Ah, crap.

Was working on my DF character a little more when I realized that the Knight before Sanya (the character I'm making) has been expressly identified as Egyptian. Which isn't a bad thing, I had just forgotten. So, instead of his last name being Jaratt, it's Setanu. Also, instead of being descended from Frederick the Fair, he's descended from the Pharaoh Khufu (yeah--Cheops. The guy who had the Pyramids at Giza built).

Eh. Something.

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls of all ages. I don't have anything particular to say today. I just know that it's been a while since I've written here (I've been keeping a journal instead) and I just sort of have that "MUST WRITE SOMETHING" urge.

My new glasses came today. They're a lot stronger than what I'm used to, and they've also got rims along the bottom (my old ones were rimless). They're pretty cool, actually. The color is called "turtle" and they look like Clark Kent glasses or something. Kind of dorky, almost, but I like it. The only downside is that they forced me to actually stop and consider my appearance so: "Damn, I need a hair-cut..." and "the fuck is going on with this torn-ass sweater" are a few things that grabbed my attention.

As any of you readers who know me likely already know, I got those Dresden Files books. They're awesome. A cream dream. There's so much information in them that I can't begin to coherently do any work with the game because  I'm jumping around so damn much. "Omg Denarians--Wow, Channeling is kind of cool. How does hexing work? Mouse is a scion? Why bother statting Butters?" Etc, etc. As you can imagine, with all this kind of detailed-meaty stuff to read I've been too distracted to stop and JUST read the rules first. But whatever, I've got awhile until any of my potential group members are anywhere near ready. Also, Character/City creation is meant to be done together as a group, so all I can do right now is conceptualize my characters. Plus, chances are I'm going to be the GM, so any characters I make will just be NPC allies and enemies of the PC's.

On a decidedly unrelated note, I hate people with poor communication skills. You try and try to get ahold of them, and when you finally do, they either misinterpret what you're trying to say, make little sense, or spontaneously drop the contact and abruptly move onto something else.

For someone who tends to have an ordered mind, it's maddening.

Anyway, more reading to be done.

Here we go again...

I'm upset. Again. I was sifting through my thoughts, ordering them that I might write a blog and try to feel a little bit better. After a few moments, I realized that these thoughts have already come and go in the past, and that writing a blog with more or less the same message as a previous blog, is a waste of time.

Here is an excerpt from that post:

"I fear that it will always be this way, a tumultuous sea of depression, with short cresting moments of hope and possible happiness, immediately followed with long, dismal and dark troughs of sorrow and brooding."

I hate it when I'm right. Damn it all, I hate it.

If you're that interested in knowing how I'm feeling and what I'm thinking at the moment, it's basically this, but in the context of my relationship, or lack thereof, with Anthony. Then again, nobody read that blog when I first wrote it, so who the fuck is going to comment on it now? Probably no one. Oh-fucking-well.

"Likest thou jelly within thy doughnut?"

     "Nay, but prithee, with sprinkles 'pon it instead, and frosting of white."

    I feel like a freaking vampire. But instead of the blood of meat-sack mortals, I am slavering over doughnuts and soda. I just catch a whiff of something unhealthy and I go half-crazy then and there: instant predator. If I were in the natural habitat of the pastries I would be in panther crouch, downwind from the elusive jelly-filled, slowly prowling amongst the tall grasses, waiting for just the time to pounce. I would strike quickly, fatally. The kill must be clean. A jelly only wounded is a deadly foe. But I have to turn away from the Hunger, and it pains me.

     As you may have surmised, I'm on the diet again. And the first week is always the hardest. But the first two days with foods lacking in sugar and carbohydrates: miserable. Eating only meat and non-starch veggies makes me have super-smell when it comes to those forbidden foods. I walked into Safeway with Justin today and barely stopped myself from indulging in every available terrible food--I wanted so badly to wash a custard-filled doughnut down with a liter of cream-soda. Stupid teenage addiction to unhealthiness. Naturally, Justin bought about ten of those yummy fruit-topped danishes to wave in my face and tempt me with. Damnit, I just realized that I made him sign a contract that bound him to the duty of ensuring that I do not fall to food and soda temptation! But it only mentioned fast food, so I guess that doesn't count. Slippery, tricksy Justinses.

     Mom promises that after two or three days cravings for sugar and such will wane. I know she's right, since I've gone on diets before and eventually the idea of those foods disgust me, but until that day they drive me crazy with food-lust.

     Gotta take one for the gay community though, and get in a little bit better shape. It'll be good for me, I'm sure. I applied for a job today, by the way, because a guy at the place quit, but I've tried to be optimistic about possible jobs I'd get and that never works, so I'll just be my normal pessimistic self and expect that they'll never call me. Ah, well.

     Justin and I have been talking a lot about the Dresden RPG. I had an idea for a character, but it looks like Justin is moving toward sort of a similar idea. Well, not really. I wanted to make a former Knight of the Cross, who lost his faith because he wasn't smart enough (or fast enough, or tough enough or whatever) to save a loved one, or maybe who had to let a Denarian off on the whole "I might fight Redemption--not really, but you have to let me go just in case" principle only to have that same Denarian kill one of his family members. It was originally going to be a daughter or wife or something, but I just realized I've never played a gay character in any RPG, so fuck it. This character is gay. The Denarian killed his partner. So he loses his faith in whatever Higher Being he believes in, and ditches Esperacchius. (The Angel Michael then picked it up and passed it along to Sanya.)

   Anyway, the former Knight of the Sword might play as just that for a few sessions, with little to no supernatural power, but then I want Sanya to drop in on the character beseeching him to take up one of the Swords, because Sanya is too hard-pressed being the only active Knight. So the character would, hesitantly, agree to carry the Sword for a little while. (I don't know if I want him to use Amoracchius or Fidelacchius. Since he lost his faith, it might be more fitting for him to use the Sword of Faith, for Irony's sake. Or maybe he'll turn that one down because of that reason, and will only agree to take up the Sword of Love in honor of his lost love. I dunno. If Justin chooses one I'll take the other, obviously.)

     Justin wants a Knight with an anger problem, so saying that we both have the same idea for a character is complete bull-shit, of course. I just mean we were both considering the same template. Justin's been bouncing back and forth between playing a Warden, a Pure "Vanilla" Mortal, or the Knight. He wanted a character that was actually good (because he always plays evil, or at least Chaotic Neutral, characters and wants something new) so he asked me what that would be. I had to explain that Wardens don't fight for Justice, necessarily--they just fight for A) The White Council of Wizards and B) Preserving and upholding the Seven Laws of Magic. That almost made him choose a Knight right there, but I told him that just because it's not your explicit duty to fight for justice as a Warden, you're definitely entitled to. Harry and Carlos Ramirez are both pro-justice whilst being Wardens.

     Justin also wanted to make sure he could use a gun, and that made him lean toward Pure Mortal. Once again, I assured him that there are plenty of examples of supernatural character types using conventional weaponry. (For example; Sanya uses a Kalishnikov, Harry uses a revolver and shot-gun, and Carlos typically has a belt of fragmentation grenades at hand.) I think the only thing he's hung-up about when it comes to playing a Warden is his desire to kill with magic, the big First Law no-no. We've had a few long discussions about what is and is not killing with magic, but until we actually have a group together to make House-Rules regarding the specifics, we won't have a specific answer.

     I have school tomorrow, so I have to cut the blathering about stuff you people don't care about.

I don't have time for big blogs today.

Not a lot to report, at this moment. Well, nothing I want to go into depth about. The reason is that I need lots of sleep tonight, because I have ANOTHER long road trip ahead of me tomorrow. 4 and a half hour drive to some Island in Washington. Might take a ferry to it. Or drive extra long to take the bridge fo' free. I'm getting paid $35 to play chauffeur--which is something I do a lot, actually. Apparently I got another dog/house watching job coming at me this summer for some folks going on vacation. I can stay in their house for those two weeks, too. I'm also allowed to bring someone to keep me company. You see? Being trustworthy and good actually has some benefits to it. People don't always screw you over because of your virtue.

The other reason I don't want to go way in depth about anything is because Mount Laundry is currently occupying my sleeping space, and I need to fold it before hitting the sack.

To mark significance for this day, Justin's dog, Roxie, was struck and killed by a truck today. That fucking sucks. I'll be honest--I don't get very attached to animals. There are animals that are cool and make me happy to be around, but when push comes to shove, they're not people to me, and emotionally they're only a few notches above a prized possession. (Which is still saying something I guess. I mean, I value my blogs a lot obviously, despite their low quality, and one of the main reasons I hate Kimberly and don't talk to her or do nice things for her is because she destroyed some of them, and it pissed me off.)

Anyway, the reason it fucking sucks is that while animals may not mean a whole lot to me, people do. I'm 98% sure that Justin is real torn up about losing Roxie. It was his first dog (that was entirely his responsibility; he paid for her food, shots, vet visits, etc. She stayed in his room only, and was solely his.) and he cared a lot about her. Justin and I are close, and while Roxie's death doesn't really hurt me directly, the fact that it hurts Justin does affect me, and it makes me both angry and incredibly frustrated that it happened. I get to thinking about those dumb little what-ifs. Like, for instance, what if that trip to Seattle that was planned today wasn't called off? Justin wouldn't have been there to ask Zoee to let Roxie out to go to the bathroom at that moment, and maybe she wouldn't have escaped, or at least wouldn't have been hit.

Dumb stuff like that. Anyway, I said I wasn't going to go in depth, but I started to anyway. My bad. I'll get back to that laundry.

Why do I have to worry?

     Every waking hour I worry about my relationship. I know it's unhealthy, but I can't help it. So many what-ifs just come to mind. Circumstances seem to build themselves just so I will lose sleep and emotional stability over them.

     Today, for example. I asked my 'boyfriend' (I put it in semi-quotes because I'm not sure what Anthony considers me to be right now. I think I'm on the rocks... maybe even on pity tenure) what he was up to today, and he said he was hanging out with Brandon and his friends. Because Anthony has explained to me that he has no friends and only hangs out with Anna, plus he's expressed doubts about our relationship, my immediate fearful emotional response is "Brandon? The cute one who's number you got after studying together but never hung out afterward? That Brandon?" Again, my irrational side screams at me "See?! First he says he doesn't want to be with you and SUDDENLY he's hanging out with a bunch of guys he never even talks to?"

     And it tears me up. (Tears, as in wrenching apart, not tearing up my eyes. Well, it does that too, but it wasn't what I was getting at.) I try to walk the high road. I try to calm down and tell myself "Christian. Calm down. Trust the man. If he says he's with you, he's with you. If he wanted to be with someone else, he wouldn't keep you in his life." That's the big thing to do--trust in Anthony's word, and deny all suspicion I might hold. If I wish to be trusted as a wholly faithful boyfriend (and if any of you know me, you know that the value of loyalty and faithfulness is of the utmost import) then I must extend the same trust.

     But, like anyone else, I bear a few emotional scars. I was in love with someone before, and they betrayed basically all my trusts. That person cheated. That person drank, smoked, partied--all the while swearing to me that they not only denied such activities, but actively opposed them like I do. He told me he loved me. That hurt me. A lot. I didn't get over him for six months, and I haven't gotten over the betrayal in the general sense entirely yet. By that, I mean I don't have any affection for Kenny anymore. None. In fact, I flipped him off on my way to coffee yesterday (You should've seen the look on his face. Ask Justin, Shelby or Daniel.) and it was quite satisfying. I don't think of him, unless I see him, and even then it's only passing.

     But the after-effects of his actions still plague me. Because of that terrible first experience with love, I have a problem with trust. I have a problem with self-confidence (although one can argue I didn't have much of it to begin with, being a scrawny, chubby, nerdy, anti-social, closet-case homo. Scrawny denotes a lack of muscular definition, in this case). Granted, there are other factors at work here, including the shame of being forced to pretend to be straight for my family members. Regardless of their source, my emotional issues constantly sweep any foundation of Rightness and Goodness out from under me. I believe, wholeheartedly and without a doubt, that I should not, even in passing, doubt Anthony. If he says he will be faithful, than I cannot think for a second that he ever wouldn't be.

     But then those old monsters rear their ugly head. "What if he's just like Fuck-Face?" my insecurities whisper. "What if you're just a passing entertainment? Sure, he talks about a long-term relationship, but how can you trust that?" My moral and just part of me immediately shoots back, "He's not some loathsome teenager. He's more mature. I can trust him." But of course, insecurities reach through even the smallest cracks of doubt in my resolve, exploit any weakness. "Don't you see similarities? Anthony doesn't like to kiss you. Hell, Anthony doesn't even like to touch you, or sit next to you. Who does that remind you of?"

     And then the dam of resolve breaks, and I'm flooded with despair. Every little thing comes to mind, for hours. I list reason after reason for why I'm not good enough for Anthony or anyone, reasons he might stay with me (pity, lack of a better prospect, dislike for confrontation), and any time I try to bat down these insecurities something comes up (like Anthony hanging out with Brandon and co. and ignoring my messages after telling me about them) that once again cuts me down to size. Not only do these things reinvigorate my despair, they seem to lend credence to all the old doubts from earlier that day, making them seem that much more plausible; more heavy and sharp.

     Right this moment I'm remembering the events of yesterday. Anthony told me that he'd be having doubts about us, desire to end things, etc. and that he'd been hiding them from me. Again: Rational, selfless, good response--"He didn't want to hurt me. He was trying to protect me. It's a good thing." Insecure, depressive, doubtful response-- "What else isn't he telling you?" Of course, after I got him talking, he heavily suggested that the only solution is to end things. I responded with what I thought was a rational, normal, and well adjusted outlook of what relationships are supposed to be and why we should remain together and work things out. He didn't seem keen on it. The song in my mind at the time? Your Kind of Lover, by good ol' Freddie.

"Now you say you're leaving me. I just can't believe it's true. You're my kind of lover. Want a little bit of feeling; add a little bit of meaning to my life. I want a little bit of feeling--a little bit of sunshine to my life. Just step right into my heart, come a little closer-- Don't tell me that it's over, make a brand new start. We can work it out, just next to nothing. We're feeling we can work it out. Let me show all I can do, I can be your kind of lover."

     Anyway, needless to say I became an emotional mess, and almost left thinking I'd never see him again, would have to alter my school schedule so I wouldn't bump into him, reconsider moving, etc. He told me before I left that he'd go with my plan of slowing down, seeing each other a little less-- work it out. I felt a little better, but like every night for the past two months I went to sleep thinking about Anthony.

     I'm getting off track. Strong emotion is routing my organized thought. I suppose that's an example of the whole thing I'm trying to talk about, so I'll leave that chunk of stream of thought. Back on track, I'm trying to find out what's wrong with me, if all this really is my fault. I feel that perhaps I have two opposing forces working on my emotions. One is the desire to be valued or loved or whatever you want to call it. I'll label that my "distant 'Don't be gay' mother" issue. The other one is my cynical "people are lying and trying to hurt you" issue. These opposing forces, by the way, are pulling in opposite directions, not pushing against one another, hence the tearing metaphor earlier. This leads me to wonder, am I getting hurt because I give more of myself and care more for the person I'm with than they do about me? Or am I getting hurt because I'm weak in the confidence department and think that I'm being deceived or manipulated? What am I doing wrong, is basically my big question.

     I know the obvious and rational answer. "You're nineteen. Quit giving so much of a shit about relationships, and shut the fuck up. You don't think a guy wants to be with you? Leave him. Plenty more where that came from. Damn." But I'm already so invested. There's no way in the Nine Hells I will ever, (EVER. Capital, man) find another gay guy my age who is as interesting, intelligent, mature, straight edge, fun, and patient. Especially in the intimacy area. He's never been with anyone, and doesn't intend to be for a long time. Do you know any twenty year old homosexual virgins who want to be with someone for a year (+) before intimacy even becomes plausible? Neither do I. That kind of dedication to the high road is immensely rare in people my age, as well as my sexual orientation. Sorry for stereotyping, but thems the ropes. Young gay guys are extremely sexual.

     My point is that he's by and far the best that I'm ever likely to meet, much less actually have the honor of dating. And I've somehow managed to mess it up within what... A week short of two months? Major blow to my confidence. This sort of opportunity makes it big to me. That means it's worth worrying night and day about. Is that unhealthy, thinking about something and someone like that? I mean, sure, when I say all day I don't mean literally CONSTANTLY. I mean, I'll read a book or play a game for a few hours. But any moment I give up mental distraction, say if I drive to the store, or make lunch and eat it, or go to the gym, or am laying in bed for hours trying to sleep, I think about him and myself. Obviously I've been writing this blog for what... an hour? Basically this is the kind of stuff that runs through my mind any time I'm alone during the day, when I don't have to keep up happy appearances.

     I guess I'm trying to find a way to contend with my base nature--my insecurity, doubts, fears, emotional needs. How do I rise above that and just trust? How can I force my soul to be confident that things will work out as they should, and that people do care about me, and honestly want the best for me? How do I remove these old emotional scars so that I don't turn to despair every time I lose sight of rationality? How do I be a better person? A good person doesn't question the honesty and openness of those he cares about, right? How do I un-fuck up my soul? Is there some sacred mantra to turn to, like Alcoholics Anonymous?

    I don't know how to better myself so that the people I care about will care about me in return. I don't know how to keep a boyfriend. I don't know how to confront my mother about this bullshit with hiding who I am, and put that emotional problem behind me. I don't know how to illicit openness from the person I would never hide a thing from. I don't know how to rise up, and stop being a worthless, loathsome being. I don't want to play the lonely man, anymore.

     I'm some kind of fucked up, aren't I? My expectations are probably unrealistic. I don't think I'll ever be able to find someone who will be as open as I am, as willing to give emotionally. At least not at this age. People don't want that. People want a nice pretty boyfriend to show, one who isn't misanthropic and pessimistic, and who wants to actually talk about feelings, emotions, and those other silly, trifling bothers. Maybe it's the Dresden problem. I don't do casual. I don't do temporary. If someone is going to be with me, I want to give wholly of myself, put everything I have into it. I want an invested relationship. People don't want that, so people don't want me.

That's my theory anyway. If any of you amateur psychologist/psychiatrists wanna put in your two cents, go for it. Gimme your insight. Bitte. Danke.

Okay, a bit better.

About to go to sleep; But I talked with Kyle for a while, and the nice, rational suggestions he gave me really cooled me down. I'm upset because Anthony is upset and won't tell me why. I've been worrying about it, because Anthony will drop many-a-hint that something is wrong with me, and the best thing to do is just confront him about it. And not in the stupid little "What's wrong?" "Nothing." sort of confrontation. A nice actual sit-down conversation. Hell, we're both adults after all. Well... legally at least.