maybe, hopefully, things will work out (even though I still really hate that phrase). 

Crushed by Success

By now, everyone has heard about the death of Robin Williams.  They’ve likely also heard about the details of his death, whereby he committed suicide by hanging himself, after what appears to be a failed attempt by cutting his wrists.  There has not yet been a report stating whether or not he had drugs or alcohol in his system, but he was known to have a substance abuse problem.  However, even if those weren’t the final catalyst to his actions, it was also reported that he had been suffering severe depression in recent months because he felt he couldn’t provide for his family.

I’m sure like many people, when I heard those words, I scratched my head initially.  How could an amazing talent like Robin Williams, a box office draw who always seemed to be working, ever have to worry about money?  It was even stranger when I found out that he had also already set up a trust fund for his kids that would have them set for the rest of their lives.  It was originally very hard to imagine what his worries could be that he would feel driven to kill himself.

Then it hit me.  Or at least, a theory hit me.  I can’t presume to know what was going on inside his head when he made the decision to end his life.  However, there was an article on Cracked.com recently that helped to shed some light on the situation.  You can find it here.  It’s a solid piece on why people who you might think are very funny and generally the life of the party, and always seem to have a smile on their face, would ever decide to end their own life.  But we see this type of thing happen to all types of celebrities, not just comedians, and also many of them are successful.  You can also find examples of this in your day to day life.  I think we’ve all heard of someone who, for no explicable reason, decided to commit suicide.  So it got me to thinking…

A lot of people who have been considered incredibly talented and successful, yet still killed themselves, always seemed to be uncomfortable being described as “geniuses”, “amazing”, “phenomenal”, or any number of superlatives.  They would usually laugh it off, or make some self-deprecating remark about how they’re just having fun doing what they love, and they don’t see anything special about themselves.  A lot of people would see that as being humble.  However, to anyone who has ever suffered from depression, there’s another reason for trying to deflect anything good being said about them.

Quite simply, they don’t, or rather can’t, see themselves that way.  From personal experience, I can tell you that when you’re locked in the throes of depression, you can see nothing good about yourself.  Every positive thing that someone says is either taken as not being sincere, or as added pressure to live up to a standard that, to your own mind, you can’t possibly live up to.  In fact, that pressure can feel so strong, that weight so heavy, that no matter how great the success you’ve had before, you can only see failure for yourself in the future, because you feel as though you are worthless and incapable of anything good.

That’s why a man like Robin Williams, an Academy Award winner, a millionaire many times over, beloved actor of millions, could ever feel like he wouldn’t be able to take care of his family, nevermind that they were already taken care of.  The depression had gotten so deep into him, that he could only see a bleak future, where he would be forced to toil away at jobs that would bring no satisfaction, no joy to anyone.  I believe he saw them purely as cash grabs, with no opportunity for art or passion.  It was known that he was not a fan of doing sequels, because he believed that there should be new stories to tell, not rehashing of stale plots, even if those movies would bring joy to many.  I doubt he ever thought sequels had any redeeming qualities, and he didn’t want to cheapen his integrity by making films that he felt weren’t good enough for anyone.  It would seem as though he had a very high level of perfectionalism that could have contributed greatly to his self-loathing.

I know for myself, hearing things like “You’re amazing”, or “You’re wonderful”, or really anything that could be considered a compliment just feels like added pressure to live up to those expectations.  I have always tried to be a good person, but I don’t know if I could ever truly be “amazing”.  I would rather hear a simple “Thank you for your efforts” and move on from there, because there’s no implication of expectation that I have to live up to anything special.  I’m perfectly fine with doing things as they are needed, and trying my best, without such accolades.  I know this isn’t true of everyone, but then again, not everyone suffers from bouts of depression.  It’s difficult to really see the world and how great it can be when everything feels like a dull gray. 

I think in Robin’s case, he had been so successful, for so long, and had been battling depression for so long (as evidenced by his substance abuse problems) that he hit that point where the expectations of him being that same, funny, loveable, incredible man, had finally crushed him.  When you feel as though you’re expected to succeed, and all you feel is that you are nothing or going to be nothing but a giant failure, it is no surprise that you might feel like giving up. 

Whatever he was feeling, I really hope he knew somewhere deep down that he truly was one of a kind, and that he has left an indelible mark on a few generations of fans, as well as anyone who ever had the privilege of working with, or even just meeting him.  I also hope that anyone else who might be going through something similar to him realizes that those positive things that people say about them are not some kind of cruel joke, or meant as added pressure, but rather a showing of appreciation for the good that they bring into other’s lives.  I know for myself, it’s like trying to pull a shark’s teeth out with a salami, but I’m working hard to remind myself that maybe, just maybe, I actually deserve some of that praise that comes my way. 

What Makes a Real Man

Since the heinous crime perpetrated by Elliot Rodger, I’ve been seeing a lot of articles and Youtube rants on misogyny, specifically the concept of masculinity and how it’s wielded as sort of a weapon against women.  It got me to thinking about how strange it is to be a male human, and yet by the definition set forth by what passes for typical masculinity, I don’t really qualify as a “man”.

I am not physically aggressive; I neither hide nor hide from my emotions; I believe whole-heartedly in equality for women; I don’t view women as objects to be won as if they were some sort of reward that is entitled to me; I do not have a domineering personality; I am not physically imposing; I am well aware of what I fear and will freely admit it, and a whole list of things that honestly would have a stereotypical “man” look at me and question if I’m actually a guy at all.

The type of thinking that has men trying to validate their masculinity leads mainly to violence and harm.  Being a ‘roided out monster who represses their emotions in order to “man up,” and who only see women as sexual objects who exist purely to satisfy their physical needs has somehow become the new standard for which men should strive.  The type of man who will stop at nothing to get what he wants, even when that involves hurting someone, raping someone, or just plain being a humongous dick to everyone around them, and somehow this is meant to be a goal for all men? 

I understand how that might have been the case back in prehistoric days.  Where your size equaled your ability to survive out in the harsh world.  Even then, women were still revered, because their ability to bring life into the world was considered something special.  Anthropological findings have long since dispelled the myth of men cracking their women over the head with a club in order to mate, and yet, it seems the men of today still see that as a lesson to be learned.  If you can’t get what you want, brute force and ignorance will get you there. 

It’s time that way of thinking is changed.  We need to redefine what makes a man, a man.  A modern man, who isn’t judged based on how many women he’s slept with, or how much weight he can lift, or how much money or material goods he is able to obtain.  I’ll try to put together a list that I think is appropriate and you can feel free to add or subtract the things that make sense to you.

First and foremost, a real man should take responsibility for his actions.  Men are self-aware, sentient creatures, or at least we’re supposed to be, so any decisions that they make should have some thought behind them.  There should no longer be an excuse of “boys ill be boys” whenever they do something wrong.  A member of the Indian government recently said “Boys will be boys, they make mistakes” in regards to rape.  People like this should be hung up by their toes and beaten like a pinata.  ( I said I wasn’t physically aggressive, it doesn’t mean I’m violence free )  If you are a real man, and you bring harm to someone, then you have to take responsibility and pay for your crimes. 

Of course, if you were a real man, you wouldn’t harm people for no good reason anyway, which brings me to my second point.  A real man would protect those who need protecting, whether or not they’re physically weaker than you, vulnerable, or just in a worse off place than you are at the time.  A real man cares for his fellow man, and would hate to see harm come to them if he could do something to prevent it. 

A real man would not be afraid to show his emotions.  He would be smart enough to realize that repressing your emotions to not appear weak to others only makes things worse for themselves.  Holding all of that in only leads to more internal pressure, and anyone who knows anything about that knows that eventually cracks will appear, and then a giant kaboom will follow.  A real man deals with his problems in the best way that he can so that he can resume a healthy life, where he can enjoy his time with loved ones fully.

A real man should be flexible enough to do whatever the situation demands for his family.  If you, as the man, have to stay home and be a house husband and a stay at home dad because that’s what is needed, then that’s what you do.  I’m not saying you can’t complain, because holding in that sort of resentment toward your spouse will only lead to marital woes, but at the same time, if it needs to be done, then you have to put in your best effort.  It is just another challenge that needs to be taken on, and a real man is always ready for a challenge.

A real man treats people with respect, but knows that respect has to be earned.  No matter your race, gender, sexual orientation, or tax bracket, a real man would treat you as he would want to be treated, as a human being.  He wouldn’t judge you based on things outside of your control, and he wouldn’t be quick to make judgments based on first impressions.  He knows that life is not made up only of his experiences, and that everyone has hardships that he may never have gone through.

And finally, a real man doesn’t feel entitled to anything.  He knows he has to work for what he deserves, and even then he might not get it.  However, he’s grateful for what he has and isn’t resentful of those who may have more.  He knows that life is what you make of it, and that it is his job to make his life mean something to him.

It’s not a very long list, but just because it’s simple doesn’t mean it’s easy.  To strive to be a better man, or more accurately, a better person, should be the goal of everybody on this planet, regardless of who or where you are.  Your job should be to improve the world around you, not to grab everything for yourself and claim power over all. 

Having written all that, I can’t say that I match all of those requirements for what I consider to be a real man.  However, I think those goals are something worth striving for, because they bring no harm to anyone, and only serve to better yourself and those around you.  Maybe I’m wrong, and there’s a component in the list that could potentially cause problems, but instead of looking for the cracks, how about first considering the positive spin on it first.  And if you have other things to add, leave them in the comments.  I’m always working to be a better person, and there may be things that I might not have considered.  Taking into consideration an outside perspective is also an important part of being a real man, because a real man knows that they don’t know everything.

What Comes Next?

I’ve been thinking about mortality quite a bit lately.  I’m not sure what exactly brought it on; probably reading articles about religion, atheism, scientific discoveries, and other things that makes one think about what we see and what we do and don’t know.  Anyway, I’ve been hit with this feeling of how enormous the amount of time is when you’re not alive and breathing on this planet, as opposed to the short amount of time you do spend doing whatever it is you do while you’re alive.

I’m not sure I can describe the feeling properly.  For me, it feels as though you’re sitting in a dark space, and you don’t know how large that space is.  The only thing that you can see is yourself, because you happen to be illuminated.  You can move about freely, but the only thing visible is yourself, and no matter how far you walk, you never hit a wall, or hear anything, or  see anything, not even anything directly at your feet.  If you stop moving, everything is still, all is silent, but it’s not the kind of quiet where you can hear your own heartbeat.  It’s just kind of empty, maybe white noise at best, kind of like what you get when you wear ear protectors.  That’s probably the best way I can describe the feeling I’ve been getting lately when I think about the vastness of time as it relates to my own life. 

I can say one thing definitively about that feeling… it scares the hell out of me.  It hit me the other night when I was lying in bed, somewhat suddenly, and it actually caused a bit of a panic.  It got me to thinking about what comes after death, since we can only experience our life while we’re alive, and no one knows what comes next.  There of course is a ton of speculation.  Innumerable religions have been founded on the idea of what comes next and how to get there.  The one constant is that there is something next, and that who we are as individuals doesn’t just disappear when we die.  Lying there, at night, with that feeling hitting me, I very much want to believe that one of those beliefs is true.  However, none of them have ever made sense to me, so I can’t subscribe to any religion, along with other reasons, hence my atheism.

However, it has made me wonder, and come up with my own theory.  It’s about as plausible as all the rest, although it may get a bit convoluted, so bear with me. 

If you look at life as a concept, it all comes in cycles.  We’re born, we live, we die.  That’s the basic individual life cycle.  However, on a larger scale, we see how death can lead to life.  We’re born, we live, we die, we return to the Earth, life emerges from our remains in some form.  Normally through plant life, but through that, energy is passed on to animal life, which ends up entering that life cycle, which in turn returns back to the plant life cycle. 

Ok, so we’ve established that.  Seeing that as cyclical, we now turn to our individual consciousness.  We, as individual humans, are born with basic consciousness.  However, it takes time for that to develop.  We are completely unaware of who we are as individuals until some time has passed, and we develop a sense of self.  For some, it takes longer than others, but it eventually happens.  As we get older, the biggest fear is that we lose our sense of self.  The older you get, the more likely this is to happen, but ultimately, we lose our sense of self completely when we die. 

During the entire course of our lives, we are converting a massive amount of energy, from the food that we consume, into our actions and thoughts.  Physics teaches us that energy and matter cannot be destroyed, just converted into different forms of energy or matter.  It also teaches us that due to this, we are all potentially made of star stuff.  Probability teaches us that given a long enough stretch of time, anything is possible.  There is also a theory floating around out there that the creation and destruction of the universe is also cyclical, as the universe is currently expanding, but will eventually collapse and shrink back down until it reaches critical mass and another big bang happens, thus entering into another cyclical phase.

So what I propose is this.  When your consciousness ends, at least the current version of it, you are completely unaware of time.  Time is only experienced by us because that’s how we interpret our actions, and how we move about in this dimension.  However, after your consciousness ends, all of that energy is converted.  Into what, I can’t say, but the energy that once composed who you are still exists, just in a different form.  Given a long enough time span, the energy that once was composed as you could potentially reform in the same way, possibly in the next iteration of the universe.  However, because you’re not experiencing time, you couldn’t tell this was happening, so you would theoretically wake up after your death, and still be you, and you would never know, except for the radical changes around you. 

It’s possible this may have happened already, or it’s possible we are just the first iteration.  There’s no way of knowing, but it’s fun to imagine.  The hard part is wrapping your mind around it, because it requires the stretching of the imagination into the realm of the infinite, and that’s not a comfortable place to be.  Of course, it’s also possible that this really is it, and once we die, there’s nothing at all after, but I like to imagine my theory has some plausibility to it, because it’s comforting in its own warped way.

That being said, I do still prefer to live the current life that I have as if it was finite, and my actions will have consequences that will be defined by what I did while I was alive now.  These actions and consequences extend to my family and friends, and whatever effect I have on them will be my legacy, so I have to be sure that what I’m doing now is the right thing for me.  There’s no sense in pining for the unknown, when you’re dealing with what you know right now.  (That’ll end my little morality blurb for this blog entry).

Now, none of what I said may make any sense.  Feel free to interpret it as the ramblings of a madman.  I honestly wrote this because thinking about death, for me, is more comforting than just being afraid of it.  Dealing with the fear with this weird mental exercise in explaining it with what little knowledge I have is what gives me the comfort needed to combat that weird feeling of vastness that I sometimes get.  Better than lying awake in bed all night feeling really tiny. 

Told you this blog was for catching all the detritus in my head.  Hope you enjoyed some of this bit of weirdness.

A State of Disbelief

This particular entry is written as a sort of response to many of the posts that I see on a regular basis from my friends who have faith.  While I doubt they mean to offend anyone, repeated postings of items that state that without God, there is little meaning to life, or that without God, I am not a good person, or any number of such statements can be taken a bit personally for someone who doesn’t believe.

I’m not sure I’ve ever made this entirely clear, but I am, in fact, an atheist.  I used to be agnostic, but as time went on, I felt a stronger pull away from the idea that there’s some omnipotent being that had some hand in creating everything, and is now watching over us and protecting us.  Science has always been something I’ve trusted and relied on, due to evidence and the ability to back up the claims that it does make, and the ability to admit when it makes mistakes, and continues to search for the correct answer.  It appeals to the analytical part of my mind, which admittedly, makes up a lion’s share of my thought process.

Anyway, here’s the problem.  Because of my atheism, it bothers me when people imply that I am not a good person because I don’t believe in a god.  The majority of the time, it’s in relation to the Judeo-Christian god.  Quotes from the Bible that proselytize, and admonish those who are non-believers regularly take up residence on my newsfeed, and memes from pages that extoll the virtues of being a believer or claim some sort of disability of the mind if you aren’t a believer flash across my face more times than I care to remember.  I know that not all of my religious friends are guilty of this, and I’m not writing this to place any blame, or to tell them to stop.  They have every right to express their faith in any way they care to.  I fully believe in the right to religion, and the freedom of speech, as long as there are no words of hate being spewed where religion is the justification for that type of action. 

However, I do feel I have to say something.  My being a good person is not dependent on what god I believe in.  My ability to do good is neither hindered nor helped by what faith I do or do not have.  I choose to do good things, and try to generally be a positive influence on the world around me because I think it is the right thing to do.  That belief comes from a life filled with the love of friends and family who have shown me that doing good is a reward in itself, and not due to an external influence.  I am not doing good to reach some vaunted afterlife, nor do I believe that doing good in this life will make things better for me after I die.  I believe that the life I have now is the only one I’ll ever have, and that I must use it to the best of my abilities to bring positivity to the world, which means the life that I have is the most important life I’ll ever get.  I have never needed the threat of punishment to understand that doing good is much better, by an order of magnitude, than doing bad. 

That being said, here comes the problem with being an atheist.  When the conversation of why you don’t believe in a god comes up, especially when speaking to someone who is passionate about their beliefs, the conversation inevitably comes around to the reasons why religion makes no sense to an atheist.  It will always seem like an attack, because you have to question the other person’s belief system.  It will tend to make the faithful think that atheists believe all people of religion are gullible and stupid, because an atheist will repeatedly punch holes and bring up contradictions within any religious belief system.  This is precisely why an atheist is an atheist, but to the faithful, all of those questions are answered by their faith, and that if the atheist would just believe, there would be no reason to ask the questions.  This, I believe, is the major impasse between the two groups.

This brings me to one of the reasons why I have been slightly hesitant to full out declare my atheism.  Much of the time I did any research into the atheist culture, I regularly run into smug, pretentious, overbearing people who believe that atheism is the only way to go, and that those who believe are moronic because of their faith.  Routinely, I have seen statements made that are made to ridicule people for their beliefs, and attacking the faithful for no other reason than to make the originator of that attack feel superior.  They try their best to make religion seem as ridiculous as possible, by condensing an entire belief system into silly imagery, or making it sound as outlandish as possible.  The majority of the hate is directed at Christianity, as that is the predominant religion in the world, especially in the US, so there are routinely references to “Zombie Jesus” or the justification of horrendous acts due to “God’s will”.  The only thing this serves to do is make people hate atheists, as it’s not the lack of belief that bothers people, but because the atheists come across as pompous jackasses. 

Here’s the thing for me when it comes to all of this belief vs non-belief stuff.  I chose to be an atheist because there isn’t enough evidence for me to believe there is a god, of any religion.  I do not understand faith because I simply don’t.  Those who have faith have a hard time understanding those without.  Both sides believe the answer is right in front of the other as long as they’d just look, but unfortunately, neither side sees the same thing.  As much as atheists aren’t terrible people because they don’t believe in a god, the same can be said for people of religion just because horrible things have been done in the name of a god.  Horrible things are always done with a justification, and religion is the easiest scapegoat, because it’s always easier to go “I’m doing this because I got orders from above” and not because the person doing it is a raging asshole.  If it wasn’t religion, it would’ve been something else, and then whatever that something else would’ve been blamed for the troubles of the world. 

There has been a lot of good done in a god’s name, I’d dare say much more good than bad.  However, there has been just as much good done for the sake of doing good.  All I care about is the fact that good is being done, regardless of the reasoning behind it.  Ultimately, caring for your fellow man, and not being a selfish, greedy prick, is a good place to start for being a good person.  What leads you to that decision doesn’t matter, as long as you do it.  I just hope people can understand that before it gets to be too late. 

Heal Thyself

Ok, so this is going to be one of my stranger posts.  It's based off of an idea that suddenly coalesced in my brain and it wouldn't let go, so I'm going to put it down on here, and if it somehow turns out to be scientifically possible, or maybe I just haven't seen the studies on it yet, I'd like to know I came up with it on my own... sort of.

Anyway, it began with this thing that my wife jokingly said to me before.  She says that orange juice is my life's blood.   I drink a LOT of OJ.  It is my go to drink most of the time, and whenever I'm feeling a little under the weather (which in and of itself is rare) I would just drink more and recover pretty quickly.  I've rarely had an illness that has laid me out for longer than a day or so, and I'm generally in good health.  Some of this may be a placebo effect, but I think we all know someone who is generally unusually healthy, despite not having what could be considered healthful habits.  So it got me to thinking.  What if our bodies are more attuned to a specific vitamin, or amino acid or something, and getting that particular need filled before others will lead to better overall health?

I may not have phrased that as clearly as I had hoped, so let me try to explain a little better.  There is a general belief that eating a healthful diet, as determined by some medical body or other, will lead to a healthy life.  However, this isn't true for everyone.  Some people can eat "normal" levels of vegetables, fruits, meats, fish, grains, fibers, etc., and still have health issues.  Cholesterol levels, heart disease, bad immune systems, all of these things are always blamed on genetic issues, predispositions, or some other vague thing that can't be explained.  What if it was simpler than that?  What if there was something that you as an individual could do that would lead to better health?

Something that we have to remember when approaching this is that everyone is different.  We all react to different things differently, whether mentally or physically.  With that in mind, I think that every individual person's body requires more of a specific vitamin, amino acid, chemical, or whatever, as opposed to a general diet for wellness.  Yes, you would still need to eat a decent diet, but if you were to get your fill of that specific thing that you need, you wouldn't need to overcompensate with other things, leading to a generally healthier life.

It gets a little convoluted here, so bear with me a little.  This makes sense to me because if you think about it, there are a lot of people overeating because they feel that they are trying to fulfill some need, and eating is the way to get it.  If they're eating all these things, and yet still barely getting the exact substance that they need that their body is craving, that would lead to a greater craving or desire to satiate whatever that need would be.  That would just lead to more eating, because they may be getting some of what they need, but not enough to fulfill them. 

To put it another way, think of the difference in gasoline octanes.  Most cars can run on the general stuff.  Low octane fuel is fine for most cars.  But there are some cars that need the higher octane stuff because their engines are designed to use that more efficiently.  If you use the low octane stuff, you get less efficiency out of the engine, and actually end up doing damage.  Think of that as the same thing for your body.  Most people can run on the general stuff and get along fine, but there are some bodies that require a different type of fuel, something more specific to their makeup, and that would help them run better, but if they don't get it, they could end up with any number of issues, whether it's obesity, illnesses, or just a generally lower level of health.

Now the problem of course is I have no way of proving this.  It's just general speculation on my part, but it makes sense in a way.  We all know that person who drinks a ton of alcohol, eats like a horse, never works out, yet is fully functional, maybe not in the best shape, but far from slovenly, and is rarely sick.  At the same time, we know people who do every diet in the world, work out religiously, get regular checkups, but something is always wrong with them medically.  It may be a situation where person A is by some dumb chance getting that thing they need while person B isn't because it isn't within the range of what they're doing.  There is some evidence to support this idea, since there are diseases that require you to eat high amounts of carbs in order not to get debilitating symptoms, or require you to intake high amounts of protein in order to function properly.  General guidelines would say that either idea is nuts, yet it's still required in order for that person who has that illness to function properly.  Why not take it further and break it down to the most basic level?  There is also precedent for this idea because when your body is craving certain nutrients, you will do basically anything to get them.  Like one of the stories I saw on the Discovery channel or The Learning Channel (before they became all about bad reality shows) where someone was lost at sea, and would regularly eat the eyes and the bones of the fish he caught instead of the meat of the fish because his body required the calcium and some other protein or amino acid that only the eyes could provide.  Not exactly something you would think to do, but the need of his body and the access that he had led to that particular scenario.

It would be an interesting study to run, to see if this might be the case.  It could revolutionize the health and wellness industry, not to mention the medical industry.  It would be the greatest form of preventative medicine, since you'd be less likely to get sick as long as you were able to get what you needed easily.  Then that could lead to pursuit of other things, as health wouldn't be as much of an issue, and would actually help poorer nations, since they could concentrate on what they need instead of just shotgunning ideas.  No, I don't think this would eliminate all disease, but it might be able to take care of the more common ones, and less days where you're sick mean more days that you can do what you want and what you need.  If a test could be formulated to quickly and easily determine what bit of nutrition you needed, it would save everyone a lot of time and resources.  They have genetic testing that can tell whether you're more prone to certain types of cancer, so this test wouldn't be so far off. 

I know there haven't been a lot of specifics in this, and like I said, it's more to do with the fact that this is some vague idea I had.  It likely has no merit in actual science, but hey, ideas have to come from somewhere, and if it bears out, I can always say I had that idea early on.  Besides, this is just a blog where the detritus in my head comes to settle, so this is sometimes what you end up with.  Some of my pseudo-science.  Anyway, if anyone knows of any similar ideas being explored by actual scientific minds, I'd love to know, so feel free to send me links.  I'm always up for reading something new and interesting.

Where’s the Relating?

Today has been a day full of conversation about relationships. I’m no expert at it, but then again, who really is?  Sure, there are people who claim to be, but they always end up being full of it, because you’ll find out they’re divorced, have no real friends, or have a lot of estranged family.  Anyway, the only reason I bring it up is because it’s got me thinking about relationships in general, and how they can go so wrong, so easily.

The thing I always notice first when talking to anybody about relationships, either in general or about theirs specifically, is how often communication seems to be a problem.  I know from personal experience that it’s all too easy to not say something because at the time, it feels better to either ignore whatever the issue is, or not say anything because you’re afraid of hurting the other person’s feelings.  This almost always comes back to bite you in the ass.  Not to say that you want to have a conversation every time something bothers you, because that would mean you don’t do anything but talk about the problems, but to never bring it up at all is basically the death rattle of any relationship.

The hardest part about talking about problems relating to your relationship with someone else is that most times, it puts the other person on the defensive.  If they didn’t think anything was wrong, they might wonder where the discussion is coming from.  No one wants to hear criticism about how they do things.  Most people want to believe that the things they’re doing are right, and assume that how they think is the way everyone around them thinks.  That might be too broad a generalization, but I’ve seen all too often how people will generally not question anything about their life if they don’t hear any complaints, even if the reason there are no complaints is because people don’t want to hurt your feelings. 

Personally, I feel that telling the truth, no matter how difficult, is the only way to approach issues in any relationship.  I’ve held true to that sentiment for the majority of my life.  I have had some truly difficult conversations because I felt they needed to be addressed, and despite the lengthy arguments they may have caused, the hurt that was felt, or the anger that may have arisen from it, ultimately, it was the right thing to do.  I’m always worried that if something is left to fester for too long, when it eventually comes out, it will only hurt that much worse than if you just faced it right off the bat. 

That being said, it’s hard to figure out when is the right time to approach a difficult subject.  A lot of times, there’s always something going on that just makes it hard to say what has to be said.  Then whatever it may be is put off to the side, and eventually forgotten until it gets retriggered, and then you realize you didn’t say anything the last time, so while it may annoy you even more as time goes on, you feel as though you can’t say something because you missed your chance.  Then it builds and festers, and becomes a much larger problem than it had to be, all because a few necessary words weren’t said.

I think there are only a handful of things that can happen that should derail a conversation.  One, if one of you just gave birth, give it a little bit of time. Two, if someone just died, back off.  Three, if you’re in the middle of a good vacation, wait until after, but if there’s time before the vacation, get it out of the way.  Finally, if one of you gets fired, take a breather and get past that first.  That’s really about it.  All too often, people let the little things, like they’re tired, or they had a bad day at work, or any number of minor inconveniences stop them from discussing things like adults.  These things will always be there, and they shouldn’t stop you from talking if it needs to be said.

Ultimately, I think if it’s something that you yourself would want to hear, then you should have the courage to talk to the other person about it, because they deserve that same respect.  Being afraid that you’re going to hurt their feelings, or ruin their day, or any number of things that you want to avoid just says that you don’t trust them to handle it like an adult.  If that’s how you really feel, then you might want to question the nature of your relationship.  A strong relationship is always built on trust, good communication, and the willingness to work through the difficulties together.  Without that, you’re better of single.  At least that way, the only problems you’re dealing with are your own.

Brain Drain

I have started and stopped more blog posts in the last few weeks than I care to admit.  I feel as though I can't get the words out of my head in any coherent form anymore, which is why there have been next to no blog posts for months now.  It's getting to the point where I wonder if I can even engage in intelligent thought anymore.  Some of it is due to lack of mental stimulation from taking care of my daughter all day.  The majority of it is due to my extreme level of apathy about my general state of being because I have been in a very unhappy phase of my life.  Existential issues notwithstanding, these past several months have been the most difficult of my life.  Whenever I stop whatever it is I'm currently doing, and have a moment to think, it tends to go negative very quickly, and my mood sinks.  I keep myself distracted with a lot of things, but nothing that engages me in any intelligent way. I know I should try, but any number of excuses pop up, and I'm left just sitting there, clicking away mindlessly on things that offer me some brief amusement, but nothing in the way of mental stimulation.

Having gone home recently to NYC, I spent a couple of weeks around my old stamping grounds.  Seeing friends, eating some of my favorite foods, being around my family again, it felt like I was being rejuvenated.  Sadly, upon returning to Japan, much of that faded, and rather quickly.  I was able to gain some perspective on things while home that I'm hoping will help me for the remainder of my stay here, but I find myself far too easily falling back into old routines.  I'm fighting it tooth and nail, something I wasn't doing before I had returned home for a little while, but it is creeping up on me. 

While there, a few of my friends spoke to me privately, confronting me with concerns they had about my well-being.  For the most part, they told me things that I had already thought of myself, but it really hit home coming from my friends.  I try my best to be an open book, so I shouldn't have been surprised they knew the general malaise I was feeling, but it still meant a lot to me that they were actually concerned.  I usually have this feeling that no one really cares, even though time and again I'm proven wrong.  Obviously, that's just my lousy self-esteem coming through again. 

Back to my original point though.  While I have had thoughts about things that I would have liked to write about, I routinely hit a wall in the midst of writing where I feel as though I can't say what I want to say properly.  This never used to be an issue, as I basically just let whatever verbal diarrhea I had at the moment spill forth on the page in front of me, and posted it.  Later, when I would go back to read it, it would make an odd sense, sometimes to the point where I had a hard time believing I actually wrote it.  Now however, I'll get about a paragraph or two in, read back over what I wrote, and realize that I had either lost the thread of what I wanted to write about, or I was going in a direction I had no intention of going.  I try to adjust, but always feel as though it's a lost cause, and I just delete everything and call it a night.  Hell, I'm about to do that now, but I'm making myself write SOMETHING, so that I I can hopefully get a feel for this again. 

I know this blog isn't exactly a widely circulated site, and I doubt anyone is actually getting much of anything from this, but the ability to write anything coherently used to be a real point of pride for me.  I liked looking back at something I had been able to say with some level of intelligence, and say "Wow... that wasn't half-bad."  It was a small victory for myself, and I'd like to be able to get back to that, but it just feels so far away right now, like everything else for me.  Maybe a small step like this will help get me started in the right direction again.  That, or it's just another emo post, and I should go back to livejournal and whine on there.

Not Wise, Maybe Just Lucky

When I began this blog, I named it “Questionable Wisdom” as a bit of conceit, because I had been told numerous times “You’re wise for your age.”  There was this idea in my head that I had something intelligent to say, and what I had to say might have a chance at helping others.  However, I still put it as questionable, mainly because I wasn’t so conceited as to believe I was actually wise, so I added a bit of self-deprecation in order to smooth off the ego a bit.

As I’ve continued writing here (albeit intermittently) it’s become less about any sort of observations that I’ve made about the world, and more about personal insight.  The majority of it seems to be griping, but there have been layers of trying to dive deeper into my own psyche to understand all of the issues in my head.  Much of it deals with the depression I’ve been fighting with over the course of my life.  I look back at my life, and some of my old photos, and I don’t think I could ever categorize myself as a happy go lucky person.  The phrase I’ve heard more than any other is “Are you okay?”  I’ve always had sort of a dour look on my face when I’m not really focusing on anything, and that has led to a fair share of people worrying that something might be wrong.  I always just used to automatically shrug it off, because I felt more or less fine, but lately, something has been festering in me that makes me wonder if something isn’t wrong.

I’ve been thinking about it (more agonizing over it really) as to what the problem might be.  I look at my life, and I’m actually pretty fortunate.  I seem to have a lot going for me.  I have an amazing wife and daughter, great family and friends, I’ve never had a particularly hard life outside of whatever hardships I create for myself, and in general, I’m surrounded by good people.  However, it all seems to come down to this feeling that I have that I don’t really deserve any of it.  I don’t think I’ve done anything to deserve the life I live, except maybe stumble into some lucky circumstances.  There are people who are better than me by leaps and bounds who aren’t as fortunate, and I always think they deserve it more than I do.

Much of this is likely tied to my self-esteem issues.  I don’t think highly of myself in the least, and it’s always been that way.  I tend to set up high expectations for myself, and continually fail to meet any of them, so there’s always some major disappointment for myself.  This has led me to set lower standards for myself, but somehow, I still manage to completely miss the goal, and therefore continue to feel more and more useless.  Mind you, these are more overarching goals, not little day to day things, although admittedly, I’ve been failing at those too lately, which is probably due to my depression.  I just don’t feel like doing anything aside from sitting there and wallowing in my own self-pity. 

The only thing that seems to keep me going, at least lately, is my sense of duty.  I have to make sure my daughter is healthy.  I absolutely cannot allow my own flaws and faults trickle down and affect my daughter negatively.  She is a helpless, defenseless little thing, and I would be doing a great disservice to her by not doing everything I could, even if I don’t think that I can, in order to make sure she has her best chance at a happy life.  I couldn’t live with myself if something happened to her under my watch.  I already feel like I failed myself long ago, I can’t afford to fail her as well.

However, this all drains me on a regular basis.  Having to pull myself out of bed every day, and prepare meals, and clean up after her, and try to keep her entertained during the day requires a lot of effort and energy, neither of which I have in abundance.  By the end of the day, when my wife comes home, I just want to curl up into a ball, and be left alone.  However, there are still things to be done, and I have to help because it’s only fair, since my wife is the one who works and provides us with the capacity to live.  So most nights, I end up staying up late, way later than I should, just so I have some time to myself, and just sort of sit and be miserable for a while.  Somehow, it’s therapeutic, even if it doesn’t sound like it. 

I’ve been more consistently angry at myself lately because I don’t think I’m being the type of father that my daughter really needs right now.  She deserves someone who’s happy, and enjoys life so that he can show her how, but she’s got me, this depressive, damn near immobile father who acts like he’s moving heaven and earth to get her some lunch.  I feel like I should enjoy watching my daughter, and there are times I do, especially when I can get her to laugh, but most times, it just feels like so much work, more work than I’m willing to do.  But, I still do it, because I know how important it is, and whatever effort I can muster is better than nothing at all.  Maybe not by much, but at least it’s something, right?

Back to my point earlier though about not feeling like I deserve the life I have.  It mainly comes from the idea that I don’t think I’m doing anything special to deserve all of these good people in my life.  Hell, even here, in Japan, where I barely know anyone, I’ve been fortunate enough to meet these people who are absolutely amazing with children, who I can go to for advise, and who are willing to help and have gone out of their way to do so.  What are the odds of finding these type of people right when my wife gets pregnant, and I feel like I’m at a total loss?  I’m just lucky my wife has been able to befriend them, and they’re nice enough people to put up with me. 

However, I digress again.  I feel like I’m doing what is necessary, nothing special, or above and beyond the norm.  I’m doing the things that should be expected out of anyone in my position, because these things are necessary.  I’ve always been surprised by how people react when they find out I do some particular thing that I don’t think deserves any praise because it’s something I’m supposed to do.  Like watching my daughter, since my wife works.  Well, who else is supposed to watch my child?  I don’t work, so the least I could do is take care of my daughter.  What’s so special about that?  Some people seem so amazed and flabbergasted by it, and I just stand there scratching my head, wondering why the surprise. 

And don’t give me the , “Well, not everyone does what they’re supposed to do,” spiel, because I don’t want to be compared to people who are bad at being decent people.  That doesn’t make me feel better about myself, it just makes me angry that those type of people exist.  I just don’t think I’m really exceptional in any way, and that the people in my life and the life I lead belong to someone else, someone who’s more deserving. 

I think I’ve beaten that horse to death by now.  You get the idea.  Anyway, that’s the general feeling that has been plaguing me for some time now.  I’m not sure if it’s a situation where I don’t actually deserve my life which is causing me turmoil, or whether it’s just a quirk in my personality that doesn’t allow me to see or care about what I have done to deserve it, or some other alternative that just makes me more depressed thinking about it. 

At any rate, I think this is one of the main reasons that keep me from feeling any sort of lasting happiness.  It’s obviously something I have to work on, and I’m trying, but there are days I just feel defeated by myself, and I’d rather just give up.  Like I said, I couldn’t, because my daughter needs me, and if I’m honest with myself, I’m far too much of a coward to just give up.  The hard part will be trying to not let these feelings filter down to my daughter, lest I poison her with my depression.  I would never want her to go through what I have, because it’s been a hard thing to deal with, and a sweet child like her really shouldn’t have to deal with such things. 

I of course plan to keep trying to improve myself in some ways so that I feel less trapped by these feelings, but no guarantee that anything I try will help.  In the meantime, I can and will continue to do what I must for the life that I’m leading right now.  I just hope it’s good enough, or at least that I’m lucky enough that it will go well…

Analysis 2: The Trauma

To continue along the path of self-analysis that I started with on the last blog, I’ve decided to take a look at one of the most defining moments of my life.  Originally, this blog was supposed to be about all the things that have caused me some sort of trauma, negative things that still stick out in my mind.  The only problem with that is while there are a lot of little ones, they are so little and so insignificant, I feel it would do a disservice to mention them in the same breath as the one moment in my life that I replay over and over again.  I’ve gone over this situation with therapists and friends before, but I don’t remember every just laying it out there like this, so I figured if I put it down, it might have some positive effect, or it may do nothing, but at least there’s something happening here.

The incident happened toward the end of 6th grade.  After so many years, I don’t even remember the exact date anymore, I just remember it being some time in May of 1993.  I was still 11 years old.  I’ve tried several times to just forget it, but over time, I’ve found it healthier to just confront it.  It wasn’t a particularly memorable day.  The weather wasn’t extra nice or bad, the day leading up to what happened wasn’t interesting in any way.  The things that I remember most are seeing my grandmother the morning of, and walking down the block and seeing the apartment I lived in during that time in full view… as a burnt out wreck.  There were fire trucks everywhere, police cars, soot covered people, and that smell of burnt everything in the air. 

Up until that point, I had been spending some time at a friends house, because it was a half day (if I remember correctly), and I didn’t head home until much later in the day because I was playing video games.  I attempted several times to call home, but kept getting a busy signal.  This was a time before call waiting was more or less included for free, so I thought that the phone might’ve been off the hook, as that had happened a few times before.  I thought nothing of it, so I wasn’t really too worried.  When I got home, and saw for myself what had happened, I honestly had no idea what to do.  I looked around for someone I knew, and that ended up being the father of one of my friends who happened to work at the hospital near where I lived.  He was standing outside, just sort of gaping at the building, and when I went up to him, I remember asking something along the lines of, “What happened?  Oh crap, did anyone get my games out?”

Yeah… that’s what occurred to me to ask at that moment, whether or not anyone had saved my video games.  My friend’s father just looked at me for a moment, and brought me over to my parents who were a little further down the block.  My dad was covered in soot, wearing shorts, and suddenly the day just seemed colder.  My mom pulled me aside and asked where I had been all this time, and when I told her, she actually seemed glad.  She had said she knew it was a half day, and thought I might have been home at the time the fire had started.  That’s the only time when it occurred to me, “Wait… no one was home right?  Where’s grandma?”  That’s when they told me that she had been caught in the fire, and that my dad had helped pull her out of the apartment through the window, the same window that not too long before had child safety bars put in, which would have made her escape that much more difficult. 

I was sent to stay with my friend while everyone figured out what the next step was.  I would later find out she was in the hospital with third degree burns over 80% of her body.  My parents told me they were hopeful at first, because the burns weren’t around her chest or too much on her head, so they thought maybe she could pull out of it.  They kept telling me that things would be alright.  I attempted to see her at the hospital once, but when I got to the front desk, they told me that I wasn’t allowed in because I was so young, and they were worried it might frighten me, and that I might cause a disturbance.  When I was told that, I was both a little upset and a little relieved.  From what my parents had told me, they said that I might not recognize her because of the burns, and the treatments she had been through.  So I sat in the car, waiting for about half an hour or so while my parents visited my grandmother. 

About 3 weeks or so after the fire, someone called my friend’s parents, and told them that my grandmother had died.  I remember I was eating a popsicle at the time, and I just sort of froze with it in my mouth.  I walked to the bedroom, sat down on the bed behind my friend as he was playing Street Fighter II on the Super Nintendo, and just said “My grandma’s dead…”  He looked at me for a second, a little sad, and then his mom came in the room and started talking to me about attending the funeral.  That’s basically when I lost it, saying how much I didn’t want to go.  I started thrashing around on the bed, crying, wailing, screaming at the top of my lungs that I didn’t want to go, that they couldn’t make me.  I was told it was my responsibility to go because I was her grandson through my father’s line, and it’s important because of Chinese tradition.  I wanted no part of it, I didn’t care, I just didn’t want to be there.

Eventually, my friend’s parents calmed me down, and I accepted that I had to be there.  The funeral was surreal in some ways.  I don’t remember much of it, because I more or less kept my head down, but what I remember most about it was the wailing of her friends.  It was such a tragic death, because she had only came to the US to visit us from Vietnam for a little while, and no one ever thought something like this was possible.  It scared me, and it saddened me, because of how terrible everyone sounded.  I could hear the heartbreak in their voices. 

After the funeral was over, I continued to live apart from my family for some time.  Until the end of 6th grade, which was about another month or so, I stayed with my friend in the Bronx.  During this time, my family was staying in a hotel (which coincided with my staying at my friend’s), then they eventually got put into a temporary shelter while they found a new place to live. At that point, the shelter where they put us in was somewhere in the South Bronx, and it was in a sketchy neighborhood (to put it politely) so my parents decided to send me down to my uncle’s, and my brother to a different aunt’s place.  I ended up moving in with my uncle down in Brooklyn, where I stayed with him, his wife, and their three kids.  I was the oldest out of all of them, by about 8 years, but I think I ended up just being a burden to them.  I remember feeling just so awkward down there, like I was only there because no one else would take me.  I think they tried their best, but they already had three kids, and I just ended up being another mouth to feed and another kid to watch, so I’m not sure how enthused they were about that.

Eventually, when school started up, I was moved back with my brother.  I was starting a nearby junior high, so it made sense for me to commute from there instead of Brooklyn.  Eventually, during that year, after moving out of my aunt’s to a temporary room across the street from the school, we finally got our new apartment on the upper west side.  This was before all of the current renovations, so it was still a bit sketchy, but nowhere near as bad as the place in the Bronx, and since it was on its way up, it turned out to be a great place to live. 

Now, those were the circumstances surrounding the fire and the death of my grandmother.  I think it took quite some time for all of the shock to settle in and really affect my brain.  Over time, I started blaming myself for her death.  Not too long before the fire, my grandmother had asked me whether or not I thought she should stay.  She had been there for a month or two, and was thinking about staying to help my parents watch us.  My mom had helped her settle in a bit, and got her some seamstress work, so she was contributing to the household, and seemed to genuinely enjoy spending time with her grandsons.  I liked her, so I told her yeah, it’d be nice if she stayed longer.  Because of that innocent statement, for the longest time, I felt as though I had contributed greatly to my grandmother’s death.  I felt that if I had instead said no, she would have left and never been caught in the fire, and she would never have had to die.  Looking at it from an adult’s point of view now, it seems ludicrous to think that I could have possibly thought it was my fault, but at that time, I could only think about what could have been.  I tried to push past it, tried to ignore that thought wiggling around in the back of my head, but I always felt some great guilt for it. 

As I got older, I went through some other things, which would eventually get me into therapy.  I may tell that story sometime, but for now, it was in therapy where a couple of realizations came to light.  You may have already realized what it might have been from reading an earlier passage.  During much of the time after the fire, I had very little contact with my actual family.  My therapist helped me to realize that for the longest time, I had felt abandoned by them, and that helped to explain the strange relationship that had come to form with my family for all the years after that.  I was really distant from them, and especially from my extended family for quite some time up to that point.  I never wanted to participate in anything, and I was routinely the only one who wasn’t at family gatherings.  Up until that point, it had never occurred to me why those things had happened the way they did.  Why was I apart from the rest of the family all that time?

Eventually, after some confrontations with family, and some explanations, I found out that it would have been harder on me at the time if I had stayed with them.  They were dealing with all of the post-fire paperwork and various bureaucratic things, and would not have had much time to watch after me.  There were some other things involved to, but since then, I’ve made my peace with everyone involved.  However, despite having dealt with the trauma, it left some indelible marks on my being.

Primarily, I am now deathly paranoid when I can’t reach someone immediately.  I always worry the worst has happened, and that I wasn’t there to somehow prevent it or to help.  Secondly, I hold the people who are important to me much closer than I think is normal, because I’m always afraid of losing them.  Third, I try my best to tell people how I really feel about them, because I never got the chance to tell my grandma how much I loved her, and to this day, I still regret not having that opportunity.  I want to make sure I never take anyone for granted and not let them know. 

There are some other things that are possibly related.  I’m pretty risk adverse, which while it may not be directly related, since her death wasn’t caused by some stupid risk, is still a matter of preventing something bad from happening if I can.  I’m also very blunt, which goes hand in hand with that whole “Don’t take people for granted thing” because I don’t want to miss the opportunity to say something that I feel needs to be said. 

To this day, that moment still defines much of who I am.  I feel as I’m more focused on what’s important because of it, but I still wish it had never happened.  I often wonder what my grandmother would have thought of me had she the chance to see me grow up.  I just hope she would be proud, and I hope she knows that even after all these years, I still miss her.

Analysis 1: All the Girls I’ve Loved Before

The recent entries about depression have gotten me to thinking about various aspects of my life and how they might be playing a part in this malaise.  Normally, this is all very introspective, but I’ve been finding that writing has been very cathartic, so I figured I’d think out loud on paper on the interwebs… as it were.  This set of blogs will be me going over parts of my life that have had an impact on the kind of person I am, which might help me to understand why I’ve been in such a funk lately.  This particular entry will be about the women who I have fallen in love with over the course of my life, and what I learned from each of them. 

I’ve only ever been in love four times in my life.  There have been a lot of crushes, a lot of interests, but only four women have been burned into my memory because of my feelings for them.  Not all of them loved me back, or even knew how I felt, but they all had a profound effect on the kind of person I’ve become, and there are aspects of my character that can be directly traced back to these women.  I don’t know if four is considered a lot or a little, or if that’s about average, but that’s the number that I have, and they all pop into my head from time to time, sometimes fondly, sometimes not.  I’m going to keep names out of here because I’d rather not embarrass anybody, but people who know me know who they are.

The first woman I ever fell in love with was my high school biology teacher.  Like I said, just because I was in love with them doesn’t mean they ever returned it or knew about it. However, she was the first woman I ever had strong feelings for.  Some may call it a schoolboy crush, and that’s fine to have that opinion, but I know how I felt.  As silly as it is to say, she was the first woman who ever made me really know that I liked women.  Not saying my sexuality was ever in doubt, but I was what some would call a late bloomer, and up until that point, I hadn’t really found any girls really all that attractive.  I thought there were some cute ones, and some pretty ones, but I would look at them like I would a pretty piece of art.  Nice to look at, but ultimately, just an appreciation of beauty, not something I was attracted to. 

With this teacher though, she showed me qualities in a woman that I found myself drawn towards.  It helped that I found her excessively attractive, and not only because I was in an all boys school and therefore surrounded by nothing but other guys.  However, that wasn’t what drew me too her.  She has this boundless energy, and this endless optimism.  She always had this smile on her face, which made her just light up, and I never missed an opportunity to see her and hope to catch that smile.  The thing that stuck out in my mind about her was that she was the first woman that I ever knew to utter the words, “I love you,” to me, although mind you it wasn’t in a romantic context.  Her words exactly were, “I love you, but you are the most pessimistic person I know.”  It was a throwaway sort of line, and now that I think back on it, she probably said some variation of that to a lot of other students, but at that moment, it was shocking to hear those words said to me, in any context.  It never occurred to me that I could be loved, as strange as that sounds, and it was just really heart warming to hear it. 

For some time after that, even after I graduated, I would stop by the school just to say hi and see her.  I eventually lost touch when she left the school, and I held her on a pedestal for quite some time afterwards.  I’ve learned some things since then that has brought my image of her back down to earth, but I still think of her fondly, and wish her the best.  I wish I had been able to keep in contact with her, because she really was one of the few bright spots in my otherwise gloomy high school experience, and I always wanted to thank her for that, but alas, life has deigned to remove her from my life fully.  (That was a lot more florid than I wanted to say it, but for some reason it fits… so I’ll leave it.)

Not too long after I graduated from high school, I met the second woman I would ever fall in love with.  With her, it was the first time any woman had ever shown any interest in me.  I don’t mean to say she was attracted to me, I just mean she actively sought me out to do things with.  Oddly, it wasn’t in college that I met her.  Instead, I had met her at a restaurant I frequented, and it was pure happenstance that we ever got to know each other.  I had spoken to her briefly in previous visits, but there was one time where, for reasons I don’t recall, we decided we would hang out.  It was completely random, because up until that point, I don’t think I had spoken more than a handful of words to her, but it just sort of happened, and I went with it.

What struck me the first time I spent time with her was how open and friendly she was.  It just seemed like the most natural thing in the world for us to be hanging out, even though I was honestly nervous as all hell that first time.  I had never spent any serious alone time with a girl before that, so it was a new experience for me.  I felt awkward through much of the night, but as it progressed, I was able to loosen up and just enjoy the night.  Another first for me, on the way back to the train station, we held hands.  I’m surprised my hands didn’t sweat so much it would’ve grossed her out.  Prior to that, the only time I had held a girl’s hand was when I was in grade school, and we needed to hold hands for the buddy system.  Like I said, late bloomer. 

We would go on to spend a lot more time together after that, when we found that we seemed to get along really well.  She had a lot of the same qualities as my bio teacher, in the sense she had a lot of energy and seemed really optimistic.  The biggest difference though, since I had the opportunity to get to know her, was how human she was.  While I held my teacher up on this pedestal, this person had very real life troubles, and issues that weighed on her.  Hanging out with her, I got to learn how people had to cope with things when it seemed like the world was against them.  From her, I learned how sheltered my life really was, and due to that, I tried my best to make her happy.  I would go out of my way to do things for her to make her smile.  She also gave really great hugs, so that was a reward I couldn’t pass up. 

After spending all this time with her, I couldn’t help but develop feelings for her. There were moments during the times we spent together where I felt as if maybe more could happen, but I was never able to act on any of them due to fear of rejection.  This led to some mixed feelings on my part, because I wasn’t sure if it was just me reading things wrong, or if my lack of action was sending mixed signals.  Whatever it may have been, things started to get a little awkward.  It didn’t help as I was still very immature when it came to these feelings, and I was unable to deal with them properly, and ended up feeling possessive.  Despite having no claim to her, I ended up getting jealous over things that were none of my business or outright ridiculous, and it would end up fracturing our relationship.  Initially, she was very understanding, and wanted to remain friends.  However, I couldn’t get over myself, and I did one of the few things in my life that I regret.  I wish I had handled it better, but I drove a wedge into that friendship that it would never recover from.  We remained friends in name only after that, but it always felt awkward whenever I was around her, and the conversation never flowed as freely as it used to.  It’s been a long time since all of that happened, and we’ve since buried the hatchet, so to speak, but it will never be what it was in terms of our interactions with each other, and I do miss it.  I do hope she ultimately finds happiness, and if she ever needs me, I would love to be there, but it’s not likely to ever happen.

For a while after that, I didn’t really meet any girls that I had any interest in.  I began to fall more into the stereotypical role of hardcore geek.  I surrounded myself with geek culture; comic books, video games, anime, manga, the internet (which was still the realm of the geek at the time), and I was isolating myself from the world at large.  I was nearing the end of my college career when I would get a job with a company based on Wall Street, and there I met this girl who would, in a roundabout way, introduce me to the next girl I would fall in love with. 

It was the strangest chance meeting.  I became friends with the girl from my job, because we found we had similar interests in random things, and also that we were in the same school.  Because of this, she invited me to take a swim class with her, which is not something I would ever have done before, mainly because I can’t swim and am generally terrified of drowning.  However, at the time, I was on a self-improvement kick, and my friend kept bugging me, so I decided that getting over that fear would be a good thing, so I agreed to join.  I go to the first class, and wouldn’t you know it, the friend I signed up with didn’t show up.  In fact, there was only one other person there, and it was this short little girl.  Since I had descended so far into my geek habits, I was less than amicable towards her, since I was kind of pissed that I was alone at this thing that I had only signed up for because my friend had coerced me to go.  What little conversation with her was curt at best, and I resolved to not come the next time if my friend wasn’t showing up.

So I confirmed with my friend for the following week, and showed up early for the class because I had nothing better to do.  As I sat there, this cute girl walks in, and looks at me as if she knew me.  I had no idea where I knew her from, until she spoke to me and I realized it was the same girl who was at the swim class the last time.  When I had first met her, she had on goggles and a swim cap, and here she was without the goggles, and her hair out, and I had no idea she was as cute as she was.  We chatted for a few minutes, and then got going to get changed.  After the class was over (and I chastised my friend for not showing up the previous class) I asked the girl from earlier if she wanted to have lunch together.  I don’t know what possessed me to do that, but she surprised me by saying yes, and we went to BBQs.

As we sat there chatting, I once again felt that comfortable feeling, as if I had known her for a long time.  During that chat, we found the oddest coincidence that we actually lived just four blocks apart from each other, and had been for several years.   Mind you, we met at the school’s gym where the pool was, which was on the complete other side of the city, so it was a strange moment to find out we were basically next door neighbors.  After this revelation, I suddenly found myself running into her all the time, and we soon became fast friends.

We started spending so much time together, that once again, I began to develop feelings for her.  This time, I tried to remain more level-headed, but apparently I was still too immature, and once again, made a fool of myself.  This time however, when she said we should remain friends, I was able to back off and just concentrate on the friendship, and we maintained a very solid relationship.  She stuck by her word to try to stay friends, and we were as close as two friends could be.  We spent nearly every day together, doing everything from biking, watching TV, skiing, rollerblading, going out to dinner, cooking at each other’s places, to just chilling and talking with a beer.  Over time though, some things changed, and we became intimate.  Despite that, she never acknowledged any feelings for me, and it caused me to be rather confused as to the nature of our relationship.  She never acknowledged me as a boyfriend, but I never stopped admitting my feelings for her, so we were at a sort of weird impasse.  The reasoning behind her failure to acknowledge any feelings for me were kind of strange, as she would tell me she wasn’t attracted to me, but her actions spoke otherwise.  She also tended to knitpick a lot about my personality traits and how I looked and dressed, and would constantly try to make improvements.  Me, being the in love fool I was, followed her “advice” and made some pretty drastic changes to myself. 

This all finally came to a head after a few years when I finally gathered the courage to tell her that I needed to hear some sort of acknowledgement of our relationship.  I straight-forwardly told her that if she didn’t, I couldn’t remain in this type of strange holding pattern, with this unrequited love forever.  She told me that she couldn’t force herself to feel that way about me, and I had basically closed the book on that chapter of my life.  This coincided with a trip of hers with her family, so I felt the need to tell her these things before she left because it just felt like the right time to get it off my chest.

Wouldn’t you know it, during the time that she was away, my future wife would walk into my life.  Well, more like message her way into my life, as we met on Myspace because she sent me a random message.  Normally, I would think it was spam, but I decided to look at her profile, and found that it was an actual person, not some weird robo-messager who was attempting to convince me to join a sex website.  I was still doubtful at first, because when I saw her profile because, I couldn’t believe how hot she was, but I took a chance, and we began a conversation online, where I made some awful puns, and she actually laughed at them, which told me I was dealing with a very different kind of girl.  We decided to meet shortly after those initial messages, and found that we hit it off incredible well, despite spending the first two hours in each other’s presence without speaking so much as 2 sentences to each other (we were at Barnes & Nobles reading manga together).

And thus began the most difficult year of my life.  When the other girl came back from her trip, she found out that I had met a new girl, and despite her previous protestations, the green-eyed monster reared its ugly head.  Suddenly, all of the feelings that I had expressed to her had become a big lie, and I had been deceiving her all that time when I had been telling her I loved her.  Mind you, this was literally 3 days after I had met my future wife, and I hadn’t even gotten to know her all that well and wasn’t even sure if it was going to go anywhere, before the first girl decided to rip my head off. 

During the course of the next year or so, I attempted to stay friends with the girl who didn’t love me, because she had stayed true to her word before, when I had made a fool of myself.  Needless to say, it was hard on my new relationship, but somehow, she stuck by me.  She was so patient as I would engage in these drawn out conversations with my “friend” that lasted until well into the wee hours of the morning.  My future wife would literally be waiting in my bed at home while I was down the block, at my friend’s house, arguing with her about all of these things she was accusing me of, primarily some form of betrayal.  I would come home, exhausted, weary, sad, and angry, and my future wife was just waiting in bed, welcoming me back with open arms, a warm hug, and a loving kiss.  Never in my life had I experienced that, someone who just seemed to care about me so much that they were willing to put up with that much ridiculousness.

Eventually, I broke off all ties with this friend of mine.  I look back at that time of my life as a learning period.  While she was harsh on me about my appearance and general demeanor, it did force me to make some changes that I was unwilling or hesitant to make, and I did improve a lot because of it.  If it had not been for her, I wouldn’t have been ready for the relationship that I was to have with my future wife, because oddly enough, I gained a lot of confidence from dealing with a girl like her.  It made me aware that I was able to make someone happy, even if they had a hard time expressing it.  It showed me the amount of fortitude I had to deal with a difficult situation.  It taught me how to communicate to the best of my abilities, so that I was clear with my feelings.  While it didn’t end well, I was able to gain a lot from it, so while I don’t have the best feelings toward her, I am grateful for her influence in my life, if for no other reason than what became of it.

This brings me of course, to the fourth and final love of my life, my wife.  As I said before, she showed an amazing amount of patience during that particularly difficult time.  She also showed me that someone could love me for who I am, not for who they want me to be.  She accepted me as I was, and actually encouraged some of my more geeky behavior.  It was a shock to me, to say the least, but here was this incredibly attractive woman who loved me, who wasn’t afraid to say it or show it, and who didn’t want me to be anything or anyone else than what I was.  My mind was blown.  Obviously, that story is ongoing, and it’s a happy one so far, despite my depression. 

From my wife, I learned that I could be who I am, and still find love.  I also learned that I was capable of taking care of someone, as she was having a bit of a hard time with her life at the time I met her.  She was a bit lost with her direction in life, and I did my best to foster her growth as she was groping around to find who she wanted to be.  That search is not done yet, but neither is mine, and we’re working together to find who we ultimately want to be as we get older.  We’ve had our trials and tribulations (to use a cliché) but we know that the best way to get past them is to work together, and communicate as much as we can.  Now that we have a daughter, we have found that we’re either not bad parents, or have been very lucky with our child.  Either way, we have a beautiful, sweet baby girl who brings up joy with her every waking moment. 

Maybe it got a little sappy at the end there, but looking back at how my life has been shaped by my relationships, and the difficulties I’ve faced, it’s made me more appreciative of what I have now.  I may not be magically cleared of my depression, but having a little bit of perspective on where my life has been and where it is now does make some things easier to bear.  Of course, the whole purpose of these entries is to gain some perspective, so I guess we’ll see what kind of progress can be made with the next post.