I haven’t blogged in months but I’m not going to apologize. I post private notes on facebook and rarely go as much as a day without tweeting something, but I tend to save blogging for when I have something both significant and universal to say. Hello again.

My New Year festivities for the second time in a row were held at Lindy Focus amongst dozens of actual friends and hundreds of potentials. While there, I got into a conversation with a dear friend that encompassed many ideas about relationships. One segment stood out in my memory and went a bit like this:

me: I don’t know what I’m passionate about.
she: Words? Do you even want to be passionate about something?
me: Women want men who are passionate.
she: [patted me consolingly on the arm]

I don’t think I was wrong in my assessment there, but I left out many important bits: that everyone is attracted to passion, that I have experienced many times of passion, and that passion drives me and everyone around me to some degree… just to mention a few. That is to say: the conversation reminded me of one benefit of passion, that it is attractive, but that wasn’t all there is to it. Still, my major concern there was that in a moment of introspection, I couldn’t name something that drives me like that off the top of my head.

She was right, of course. Words are my passion. It’s become such a reflexive response to the questions asked of me, though, that I’ve grown suspicious of it and had to reexamine once again. The thing is, it’s not just prose on virtual paper like this that I mean by ‘words’.

By WORDS, I mean the whole complex layered thing that is the magic of communicating ideas from one mind to another mind or several other minds. Some people can do that by painting or sculpting. Others can do that by leading great lives of purposeful example. Still others can communicate with their movements. I am impressed by them all!

I am not good at creating poetry; I fully realize I’m a hallmark card hack when I try. But in other respects, I think I treat words well in expressing myself. I think can turn a phrase just so and allow you to see it better. I can write it by hand or type it out quickly. I can speak the words as well as I write them, if I take the time to do it with care. I can read my own or those of others and I think my voice can convey as much as I feel. I can even sing to add more layers, though again I can’t write songs to save myself.

The words drive me. They drive me to wake up early and stay up late. I’d rather oversleep from having had too late a conversation than greet the day early because I kept words to myself. Yes, Words are still my passion: their curves, their spaces, their rhythms, their decorations, their meanings and their meanings, their sounds and their absences. Their music.

I’m not sorry for not blogging in a while because if I’d just done it for its own sake, it would have lessened what I had to say. I am sorry that I didn’t have better things to say. I am sorry that I haven’t explored more ways to say them. I’ll be trying to find more of these waves of passion to share with you this year. I may even sing them if anyone can reassure me that my voice is better than bad.

I’ve found you again, passion. And now I’ll share you.

The title of this article might seem a strange one to read on Christmas.  Please don’t avoid this, if your avoidance is just to steer clear of a sad note, because I write this with an uplifted spirit and a hope that I can bring some cheer to my friends and even unknown readers.  You see, recently, several of my friends have experienced situations where everything seemed about to go their way, and then life took an unexpected turn and results turned out not in their favor.  Whether they expressed it explicitly or not, I sensed a feeling from them that echoed this blog’s title.  Here is a message from me to them and coincidentally all of you.

Let me start with a historical example of life turning out pretty well:  One Christmas show that I like to rewatch is an old production of “Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus”.  When I first watched and learned of this tale (as a young teenager), I was moved by the story of an adult validating a child’s wide-eyed wonder and hopeful belief in a positive symbol of the season.  As I grew into a more skeptical and downhearted mindset, I tried to shun the story as a fantastical and overly religious morality play, regardless of its historical accuracy.  After all, the famous editorial from whence the title comes includes mention of God and fairies and faith!  How abhorrent to a rational thinker, no?  But I’m proud to say that I have continued to grow.  Now, in this stage of life, I’ve reached a point where I am happy to say I like the story again.

I like the story because of the reasons why.  Little Virginia wanted to believe that there is good in the world, represented by the jolly old elf.  Frank Church didn’t literally believe in Santa Claus and as a hardened veteran journalist, I might even question his belief in God, let alone fairies.  Yet, he wanted to encourage that pursuit of goodness and happiness and cheer that he could read described between the lines of Virginia’s letter.  He wanted to provide a helpful bit of externally derived strength and support against the dismissive and spirit-dampening people who surrounded that little girl.  It feels right that Virginia O’Hanlon’s letter got the response it did.  In writing his editorial, Mr. Church sent a message into the world that has reverberated through time.  There is almost no other information about Francis Pharcellus Church, save note of his response to the youthful missive.  Even the fact that the story has been retold to this day is itself a point that warms my grinchy heart.

Now, despite my renewed appreciation for that page out of history, I also want to send another message out to all of you; something more universal that requires no more belief than that in one’s own senses and self.  I may question the existence of God, but I do not doubt that things are what they are.  Actions and people are but themselves and I firmly believe that solace for our world and our future can be derived from that most important act of paying attention to the events around us.  Maybe you don’t care about Virginia’s story.  So, I’ll share with you an anecdote from my own life in the hope that it may hearten you in some way akin to how Mr. Church’s response heartened Virginia.

My own heart has been broken in the past.  Again, I’ll tell you that’s not a reason for sadness and I’ll try to explain why.  I found my life enriched by the presence of a woman, full of beauty and cleverness and other qualities I hold dear.  I wanted to be with her and courted her.  She was kind and appreciative, but did not reciprocate my feelings and responded in honesty.  I won’t lie here and say it didn’t hurt but that’s not the point, anyway.  I reflexively fell into a depression for a moment before I was able to recognize that I was just continuing to hurt myself to no positive end.  I had found myself thinking that life isn’t fair and resenting it for the injustice of introducing to me someone who should return my affections for many good reasons but did not.

Well, life really is not fair.  That’s because fairness is our invention.  I think we see rationality in the causes and effects of the world around us and recognizing things for what they are and appreciating the rightness of reality, we seek to impose that reasoning upon ourselves.  If a seed is planted in the right way, a life springs from it and that is good.  If a right action is performed by a man, a reward should come to him by similar reason, and that’s what we call fairness.  This is obviously a simplification just to illustrate my meaning.  But many of the rewards that we value come from other people.  And though the inner workings of the mind may be trained for reason, I have yet to meet anyone who can train his heart that well.  These realizations helped me to change both my perception of what I’d experienced and of that woman.

She should not have been blamed that as the object of my affection, she did not return my attraction.  She was truly herself and not the hoped version of her for which I had wished.  The fairest thing that she could do is be honest with me, which she did.  I had chosen to take my heart from its place of safekeeping and offer it willingly, not as a barter or a sale, but as a gift.  No person is ever required to accept such a gift, though it’s to be hoped that a return would happen sooner than later, since it is not a pleasant feeling to be missing one’s heart.  My heart was declined and returned and it is a fragile thing so there is no surprise that it broke in the process.  Ah, but some of the amazing qualities of our hearts are that they heal, they are strong, and they keep us going.  If I hadn’t risked my heart, I wouldn’t have had even a chance for success, and I would never have known the truth of matters and that truth is important to me.

The result of my courtship was not what I wanted, and not what some might call fair.  I am happy, nonetheless.  The world is no less filled with wonders for my heartache.  This woman herself was no less wonderful for my heartache and her honesty was just another quality I held dear.  I worked to overcome my own foolishness and hoped to keep her in my life as I still cared for her very much.  I take comfort in the fact that I could recognize the good in this situation.  If there is no fairness in the affairs of the heart, I still see that the universe around us is as fair as it can be.  Life doesn’t hide its realities from us.  We are presented with the truth of things, no matter how enjoyable or painful.  It is in us to extract fairness and justice and joy.  What if we never have another chance to do good and be right and enjoy happiness?  How dare we waste our tiny lives in dwelling upon pain and sadness when we can choose to make the world better in everything we do?

My tale of difficulty is also tiny and I know that.  But it’s a universal story and I suspect most of my readers have felt these feelings.  Had I chosen to stay in my head, surrounded by a wall of misery built by myself, then this story would be tragic.  I refused.  I take comfort in truth and am uplifted by the gloriousness of the real world and make the best of it that I may.  And I hope that knowing how I interpreted my emotional trials is of help to you.

Life is not fair, but I can be.  So can you.  So can we all.  I look to the events around me, good and bad, joyful and painful, and I appreciate them as fairly as I am able.  I look to you and appreciate that you take the time to read my rambling paragraphs.  Getting this far was more than fair of you!

I choose to be happy and to have a Merry Christmas.  I hope that my overlong note also helps you to be happy in some small way.

And since it is only fair that I would share this with the people who read my blog, I am happy to wish you a Merry Christmas, too!

I think that I can legitimately say that I still have good relationships with all of my ex-girlfriends from the past six years.  All both of them.  It doesn’t seem too surprising at this time that things would turn out so well, while looking back at both experiences with the clarity of hindsight.  Both were loving relationships, both involved emotional growth and general maturation, and both ended in honestly facing the evidence that we were not meant to last as couples.  There were rocky parts through each.  There was some dishonesty in each (though I think sometimes it was unintentional or from misguided concerns).  But there were moments of beauty experienced together, and hundreds of great memories built in each, and I still regularly talk to both women.

They are both great women in ways too numerous to count and right for someone, just not me.

I was inspired to think of them both as I drove home tonight after hanging out with one of them and I heard a song on the radio: Miss Independent by Ne-Yo.  It’s a cool song and a fun video (although there were parts in the video that made me wonder, “Is this scene appropriate for the message here?”) and hearing it made me realize that the female object of the song is the sort of woman who I would want to date, too.  At least in part:

“There’s something oh so sexy about
The kinda woman that
Don’t even need my help”

I do think that’s sexy.  And the very beginning of the song included another great phrase:

“Ooh there’s something about
The kinda women that want you
But don’t need you.”

Sing it, Ne-Yo!   The something about them is self-sufficiency, which usually goes hand-in-hand with some level of maturity.  There’s not much that a woman could wear, or not wear as the case may be, that’s hotter than that.

After the song finished, I turned off the radio for fear of a whining, moaning, or Britney Spears song that could turn my mood.  I took the rest of the drive home to try to think of other songs that would fit my interests.  What other song could I quote in a match-dot-com posting to describe the person-I’m-seeking?  As I thought about it, I realized that tons of songs portray women (and men) as whiny, foolish, overreacting, in-need-of-protecting, incapable damsels in distress of staying unattached.  Yeah, the men, too.  Losers.

I did think of one other, though.  Short Skirt/Long Jacket by Cake.  Okay, the last verse is weak except for the white Chrysler LeBaron, which is just rad.  Especially in a ’93 coupe.  But the first two-thirds of the song just describe some fantastic feminine badass.  My favorite lines (not necessarily in order of preference nor contiguous):

“I want a girl with a mind like a diamond”

“And eyes that burn like cigarettes”

“Who is fast, and thorough, and sharp as a tack”

“Who uses a machete to cut through red tape.

With fingernails that shine like justice,

And a voice that is dark like tinted glass”

What’s that you’ve got there?  Some fantastic similes?  One brilliant metaphor?  Nice.

So I’m pretty sure the woman I’m looking for is a combination of the badass personality in Cake’s song and the wholly capable adult of Ne-Yo’s song.  If you’re out there, I have two good references and I can dance.  Here I come.

In my life, I have been in therapy.  The most difficult concept for me to accept when I was in therapy was the notion that any emotions and thoughts that were fighting for attention in the theatre of my mind were neither new nor unique.  The idea that anybody else could have felt my feelings or thought my thoughts seemed absurd to me.  If anyone else in history had ever suffered the magnitude of exquisite agony that I, in my teenage years, had to survive on a daily basis, surely that would have been recorded somewhere to serve as warning for all future generations of human beings.  If this had happened before, why wasn’t I warned?  My thoughts, too, seemed earthshatteringly brilliant and revolutionary.  It was obvious that all the adults around me were far too asinine to synthesize the intellectual gems that were occuring to me, so this at least must be new and unique.

Good grief, I was an ass.  Yes, I’m afraid that in the thousands upon thousands of years of recorded human history, other people have experienced the righteously self-deluded feelings and thoughts that I have had.  Your feelings and thoughts, too, probably.  I still think I’m pretty great, but at least I realize that most of my brilliant observations on life have gone observed before.  My thoughts on the topic of Love are no different — people have thought it, felt it, and said it before (in many cases, more eloquently).  Some writers who have contributed to my opinions are M. Scott Peck, Terry Goodkind, Ayn Rand, Terry Pratchett, C.S. Lewis, David Gerrold, and Robert J. Sawyer.  Those authors never became Jane Austin, and I don’t say I wholly agree with all of them on the topic, but they do inform my beliefs.

Love is an active relationship with a person of worth who has the capacity for reciprocation. Love is investing the effort necessary to better yourself as much and as constantly as possible to become a greater person of worth to your loved one and yourself.  Love is committing just as much energy to supporting your loved one as your loved one works to become an even greater person of worth for herself and for you.  Love is a wholly selfish endeavor that just happens to expand the notion of self that it may include another person.  And Love is hard and Love is easy and Love is not guaranteed and has no guarantees and Love is worth it.

Since there is no way to quantify or prove the existence of love in an empirical fashion, it should go without saying that every statement I made in the previous paragraph was an opinion.  But here I go saying it, because people do not understand facts and opinions, just as they do not understand Love.  I understand it well enough that I try not to misuse the word; I like things, I enjoy things, I adore things, I even heart things.  I try to be careful, out of respect.

I am happy to say that right now, I definitely Love at least four people.  I suspect that I am a very rare person indeed to be in such a fortuitous position.  I’m not dating or engaged to or married to any of those women, but that does not lessen the Love I feel for them, my friends.  I am glad, in fact, to have my loved ones as my friends.  As I better myself, they support me.  Should I lean toward bad life choices, they warn me.  I do the same for them.  And because we are all persons of worth, I enjoy the time I spend with them all, in person or in remote conversation.

When I was that foolish self-absorbed teenager, I thought Love was just strong emotions and a willingness to give up any part of myself that was necessary in order to be with an object of my affection.  If I ever met that teen, I would give him such a smack that it would reverberate up the timeline to hurt me, too!  I realize today that the feelings I’ve labeled love in the past were really affection, lust, addiction, obsession, adoration, devotion, and avarice.  You cannot love someone who doesn’t know you.  You cannot love a thing or an animal.  You might love a pastime or an organization but most people do not.

People in my society use the word so frequently and so incorrectly that I wonder if there is an undercurrent of such desperation for Love that they use any excuse for the mislabeling?  “I love my dog!”  “I love tiramisu!” “I love those shoes!”  “I love my team!”  “I love my country!”  “I love that photo I saw on lolcats!”  Only two of those statements are possible but none are probable.

I have a dog.  I like her, I adore her, I care for her, I’m devoted to her, and I even dote on her on occasion.  But she is a source of unconditional affection.  If I beat her (never!), she would still want to be affectionate, though her fear might overcome the yearning.  True Love is not unconditional; there must be the requisite persons of worth.  If you think that it is somehow possible or noble to love an unrepentant villain, you should be locked up.  You should be locked up because you are so blatently insane that you might do harm to others, if you think this way.  I cannot love someone who is purposely self-destructive.  I cannot love someone who purposely hurts others for no good reason.  And, I cannot love someone who is an imbecile.   I might like those people, say at a party, but love would probably be a lie.  Those people are usually not people of worth to me.

Another assessment of people of worth derives from our first impressions.  Xenophobia and its ramifications are discussed by many of the best speculative fiction writers, many of whom note that we classify our interpersonal encounters as Superior, Equal, Inferior, and Other.  I am not the first person to propose that you can only Love an Equal, with a bit of a leeway towards Superior or Inferior.  I could define these categorizations, but the point is that you already do.  You already decide those estimations of the people you meet, though you may not realize or admit to it.  Lying to yourself about that assessment will lead to heartache.

Trust and truth are essential components to a Loving relationship.  If you don’t know the truth about your significant other, how can you support her positive growth and advise her against the negative choices?  If your so-called loved one doesn’t know the truth about you, how can you expect to receive that consideration, either?  Relationships fail in misery the worst when there is deception involved.  Either of the self, or of the partner.  We are fallible, we make mistakes, and we can always try to make the better choices.  I have high standards but I could not love an infallible robot (they would be too Superior or Other).  On the other extreme, there is a significant difference between a partner who chooses to do the wrong thing and the partner who generally chooses to do the right thing but makes mistakes. I wholeheartedly believe in forgiveness, but I believe in acts of contrition as well.  I would not absolve a loved one of her wrong choices if she had no intention of making the right choices the next time.  It may be difficult, but you have to get away from unrepentantly bad people.

The hardest thing about Love is realizing that you love someone who isn’t the right person for you and then taking the right next step.  After all, companionship, friendship, sex, and inside jokes are pretty hard to give up just because it’s the right thing to do.  But I’ve come to think of that situation in this light: if I love someone, then I want the best for her and for her to have the best possible life.  Those feelings would be true whether she and I were suited for a relationship together or not.  So if we’re not right for each other and I claim Love, how could I do anything else but get out of the way so that she could find the right relationship?  The right relationship should contain Love, it’s true, but it should also contain a unified set of goals in life.  In simplest terms, if her goal is to the right and mine is to the left, there’s only so much we can each do to support ourselves and each other before realizing we’re still stuck in the middle.

As I review the paragraphs I’ve written so far, I fear this blog reads like a warning sign for Love, making it akin to the Hell of the Divine Comedy: Abandon all hope, ye who enter here!  Far from it.  Humans are a social animal who need affection, companionship, and yes Love, in order to live.  Without Love, we are merely surviving to get through the next day.  With Love, we grow, we better ourselves and the world around us, and there is a completeness that seems to whisper in our hearts that there is nothing we cannot do, no obstacle we cannot conquer.  Love gives us the strength to be the people we want to be, and with your loved one supporting you, it feels like that doesn’t take so much strength after all.  You can grow and be a good person and have a good life without Love, but I would feel sorrow for you and the hardship you must endure.

I write this article to help people.  I find that I’ve spoken to my loved ones a great deal recently about their lives and their struggles and I wished to get my opinions pinned down to the page for closer examination and for retrospection in the future, to help myself.  I want to help my friends who seem to be struggling and I want to help people I haven’t even met.  I think a world in which everyone believed in concepts like these would be a better place.  A place where people don’t settle for fear or from exhaustion, a place where people believe in the dignity and importance of Love.  I hope that I will find a relationship with someone whom I can Love and will Love me in turn and that we will build a wonderful life together.  If I do not, but some of these words help you to find that life, then I have done a good thing and will be happy for that, too.  Perhaps if we are very lucky, my friends and you readers and I will all find that life, a worthwhile life of Love.

I purposely attempted to keep my daily entries in my Traveblogue upbeat and positive, but I did have some thoughts cross my mind that were not quite positive.  If you’d rather avoid reading subjective criticisms, complaints, and general grousing, I would point you to the rest of the series and just skip this entry.

Travel to the event was flawless, but here I am in the airport on the way back facing a rain delay.  Whose fault is that?  If it’s anyone’s fault it would be mine.  I could have chosen to take an earlier flight home, but I wanted to give myself time to eat, get cleaned up, get lost, and return the rental car on time.  So, that’s fine, I chose a later flight for the best combination of cheap and later in the day and I’m stuck here for it (although I’ve gotten to chat with Naomi Uyama and Mike Legett, which makes up for it).

The car was as good a rental car as I could have gotten.  I highly recommend the Hyundai Sonata as a temporary vehicle if you ever need a cheap one.

The hotel, Holiday Inn RiverCentre, was pretty great, except… I think all hotels should offer some sort of breakfast refreshment in these days of competitive marketing.  A nice hotel can offer a nice breakfast, or a lower tier hotel can offer orange juice and pastries.  Okay, they did give me one free Quizno’s 6″ sub, but still.  Also, the hot water was sporadic in the bath/shower.  It would rapidly alternate from hot to cold for no apparent reason that I could figure out.  I got back at the hotel by splashing water everywhere.  If I ever stay with you, have extra towels on hand for the first time I take a shower because I have a tendency to flood bathrooms with splash water.  I don’t know why it happens to me and not others.  Do other people not dance around under the shower stream waving their arms?  I find that provides the best coverage, personally.

Jimmy John’s is a great place.  No complaints.  Likewise Target.  Okay, maybe they could have a larger men’s clothing section.  Taste of Thailand was a little slow, but the food was great and the Tofu addition was welcome.  It was a tad expensive, but again tasted great.  SuperAmerica markets are not that super but they’re okay.  I would like to complain about the prevalence of young adults going in there to buy cigarettes and chewing tabacco, but I’m not sure to whom I should direct that. Their parents? Society? Al Gore.

Now, the event.  Here I go.  …  Yeah, I got nothing. Wait…

Oooh, okay, the competitors could have been more numerous… but that’s partially my fault since I didn’t put together a team or showcase entry.  Oh, the venue was freaking hot and humid.  I mean, it was hundreds of people squeezed into a relatively small space, but couldn’t there have been more air conditioning?  Maybe drop the temperatures down really low between events?  I dunno.  I hope the New Orleans venue isn’t any worse, but I fear it may not be any better.  A lack of water fountains was also dismaying, but at least they had purchasable refreshments.

Okay, looking back at my list of complaints about Showdown, I see that I haven’t got much.  Oh, well.

How about my complaints about myself?  I had some items on a mental wishlist, all of which were quite optional, but still desirable.  I would have liked to lose weight and get exercise (one combined goal), to enjoy the Soul After Party, and maybe to get my flirt on with some lovely dancer. Oh, and to get reinspired about my own dancing.

I don’t think I’ve lost any weight, but I feel pretty good about my intake versus my activity.  I’ll find out when I get home… Maybe after Jam Cellar after I get home, since I plan to eat during my homeward trip and airport food isn’t exactly health food.

I tried really hard to enjoy the Soul After Party, but I just couldn’t get into it.  I don’t think I was there for more than 15 minutes or so. Soo would know.  In that time, I heard one older soul song that I liked but the rest of the music did not appeal.  I heard that the music got better later in the night.  When I watched Peter and Skye moving to the music, they looked good, but they moved in a way that I…don’t generally feel like moving.  I saw many leads leading what looked like a mangled Lindy Hop, which I very much didn’t want to do.  So I felt that I would have been lost even if I’d wanted to dance. That is, even if the music made me want to move to it.  And I hate to say this for fear of repercussions but… I don’t think I like soul music.  Jerry Almote once wrote something along the lines of “If you don’t like soul music, there’s something wrong with you.”  I guess he was talking to me.  Well, when I was talking to Soo at the beginning of the Soul party, I came to realize that I was being a downer and I didn’t want to bring anyone else down so I took off.  I hope everyone else there had oodles of fun, but I think I would have lessened it for some poor people.

As for flirting: I wasn’t trolling for anything, but I know of many instances when people have gotten together, either for something lasting or for something fleeting, at large events like this one.  I’m single now and I’m interested in new romantic encounters, so I tried to be open to that this weekend.  I think I felt some sparks here and there but frankly, I had no idea what to do about it in the circumstances.  There were always so many other people around and there was no easy escape location and I generally wanted to attend the next scheduled event more than take time away for flirty mischief. Maybe if the event had been in a place where there was an attached or nearby “away” space where people could duck out to do non-event things, I might have tried harder. Like a convention center or a hotel+ballroom. “Hey, wanna go chill out in Ballroom D for a while?” just seems more likely to lead somewhere than, “Hey, feel like walking out in the rain to my rental car and then driving no less than 10 minutes to somewhere away from fun events we might miss in order to chill for a while?” I suppose it may also have helped if I’d actually done any of the social things that the other attendees did, like eating together or… talking to each other or… being around each other.  Hmm.  Oh, well.  I met and got reaquainted with many attractive and interesting women and there’s certainly nothing wrong with that.

And for my own dancing? I’m happy to say, I think I got my groove back. I definitely danced with a few dancers where I got the “nice!” or “that was cool!” comments, and the live bands certainly played music to inspire. I’m feeling good about Lindy Hop again. I hope it sticks. Maybe I should dose myself with a daily regimen of Lindy dance clips from various international events to keep the juices flowing. It would be like a swing dancing vitamin. Or the hair of the dog.

I’m planning to go to Jam Cellar tonight and I hope I’ll keep on attending these dance events that I’m so fortunate to have local to me. I hope it stays fun.

I’ll work at it.