Whoa! Didja get the numbers off that truck?!?

July 25, 2003 - 6:13 a.m.

Talking to dogs

I asked my dog a question. "Do you know why people have dogs?"

She looked at me, with that dog look that says "I know you're saying something to me, I'll pretend to understand."

I continued, "People have dogs so they can have an excuse to talk to themselves."

People who are alone mostly benefit from having a dog around the house. It works for me because I can verbalize the thoughts that bang around in my head constantly. My dog provides a nice Q&A forum for me. Naturally, the questions I ask lately don't seem to have any answers.

I sat on the porch tonight in my quiet neighborhood and thought about my current state of mind. I'll bet there are many people in the world that would love to have my life. I'm willing to work out a rent to own program, but there's no getting out of the contract. You have to own it eventually.

My column was published today. More people at work are taking notice of it. Frank asked me how I come up with ideas. The problem is not coming up with ideas; it's harnessing them so they fit into a confined space. I take the phrases and paragraphs and mold them like clay in my head and make them into cohesive thoughts. Many times a phrase will capture me and I'll build a paragraph around it, like a pretty fence to make it just so. Jeff came up and told me that he thought I had a tremendous way with words. Thank you, Jeff. That and five bucks will get me a coffee at Starbucks.

I'm coming to grips with the fact that I may be living alone for the rest of my life. That's a hard thing to face, but I look at the mounting evidence and it's becoming painfully clear. I was meant to live this life alone. I'm not sure why yet, but there has to be a reason. I've been alone more often than not. Many times I've been alone even when surrounded by other people.

Sometimes the solitary life is a welcome respite. Sometimes it's a cage with invisible bars. The invisible bars are mocking me now; my self-made prison is having fun with me.

Relationships I've built with women: a series of unfulfilled promises.

Dating sucks. It's a game, it never worked well for me, and perhaps it's my attitude about it. Match dot com was a fucking joke. I played the game as best I could, but perhaps I'm not conversant enough with the rules. They advertise that service as a way to "meet your perfect match." Nothing is perfect and the women I contacted by email apparently thought I was less than perfect. Trust me, I have a firm grip on command of the English language and I can write convincingly enough. Perhaps I'm too honest. Maybe I don't bullshit well enough to win these women over. I don't rock climb, I don't vacation in Aspen, I don't have fantastic stories to tell of adventures spent backpacking in France and puking on the Eiffel Tower. I'm just me, and if you can't get that from an email, then fuck you very much. I don't have time for you either.

I picture myself sometimes as an old man rattling around in this house by myself, talking to a dog. My positive side tells me I'm too unique and different to find someone perfectly right for me. I know what I want. She appeared, but I couldn't have her. She was tied to a life apart from me, so tightly tied to it that I couldn't cut the knots away. She was my perfect match, too. I've never felt the strength of the love we shared, ever in my lifetime.

Have you ever met someone that makes you realize that there are kindred spirits on earth that transcend lifetimes? Have you ever met someone who speaks to you with a voice that transcends those lifetimes? Have you ever met someone and loved them, knowing you'll never have them in this lifetime? I have. And because of that, I'll spend the rest of my life here, talking to a dog.

It's a hell of a thing, loving someone you can't have. So you resign yourself to this fact and plan your life accordingly. I told her I couldn't continue playing third or fourth chair to what she considered her destiny in this life. She did what she had to do, she let me leave. She understood the depth of what we shared too, but she was locked in a prison of her own, Rapunzel personified. Trouble was, her hair was too short.

I tried to move on, distracted by another. She was incomplete in some ways, but nevertheless a kindred soul. Not to the depth of what I'd experienced before, but certainly rewarding. Rewarding to me in the fact that I was a Teacher of sorts to her. My love and I were equals in that respect, we fed each other from the accumulated knowledge and experience we'd acquired and we were always learning from each other. This new interest had depth but she kept it from me.

She�s moved on now.

But I have a dog.

the last one -*- the next one