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10-10-09 // 7:53 pm jigsaw falling into place Soundtrack to my life: Cardinals crapping away Game 3 against the Dodgers. I fear our 2009 playoff adventure is this close to being over. It's nearly a mercy killing at this point, really. Make it end. This game (and this series) is putting me in a foul mood; I'm never going to be able to get that image of the ball hitting Matt Holliday in the solar plexus out of my mind. It's seared into my memory -- having it on the front page of the Post the day after didn't help, either. These pretzels are making me thirsty! Kinda in the mood to go out tonight and be amongst the grumbling masses, but I'm a bit skint at the moment after my trip to Chicago to see the Manics. Well worth it, but I should not be spending $ at a bar until next pay period. So it's polishing off a spectacular bottle French red wine that I somehow acquired years ago and finally cracked open the other day. The onset of fall, the chill in the air and especially the first really gray, dark, wet, chilled-to-the-bone week of the season always puts me in red wine mode. So here we are. It's a good thing. Nowt to get off my chest today except this. One night earlier in the week Sarah called me out of the blue. We talked for almost five hours straight (and could've gone on for several more had it not been midnight on a work night), and she gave me a heartfelt apology for the way she acted and the way she treated me in our relationship. Specifically, she said she was deeply sorry for shutting me out, putting me in no-win situations, and for basically starting shit because she didn't know how else to deal with her internal strife. Long story short, she noticed recurring behavior on her part with her current boyfriend and she's entering into some a period of self-analysis and attempting some hardcore self-improvement. Which is awesome! Seriously, I stood there in my kitchen with this massive smile on my face. No jealousy, no bitterness, only happiness. She's a good person; I'm a good person. We both deserve happiness. And I firmly believe in self-improvement, life oughta be a constant process of trying to be a better you. Hell, I told her that I made mistakes too, specifically that I should have tried harder to build a support network in California, that it was unfair of me to put the entire load on her shoulders when it came to being my support network. Making friends out there was hard but even though I worked at it, I could've worked harder. I simply succumbed to inertia and depression. The environment was there, I just didn't work hard enough for it. Of course, it was hard to work hard at it with all the other associated stuff going on around me, so I'm not beating myself up over it. But it was so healthy, affirming, and adult for us both to admit our faults, to own up, and to atone for behavior the other person didn't deserve to be on the receiving end of. All "High Fidelity" style "Serious Talking" aside, we also just talked and shared and caught up and laughed and got on famously. She told me more about her man (also named Michael, oddly enough. I call him Michael #2, and he sounds like a genuinely standup kind of guy), I talked about my wading pool dips into the dating world, we talked about old friends and the difficulty of making friends but the value of the awesome ones you do make, etc. So this was an absolutely affirming development. Most importantly it was unguarded, honest, and a conversation overflowing with rapport but devoid of touchiness or unresolved issues. I got a sense of closure that had been eluding me for over a year, and one that I'd only recently convinced myself would never come. I was OK with that, but it wasn't an optimal outcome. But that 2100 mile removed trip down the pub with her allowed me to set down a debilitating psychic burden. I've felt so light, so free, so...at peace all week. It's not only instilled in me this otherworldly zen calm, but it's propelled me forward! Amazing. It's restored a bit of my faith in humanity, which certainly sounds overblown, but there's a semblance of truth to it. This was a big deal for me. Other positive developments include working my match.com profile. Kinda slim pickings and it's all slightly more meat market stylee than I prefer, but I check it daily and send out winks/emails/etc. The important thing is that I'm motivated and interested. Oh! And at the the They Might Be Giants show last night, I chatted up a wonderfully geeky-cute indie rock chick and got her email address (I know, how '00s). The best part of it was that I did it so effortlessly, well, for me anyway. I saw her walking to the venue ahead of me out of the Metro parking lot, thought she was damn fine in her pea coat, glasses, and scarf, and thought "that looks like the kind of woman I wanna meet." Fortune smiled on me and she was directly behind me in the pre-line in the Halo before the gig. I said my hellos, we talked about music (she asked me to name five all time favorite artists), I asked hers (I love it when some of the answers are intriguing sounding things I've never heard of), and I found out that she's moved all around the country before settling here in the STL. Very promising. So as they began to let us in to the theater, and before she ventured off to meet her friends, I asked her if I could get her # or email, she smiled and said "for sure." And here we are. I'm gonna email her tomorrow, I wanna meet her for a drink or a coffee and continue our in-line convo! I don't need a partner to be happy, but it'd be fun and awesome to meet someone, well, fun and awesome! The best part is that not only am I out there with my heart actually in it, I'm feeling properly confident. Again, maybe for non-spaz people these are all minor developments, but for me it's all huge, a jigsaw falling into place.
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