Day 4

Officially day 4.

...he wrote many, many hours ago. It's now 11:41pm on this rainy Friday night. I don't know if it's raining anymore, but it was raining when I was out earlier today and that likely colored most of my mood. I had a pretty decent day, actually. The temperature was perfectly early 60s and it was dreary, not very windy a little rainy with a nip in the air. It was autumn like I forgot existed in this humid, Tennessee 90+ degree weather of the past few weeks. Today felt good though. I still am far from being put together, but it was the first day, stemming from coming home last night, when I felt like I was comfortable being here. It was the first day where I've thought back into my mind and remembered that I live in Nashville, which is still kind of crazy, but it felt commonplace. Walking outside of this little restaurant with my brother and his girlfriend to my bike in the wet air, it felt like my surroundings were a blanket again. Like I could run this town. And I was comfortable. I think the problem with thinking rationally about my potential for a relationship with this woman is that we're so fucking far away from each other, that it doesn't even seem real. I see women who do nothing for me and that immediately makes me think of her, but those thoughts seem outrageous because there's nothing I can do with those thoughts. They're just little things I get to mentally explore, but I think I still ultimately feel dejected about this whole thing because it doesn't feel like anything. It specifically feels like nothing and that's confusing. I should feel stronger about this, but what's that going to do? It's going to leave me right where I am, just more or less still resolute in my current state of stasis about it. I mean, motherfucker I want her to stay in my life because something may happen in the future and I just enjoy her, but right now that all just seems like me wasting her time and making everything so much more difficult for her. I so wish I knew what was on her mind, but maybe that's the real point of this. We're allowing the communication to breakdown on it's own without communicating until another couple Mondays from now. I'm so very curious to see where we stand on the 10th. This is all going to feel like a dream. And any further written discussion with myself and then with her when that eventually happens will likely seem absurd. Hopefully we don't start this process all over. We very well may, but I think when we eventually start talking to each other again, it's going to be like taking a breath. It'll be a rare feeling of breathing though, I think. It'll be the realization that we've been breathing this whole time and then taking a full, deep-lung breath and that you've been making a mistake this whole time, but it's okay because something finally came back to normal. I don't know if that makes sense, but it does to me in this moment. I feel okay about this. It's horribly upsetting and my future of having a functional relationship with a woman gets more and more distant. But. I feel okay right now. Happy October.

Day 3

It's far enough into Day 3 that it's Day 4. I went to my first proper concert, so that whole sobriety plan didn't last too long. There was such a small likelihood that I was going to attend a hard rock show stone cold sober. That said, now I'm a little intoxicated and a little agitated. I don't know if that's entirely true. I think I should have written down my thoughts before all of this happened because I'm in an interestingly different spot now than I was hours ago. Maybe I should just call this day. Maybe I just leave my drunkenness where it is and move on in the morning. This is my fucking problem right now when it comes to drinking, I don't have my sober thoughts in order, so my drunken thoughts take far more effort to align themselves.

You see, this is the problem, when you're out and about and drinking and roaming around and having a good time, all is well. When I get home and my brain becomes mush, it's fucking depressing. I don't want to wade around in this any longer. I had so many things I wanted to write about, but I'm going to call it because I can't handle this right now. I need to go to sleep.

Day 2

It's day 2. I've been in Nashville almost a month now and my roommate still hasn't moved down here yet. I'm trying to figure out how much longer I wait before I just tell him to shit or get off the pot. I can't afford $1300/month plus utilities and eating everyday on my own, this is ridiculous. I need his financial help.

I just spoke to my brother and his girlfriend who seem completely disinterested in finding out why I'm actually out of sorts, they just want to talk about this roommate thing or something completely irrelevant. They say that he's using his father's overbearing nature as a scapegoat to not actually pay me and then ultimately not actually move down here. I feel like I have no one to talk to. I don't know if I really did it on purpose, because I feel like I'm often reaching out to people, but either no one wants to listen or I'm really living on an island right now. I feel unprecedentedly alone right now. There's moments when I just start mumbling and talking to myself because I realize it sometimes is days at a time before I actually speak to another person. And I fucking love talking to other people. I got excited without even realizing it, to talk to the folks at the Post Office and joke with them. I wanted to go back and hand my bit of mail off to them and was actually a little nervous to go back and say thanks for their help and then disappointed to turn around to see a line has formed. I should adjust me previous statement: It's less that I love talking to people, but I love interacting with people, strangers and all. These are loner thoughts. The ramblings of someone unusually isolated.

I'm feeling sort of paralyzed about this whole "her" situation. There's really only three things that can happen. I bet I'll forget an option by the end of this. The first thing is that she breaks up with her boyfriend and we figure out how to be together (the least likely option). The second thing is that she stays with her boyfriend, continues to live her life and we continue to not speak to each other (perhaps the healthiest, but second least likely option). The third thing is just like the second: she stays with her boyfriend and we submit to the fact that we're just going to be friends. The lattermost option is easily the most likely and the most emotionally irresponsible because it's not technically possible. Sure, it's theoretically feasible, but it's practically ridiculous. I don't mean to go all 17-year-old Evan-logic on you here and quote the ever-depressing and partially misleading When Harry Met Sally, men and women can't be friends. The sexual attraction is always going to get in the way. We can say we're going to be friends, but we'll always want something else to happen. And in the mean time, she'll still be with her boyfriend and she'll inadvertently sabotage herself and her relationship, and then we're stuck with the sneaky fourth option: We're both not in relationships, but we're still apart and we become so disconnected from who we both really are because we'd never be friends in the same fucking room during this whole process and then any attempt to actually be together might work, but it'd be so goddamn dramatic that at that point we would have built it up so much and would have likely changed as people in the interim that it wouldn't work. Or it would, but the work would be regressive, not progressive and ultimately profoundly painful. The sneaky fourth option as a by-product of the third option is probably the scariest one because it seems the most honest and realistic. I don't want to think about this anymore.

Life is just so goddamn short. This would be yet another opportunity for happiness that I've squandered and let walk right by. I just don't know.

Day 1

It's days like today when I realize I've been really numbing myself to the world for a long time and alcohol has been a major catalyst for that. Alcohol and the internet work excellent as distractions from your own reality. And I've been drowning myself in both of those things for a long time now, but none more so than the past couple weeks. I need to get the fuck out of this apartment, but I should write something down. I don't know what's going to happen between us. What happens when the dust settles over these two weeks? Are we out of each others lives? I have a feeling that's what's going to happen. We can't stay in and stay sane, I don't know what the other option is. Right? I mean, she's not going to break up with her boyfriend to be in an already long term relationship, that's psychotic. This house being built is going to drive me up the fucking wall. I think this is the first time since college that I've pined for the weekend or felt the need to turn the music up to drown out another sound, holy shit. I even wonder if she would consider visiting me, or what's going to happen if I were to go up there and visit her. I couldn't conceivably do that for a couple months, probably, but honestly I could make it a two day trip and it'd be pretty easy. This is just such a tricky thing. I want to be with her, but it seems fucking impossible right now. Is this the most important thing? It's the only thing I find myself thinking about anymore. Why have a built this shell around myself though? I keep telling myself to move on. Maybe that's the easier thing, but whenever I think about it I make myself stop thinking about it. No progress is being made and maybe that's why I'm so easy to continually say that nothing is going to come of this. These two weeks or this relationship. Maybe I have to submit to the fact that we emotionally passed each other like ships in the night. I haven't wanted to be in a relationship like this before, it's exciting and it relaxes me when I imagine what our life could be like together, but I've never been in a truly functional relationship, really, so what the fuck do I know. I know myself far more than when I was 18 and in my last relationship. It's just so damn tricky. She's like 880 some miles away from me, we'd have to submit to changing our lives. Man, she should just move with me to New Zealand or Australia. She'd fucking love those places. The future with her looks more and more bleak with each passing day as I get calmer. We'll see how I feel in two weeks. I'll keep this open and try to post at the end of each day. I'm going to go deposit this check, go find a green space to do some reading and maybe grab some grub somewhere. Financially, I should just grab my rice and chicken sausage and call it there. We'll see.

I'm gonna detox. I'm going to cold turkey this alcoholism until next Tuesday, that'll be my goal. Instead, I'm gonna start working out, finally go find a court I can shoot some hoops first thing in the morning. I think the alcohol has clouded my ability to really process this whole thing. I need to take better care of myself and take further control over my mind and then over my life. I'm not sure if things would be different if I had taken everything more seriously over the past few years. I don't even know if it was for a lack of taking things seriously, but I probably let opportunities literally walk past me because I wasn't paying attention. My mind was getting more dejected and more irreverent. I need to reverse this trajectory I'm on. I think this two week process is going to turn more into self-reflection than analysis over what's going to happen with her. In a lot of ways, that's for her to decide. Both of our happinesses are at stake here, but neither of us really owe the other anything.

Let's further this deal. You're going to spend the next two weeks bettering yourself. Relaxing your mind without the assistance of drugs and alcohol (which is a drug, you love to neglect that addictive detail). Drink more water. After you finish going through House for the umpteenth time or even in the middle of that, fight the urge to just soak up more TV. You've been reading Catch 22 for months now. When you really sat down to read it, you read 80 pages. Sure, it's a fucking long book but you're enjoying it. You feel better when you read. Change your habits, buddy, it's not so tricky.

See you tomorrow.

Day 0

First of all, hey. I haven't written to myself in a very long while. It's probably for the best that now is the time for me to restart this whole process. Me and this woman made a deal that we wouldn't speak to each other for a full two weeks so that we both have some time to think. I'm fully aware of the context, but I suppose it makes the most sense to rap this out. Speaking of which, there's this poolhall down the street from where I live here on Edgehill that has free pool Sunday nights; I went there last night and they had MF Doom on the jukebox. Maybe 5 or 6 songs from Mm..Food. What the fuck was that about? They had the Death Proof Soundtrack, some Elvis, some Zeppelin, some DOOM? Who casually throws DOOM tracks into a jukebox in the south. What the hell was that about? It was awesome, but confusing enough to not put anything on. I tossed on The Coasters, Spoon and Zeppelin. Anyway, yeah sure. Context. Goddamn it Spencer Krug's voice in Bang Your Drum on this Wolf Parade track just makes me feel like I know everything about indie music in the 21st century and that's just a lie. Jesus, OKay, approximately 21 or 22 days ago, I moved from Minneapolis to Nashville. Maybe two weeks later, my emotional restlessness reached it's peak. There was this woman I used to live with (with four other people, mind you) who I've had feelings for since well before we lived together. We both knew that it would be interesting living together. What we both neglected to consider that we're both the kind of people that wouldn't make it that big of a deal and it actually ended up being a pretty calm situation. However, I've been latently in love with this woman for an unbelievable amount of time. She makes me more comfortable than almost anyone. And I know what you're thinking, Evan, why do you always go for the top shelf with your proclamations about the women you're with? Everything is everything all the time with you. Your evasion of melodrama exudes melodrama. To that I say what every emotionally exhausted person would say in that scenario: This situation is different. Easy, throw away sentence, I know. Here's why it's different: This hasn't been happening for a couple of months. This has been bubbling away for actual years now. The reason it seems appropriate to use those inadvertently throw away sentences is because maybe a week or so ago, in my aforementioned emotional unrest over moving so far away (not that far, really, but you get my point you over-critical wank), I had to send her something I had written that explained the serious feelings I have and have had for her, the respect I feel for her and basically fully opening up and letting my emotions run out about almost all the things that had been on my mind in her regard for what feels like such a long time. We talked passionately for the past however many days, I can't even keep track at this point, my perception of time in this regard is all nonsense.

I'll fragment this with time and altered states of mind. I've been drinking, plan on it for the rest of the night, and made a deal. That deal is this: For the next two weeks, her and I won't speak to each other, I'm going to either drink not at all or significantly less (which of those two options seems more likely to you), and I'm going to write about how I'm doing and the situation as it stands to really get some things out in the open. I think the alcohol has really stunted my emotional grasp on the situation. I love her though. I feel for her differently than I have for most people. I feel immediately comfortable, like I could be around her forever because of how calm she makes me. She challenges me in an interesting way. I have to be radically honest here, I've thought about marrying her more times than I can even remember. And now, thinking about that, I think it's more just the idea of the two of us being together for a really long time. But, she has a boyfriend. She just signed a lease to be with him for another year, both legally and emotionally, which is a fucked up combination of details. I just moved far away from her to Nashville. Physically, right now, we can't be together. Here's the rub though: If we really wanted it to happen, we'd make it happen. I think that even though this has been on our minds for years, it still seems so new, but so aged and that's what's pissing us both off and is destroying our ability to think rationally about it. Fuck I've slept on this Wolf Parade album for far too long, holy shit. I always loved the line in 'I'll Believe In Anything,' "Nobody knows you, and nobody gives a damn either way." For some reason I heard 'Apologies To The Queen Mary,' heard the one-two punch of the aforementioned and 'Dear Sons And Daughters Of Hungry Ghosts,' and called it a day.

Anyway. This is Day 0. I won't post this until I'm about to go to sleep, so that as I get progressively more drunk I can write things down. I wish I would have never stopped doing this. It's chaotic, but it's such an excellent way to keep my thoughts in order. I think Spencer Krug's voice just makes me think of a more throaty Britt Daniel. Wolf Parade and Spoon are interesting to think about as similar. Goddamn it. I just want to talk to her about everything. Maybe this is selfish. Maybe this is what it feels like to pine for being in a relationship. I've always felt like she's understood me. I always dismissed a relationship with her because it always seemed like it would never happen. Whenever I really thought about it, a relationship really made functional sense. I think it mostly made sense because we're the same kind of crazy. At least that what it feels like. But at the end of the day, I feel like I could make her happy because all I want for her is to be happy. Something I think about a lot is that....goddamn it I want her to listen to these Hop Along songs. Okay. Something I think about a lot is how much her body and brain need the catharsis of going dancing. I don't currently have it in me to be the man in that situation, however, if she needs to go dance and simply be, I have no qualms whatsoever with her being temporarily with another person for the sake of release. Openly communicating can come with other aspects of being in an open relationship. I think that sense of physical honesty is necessary. I want to talk to her right now. It seems like the only thing that makes sense. But it's all selfish. I want to dump my interests onto her. I just want to talk to her about music, but that's even more selfish because it's all music that I enjoy. I'm going to do something else now. Oohhh goddamn. I so badly wanted to just use the phrase "Tits & acid" as an exclamation, but then I was swiftly reminded that context and information are key and that using a Simian Mobile Disco song next to no one thinks about as an exclamation would seem offensive or at the very least uselessly unrelated.

I started writing this around 10pm, just after the debate.

I think this means I have to drink all of this beer.

and now it's the following day and I'm a fuckin' mess.