Sunday, May 29, 2005

Update via Google

I just Googled "Karen's" real name and found out that in September of last year, someone with her name and birthdate (11/10/72) reported a rock busting the windshield on her '03 Ford to the cops in Wisconsin. Yep, she drove a black Ford when I dated her. Don't know how to feel about this one. Sure, it's some bad luck for her, so I should be thrilled, but I can't help but wonder, was this a purposeful rock through her windshield? Did she not learn anything from screwing me up the ass and wound up doing it to someone who reacted worse than I did? Will the rock stop her? If not, will my next Google produce her death certificate? More questions than answers I guess, which is why I shouldn't be Googling her in the first place.

And yes, I know of all the things she's doing at midnight on a Saturday night, Googling me ain't one of them. Yes, I know I'm pathetic. I have no reasons for my actions, just a very unhealthy obsession with that woman. It is what it is.

Saturday, May 28, 2005

Totally Honest Personal Ads

Someone in an internet group posted what her personal ad would look like if she was raw and totally honest. I wish everyone's personal ad would be raw and totally honest. Then I could seek out the really desperate women, the ones I actually would have a shot at. Here's my Totally Honest Personal Ad:


SEEKING SOMEONE WHO UNDERSTANDS ME

Hi. SBM, 29, 6'1", obese, have no life, sometimes have no clue. My hobbies include fantasizing, video games, televised sports and fantasy leagues. I'm very lonely and have very low self-esteem, so I've settled for fat, ugly lovers who didn't respect themselves or else they never would have slept with me. ISO a woman that normal people would describe as not hideous. Must be smart, hygienic, and not frigid. Must be able to know within a half-hour of meeting me that I'm desperate and lonely and I will treat her like a queen for the rest of her natural life just out of thanks for being with me. Independence not necessary; if she lets me take care of her, I might trust her not to dump me for a better catch ten seconds after I bring her home. I don't demand much else, just that I'm a good man, looking for a good woman, so we can create some good children.

Grade A Product

Much to my surprise, it appears that I am going to swing an A out of each of the four classes I took this semester, which just ended this past Thursday. The general math was a breeze, and the social science was no problem once I made up the data for my research paper and wound up getting a perfect score for that. I still needed to get 22 questions right out of 50 on my final to get an A based on raw percentage, but since I showed up every class and participated, I'm sure the teacher would have given it to me even if I had fallen short on the final. But I got a 44 on the final, so I didn't have to beg. But the English grade and the humanities grade were up for grabs. I was averaging a B+ in humanities before the final, which was all about architecture. We were shown twelve slides and we had to identify the landmark, where it was, and the creator and style. But the teacher was nice enough to make the test where the creator and style were extra credit points instead of mandatory, and as a result, my score on the final pushed my final grade just barely into the A range. The English 102 was the most nail-biting. The teacher was a French-Haitian man who was the epitome of arrogance the whole semester. Our first paper was back in February, and he actually told the class that out of the close to 30 papers, only five were passing quality, meaning D or better. My B was the best, according to him, but I refuse to believe that only four other people in that room could write a passing paper. Needless to say, there were less than half of the original students left by the time this final paper was due Thursday. I was averaging an A- on the three papers we were assigned before this final, so I needed to get a great score to secure the A. It was an eight- to ten-page research/argument paper, and mine was nine pages and tight enough to get an A, in my opinion. But this teacher couldn't bear to give me an A on this final paper because he thought it would be such a bear that it would break even the best writers in the class. It didn't break me. I even turned it in Tuesday so that he could grade it by Thursday so that I could pick it up and walk out of his office and never see him again. 90-100 is an A. My paper's grade? 89. He just couldn't stand to give me an A on the final paper. But it's okay, because that 89 wasn't low enough to drag my overall average under 90, so he's going to have to give me an A for the course whether he wants to or not. The rat bastard.

I'm celebrating by flying back to Minneapolis next Thursday and spending two days and nights with "Torrie." I'm still giving serious consideration to moving up there this summer, despite the loud protests of my aunt, and the rest of my family and friends when/if I ever tell them. I may just run up there and not tell anybody just to avoid the yelling and drama. It would not be a situation of moving in with Torrie and trying to get married to her anytime soon, like I intended to do with "Karen" in Wisconsin. I would not accept moving in with anyone unless something happened where I wound up unemployed. There's not exactly a job waiting for me there, but Torrie's job is taking calls at a call center for a company that's expanding, so they have been hiring at a good clip, and it's over $12/hr. to start. Not Sunshyn money, but not bad. ;) So I'd go up there for that job, I'd go to school next fall during the hours that I wouldn't be working, day or night, and if things go great between me and Torrie, fine, but if they didn't work out, if these different internet groups are any indication, there are many more women in Minnesota wanting a big black man in their lives. And I'm willing to gamble that they aren't nearly as stuck-up and arrogant as the Chicago women, so I might actually have a chance with them. BTW, I'm even less optimistic about me and Torrie having a future because she just informed me yesterday that she's pulling a "Sarah" on me and making out with girls, but it's not a cheating situation because "playing with girls" has nothing to do with me. She didn't volunteer this information. She asked me if I had fucked anyone since I last saw her because she wanted to protect herself from my potential promiscuity, but when I told her I had not done anything and asked her if she had, this woman that's so concerned about protecting herself and being responsible told me that she sucked face with a total stranger at a gay bar, but it was okay since no bodily fluids were swapped besides saliva. Yep, I sure can pick em.

I'll spend some time with my family this holiday weekend before I spend time with Torrie next week. I'll be able to determine which scenario is more desirable for me: Living with my family, living near Torrie, or continuing to live alone, hiding from the world. Or, since my decision making has sucked dick the last few years, maybe I'll draw an option out of a hat.

Sunday, May 22, 2005

Why Are Men Happier?

Stolen from an MSN group--thanx Peter!

Why Are Men Happier?

Your last name stays put.
The garage is all yours.
Wedding plans take care of themselves.
You can be president.
You can never be pregnant.
You never have to worry if your white T-shirt gets wet.
Car machanics tell you the truth.
The world is one big urinal place for you.
You never have to stop and think of which way to turn a bolt or nut.
Same work,more pay.
Wedding dress-$4000.Tux rental-$100.
People never stare at your chest when you're talking to them.
New shoes don't cut ,blister or mangle your feet.
One mood all day long.
Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat.
A weeks vacation only requires 1 suitcase.
You can open all your own jars.
If some one forgets to invite you,he or she will still be your friend.
Your underwear is $8.95 for a three-pack.
Three pairs of shoes is more than enough.
You are unable to see wrinkels in your cloths.
Every thing on your face stays its original color.
Your hairstyle last for years.
You dont have to shave lower than your neck.
You can wear shorts no matter how your legs look like.
You can do your nails with a pocket knife.
You have the freedom of choise concerning to grow a mustache.
You can do Christmas shopping for 25 relations on December the 24th in 25 minutes.
The line up fot the gents toilets are 80% shorter.
We can apply of a job and no one will look at our butts.
All our orgasms are real.
We can go to the toilet on our own.
If they criticize our work we dont panic cause "every one hates me"
We can get showered and dressed in 10 minutes.
None of our co-workers can make us cry.
We dont have to crawl up against a hairy ass at night.
If you still single at 31,no one will fuss about it.
Where ever you are you can always eat a banana.
Fore play is only an option.
It doesnt matter if you had a hair cut,no one will notice it any way.
You can wear a T-shirt and still jump up and down.
We never have a problem at a self service gas station.
We know 20 differant ways how to open a beer bottle.
What ever we wear,we can sit down with our legs open.
Grey hair and wrinkels just gives us more character.
If we wanna scrath our "nuts"we dont have to leave the room.
With 4,000,000,000 sperm cells at a time,in theory we can multipley the world population in 15 orgasms.
The remote contole is yours and yours alone.
You can find all the sport channels on the tv.
If some one wears the same cloths as you,he's your friend for life.
If you go and visit some one,no one expects you to bring any thing.
If you buy condoms no one behind the counter will give you that look.
And we dont even have to like some one to have sex with them.

Saturday, May 21, 2005

Interesting Week

I actually got out of the house again last weekend. I went to a Ring of Honor wrestling event in Chicago Ridge last Saturday. The night before, I met my friend "Drew" and his girlfriend downtown and took the Metra to his house in Park Forest, IL. Usually we stay up all night and play poker with Drew's mother and brother, and "Ronnie" if he decides to come there. We did play poker Sunday, but not Friday or Saturday because Drew's mother was comped a room at Trump Casino and she, his brother, and his brother's family were spending Friday night there. So Drew, his girlfriend, and I had dinner Friday night at Buffalo Wild Wings, then I won $100 playing online poker at Drew's house. Saturday Drew and I got Burger King, and let me tell you, I never appreciated BK more because there were two of them near my old job and I could go to either of them right now since my school is near my old job, but they both closed. And I can't eat McDonald's because that shit is just toxic. If my stomach can handle White Castle and Taco Bell and all the other junk food I eat, it should tell you something that it can't handle Mickey D's.

Then Saturday evening, Ronnie continued to try to impress his current girlfriend by telling the guys going to the wrestling match (me, Drew, and his brother) to wait until he got to Drew's house so that he could drive us the 40 minutes to the match even though he wasn't going, then he and his girlfriend would perhaps go to Navy Pier and wait the three hours for the event to end, then pick us up and go somewhere for dinner. There was no reason for him to do that other than he was trying to show his girl what a magnanimous guy he is. If the pussy wasn't there I guarantee he never would have made that offer because there was nothing in it for him. As it turned out, Drew called him to come pick us up when the steel cage was being constructed for the main event because we figured it should be about 15 minutes for the cage plus about 20 minutes for the match. But Ronnie arrived fairly quickly, and there were problems with the cage, so when he got there, the main event had not even started yet. Ronnie made the mature decision to not wait for us and took off for Mokena, which is near Park Forest. I can say he wouldn't have been that much of an asshole if he didn't already know that Drew's brother had driven to the wrestling match by himself and therefore could drive us back to Park Forest, but I'm not 100% certain. We met Ronnie and his girl coincidentally at the same Buffalo Wild Wings, had a late dinner, and made plans to get together the next day.

Ronnie and I used to be in a bowling league together, and we're very competitive when we bowl against each other, not yelling at each other competitive, but silently concentrating on the game like it was a PBA Tour event. Since he will never admit that I am a better bowler, he never asks me to go bowling with him unless he's feeling like he has to build his self-esteem, and having this new girlfriend certainly qualifies, so at his suggestion, Sunday evening he, his girlfriend, Drew, Drew's girlfriend, and I all went bowling. The last time we went bowling was before I met "Karen" or "Sarah," so almost two years ago. And Ronnie had another advantage: He knows that I generally don't do as well bowling with a house ball and shoes as opposed to my own bowling ball and shoes, which were back at home on the North Side of Chicago, a good hour plus away not counting traffic. He was going to leave it up to me to bitch about not having my gear and look like I was a wuss. But I went anyway. I had not bowled myself since late last year, so I started very rusty, and as a result, Ronnie actually beat me the first two games. I even offered to bet him the second game, since I finished the first game pretty well, but he declined. But after the second game, feeling full of himself, he waited until I had pried off the rental shoes before announcing, "Okay Dre, it's time for you and me, one on one, the main event, what everyone came to see." He then bet some money on himself, but he bet with Drew, not with me. I wasn't about to put money against him after losing the first two games. But I should have, because I forgot how tight his asshole gets when there's money involved and the score is close late in the game. I beat him 150-99.

The night wasn't over, of course, because Ronnie would not let me win a contest against him in front of his girlfriend. That was the point of going bowling, not to have fun, but to show his white girl that he was the bigger nigger. So despite everyone being tired, we went to Drew's house to play an '80s trivia game, which he won by one question over me after I had a big lead. And I guarantee you, if I would have won that game, a long night of poker would have followed, anything to prove that he was better than me. But finally, after the game was over around 3A, everyone left. I got about 4 and a half seconds of sleep before Drew's crazy-sounding alarm went off, and we hopped on the Metra, he to go to work and me to go home. And boy, was I sore. Just imagine two 340-lb. black guys heaving bowling balls as hard as you can, competing in a silly tug-of-war, the latest in a ten-year rivalry. I would've soaked in my tub when I got home, but I was too tired to run the damn water.

I was on track for a regular week of night school when I was met by the head of the English department Thursday on my way to math class. Just like last year when he surprised me by telling me that I had won a scholarship for an essay I wrote, he surprised me again by telling me that the teachers union banquet where I would have received my award last year was canceled at that time because the union was on strike and had more important things to worry about, but now the banquet was the next day, Friday, and would I like to come and stand up and be announced? I said sure. So I made a trip to Greektown yesterday, at a restaurant called the Parthenon. I had a great meal, several courses of authentic Greek cuisine, gyros, rack of lamb, Greek salad...I was stuffed. And when the announcement was made for my award after several other students had received theirs, I guess the people involved with the scholarship did not want me to come to the stage and receive nothing, since they already awarded me the $500 prize last year, so they had another envelope ready for me this time, with a check for an extra $100. Fucking awesome! As with the first check, I was honored and stunned, and I couldn't thank them enough.

That doesn't solve my problem of what I'm going to do with myself this summer though. I'm still wrestling with my sensible option of moving back with my uncle and not having to pay so much in rent, but sacrificing my independence, my less-than-sensible option of staying here in Chicago and continuing to look for work, and my "OH MY GOD, ARE YOU FUCKING HIGH?!?" option of packing up and moving to another part of the country that I've never even visited just as a change of scenery, since I can't get a job or get laid in Chicago. I have to make a decision soon, as my unemployment runs out in July. But no matter what, receiving this award from school and receiving the compliments I've received about my blog (hey Keish!) means that I will continue to write and continue to go to school and work towards a degree some day. I may have low self-esteem, but apparently I can write my ass off.

Saturday, May 14, 2005

My History (4th In A Series)

This is the story of my first love, how we got together, and how poorly I reacted to everything that happened between us. I'll call her "Giselle."

This is a perfect day for me to talk about Giselle, because today, May 14, is her 27th birthday. So I get to talk about the epitome of a stubborn Taurus, for no matter how many times I insulted her and called her a whore or a slut for no reason, she stayed by my side for three years. Why would I continue to berate someone that was obviously down for me all that time or else she would have left? Because that's how low my self-esteem was back then. I thought, if she spends this much time with me, what happens when she meets real men? She must really get busy with them. Of course, I didn't take into account her many physical maladies that made her arguably the least attractive girl in high school and made almost every other guy except me shrink away in horror. But I did worry because her self-esteem was very low as well, and if she had a chance to upgrade to a better boyfriend, I couldn't see a reason why she wouldn't. And as we all know, guys fuck anything.

Here is her list of physical problems, just to get it out of the way and paint the picture of her: First, she was very fat, something I really couldn't focus on since I was also very fat, but still...she was about 5'9", 220 lbs. when I first met her in late 1992. She had gained about 50 lbs. by the time we broke up three years later. And it wasn't the sexy, juicy kind of fat that a lot of women have. She did not carry it well at all. It was mostly in the belly and ass, not a round Bonita Applebum ass either, but a large, wide rump that beeped when she backed up like a garbage truck. Sometimes during sex she would try to ride the top, and my chest would literally start hurting like I was having a heart attack trying to support all that weight on me. One minor thing about her that other people could notice: These hideous brown spots on her front teeth that looked like she had been eating shit or something chocolate. They didn't go away ever, and she did brush, but these stains just stayed there at all times. Her explanation: Something about a botched dental exam that she didn't have the money to fix. Something more major that other people could notice: Her feet stuck out in opposite directions when she walked, and combined with her weight, she couldn't avoid looking like a waddling duck every time she went anywhere. Her explanation: Her ankles had been broken so many times over the years from general clumsiness that they just healed that way. The most major thing that other people could notice: Her one eye. Yes, she had a glass eye, her left one, and it was obvious because she couldn't keep it straight, so it was always looking at something else when she was trying to look at you. It even rolled back in her head once during sex, so that when she smiled and told me she loved me afterwards, all I saw in the left eye socket was white. I'm shocked that I didn't throw up. Her explanation: Something about her father fighting in Vietnam and catching Agent Orange and passing it on to her once he came back and conceived her, and she had to have her eye removed when she was two years old or risk losing both eyes by letting it progress. Other things that others didn't notice: A huge scar underneath her belly button (knifed in a gang fight, which totally went against her personality, although she did live in the Rockwell Gardens projects); one breast being slightly smaller than the other; a very sick habit of picking her nose and then putting the results in her mouth; and a story about having been raped a year before she met me that I didn't quite believe because she still lived in the same place that it happened, the aforementioned Rockwell Gardens, even though she had family that she could have gone to live with. Then again, being raped would explain why she came after me...she wanted to get a dick of her own choosing inside of her as soon as possible to get over that experience, and I was the ugliest dick in the school, so there was less chance of me turning her down.

So here's how our initial meeting came about: I was a junior in October 1992, never had sex, never had a date, thinking I would be a virgin forever. Giselle was a sophomore. We had a mutual friend, "Sherry," a cute Asian chick that I had the hots for. During the tryouts for the theater department's attempt at a production of Les Miserables, I was sitting near Sherry because I didn't know anyone else in the room since I didn't hang with the theater crowd. It was there that Sherry introduced me to Giselle, but it wasn't a fireworks, love-at-first-sight situation. My initial thoughts were, "She's ugly...big ass though." And that was it. I totally forgot about her and went back to flirting with Sherry and some white girl that had an early case of jungle fever. Apparently Giselle really liked what she saw of me for some reason, because a few days later a common male friend of ours gave me a piece of notebook paper with her name at the top, and the entire body of the letter consisted of the lyrics to the song "If Only You Knew" by Patti LaBelle. Naturally, I thought someone was playing a joke on me, since I had never had a girl express any interest in me. That first time I met Giselle was so underwhelming to me that I didn't recognize at all the name on the letter. I had no clue who gave me the note. And while I kept the letter and kinda floated for the next few days at the thought of having a secret admirer, I still thought it might be a joke since whoever this person was had not approached me to claim ownership of the letter.

Giselle sent another note a week later saying how much she liked me, but because again she was not stepping to me to claim responsibility, I shook it off as a prank. I didn't even suspect Giselle; after all, we were going to the same rehearsals for Les Miserables every day, and she never said a word to me. But one day after winning a small amount of money from a classmate in a sports bet, I invited Sherry out to lunch, totally intending to make a move on her. And during a lunch where I was going to tell Sherry how much I liked her, she put a stop to all that by telling me who my "secret admirer" was, and when she described her as the girl she introduced me to at Les Miserables tryouts, I was shocked. Like I said, we had plenty of opportunities to talk in the weeks since the tryouts, but she didn't approach me, and I honestly wasn't interested, so I didn't approach her. Turns out she was very, very shy, maybe even more than I always have been.

The next move was now on me, since I knew who she was and she was basically waiting for me to respond to her notes. I arranged to meet her in the lunchroom, and I arrived confident since I knew who I was looking for and I knew she had the hots for me. I no longer thought it was a prank, because it had gone too far for anyone to keep a prank like that going and because there were too many people that were friends of hers coming up to me and confirming her attraction to me. She wasn't as confident, however. I found her literally curled up under a lunch table, nervous and shaking but smiling as she always did. I helped her up off the floor, we made some small talk, and we agreed to go to a movie a week later after school on a half-day. We hung out and talked between classes for the next week, and those times along with rehearsals were the only times we could talk because she said that her family didn't have a phone. So we really didn't have a conversation longer than ten minutes until our first date. That's when she told me about the rape and the gang fight and the ankles and all that.

That first date was actually very cute, because I had no experience with women, so I didn't really know how to treat her. On the bus to the theater at Ford City Mall (which was a good hour plus away from our school on the bus, but we chose there just because the movie Malcolm X was playing there at 3:00P as a matinee and it would only cost us $3.50 each), I didn't sit next to her because, well, she wasn't my girlfriend so I didn't know if she wanted me to sit next to her. She sat next to me once she saw that I was as nervous as she was. Once we got to the theater, I loosened up a little because it was dark, and I put my arm around her. During a slow part where Malcolm visited Mecca, she curled into my arm to the point where her face was right there if I turned to her side. It would be an obvious invitation for intimacy to a normal guy, so of course I turned the other way. She then said the fateful words, "I get the feeling you want to kiss me." I smiled at her and turned the other way again. About thirty seconds later, something flashed through my mind along the lines of, "If I try to kiss her, I don't think she'll refuse me. She just might actually want me to kiss her." So I said out loud, "What the hell," and turned and kissed her. The funny part is that since I had never kissed anyone before, I expected to peck her on the lips and go back to the movie. Instead, she met me with nothing but tongue, and instinctively I responded. We later watched the movie again on tape and timed how long our kiss was with a stopwatch. It was about six minutes, nonstop.

Now, at this point we were a cute little story, two shy people finding each other and growing as a couple, and I wanted to keep it going at a slower pace, really getting to know each other. But Giselle did not want to go slow. She had an agenda to be lovers quickly, and as a result I never learned to trust her because I didn't have time to get to know her or figure out what she was about. This first date was on December 10, and we talked on the phone once a week after the date because she said she was at a laundromat pay phone. I remember this conversation because she asked about the way I was introducing her to my friends. I was referring to her as my "friend," and she was not happy. She wanted to be known as my girlfriend, and since we were swapping spit every day after school, that wasn't an unreasonable request, but I simply didn't know her well enough to grant that title naturally. She was almost still like a stranger to me. She also told me during this talk that she wanted me to tell her that I loved her, and that was not going to happen. But that showed where her mindset was. She was looking to find love, and I was her choice to give it to her.

My birthday is December 22, but Giselle couldn't see me because she was working, but the next day she came to my house for the first time. It was Christmas break, so there was no school. She was only supposed to drop by, then we would go to a movie. We never did go to the movie. Once we got into my bedroom and figured out that my elderly grandmother wasn't concerned about me and my first girlfriend being alone in my bedroom, all hell broke loose. Of course, it took some coaxing on her part. I kissed down to her cleavage several times before going back to her neck, and finally she got frustrated and said, "I'm not stopping you." That was my first taste of a woman's breast. She waited until her hose was around her knees before telling me that she was on the rag, but I was so horny by that point that I didn't care. So my first taste of poon was also my earning of the old Red Wings. And because I wanted to do a good job, I was down there for a good half-hour before Giselle grabbed my head, looked me in the eyes and said, "Make love to me." And make love I did, for about two minutes before it started feeling too good, then it was over.

Giselle proclaimed that she loved me basically every day after that, but I didn't start returning the expression until about three weeks later, and that wasn't because of love, it was because I was sick of seeing the hurt look on her face when she would tell me that she loved me and I would not respond in kind. So in a way she brought on my distrust of her, because if we would have grown into our relationship like I wanted to, I could have learned to love her eventually. I mean, I did like her personality, always sunny and happy and a little quirky. And I did admire her, because she was a great student, ambitious and intelligent and not at all a product of her environment, which is why I couldn't believe that she was ever involved in gangs. I just had my own issues with trust. Since I had never been with a girl, no dates, no nothing, and now all of a sudden here's someone claiming that she loves me and thinks the world of me and she kinda came out of nowhere...I just had a very hard time dealing with that. Combine that with her spending every Saturday at my house fucking me and blowing me, then spending all day Sunday at home doing homework and leaving me all alone, and I started to create reasons in my mind why Giselle was with me. She would have time to be with other guys on Sundays if she was with me on Saturdays, I figured. Never mind why she would be with me in the first place if she could find other guys. This mistrust built with the hurried way she was going about things, and after about a three-month honeymoon period, I couldn't hold in my feelings anymore. It basically became a contest to see how much I could hurt her before she had enough and went away, and then I could say to myself, "See? She wasn't true to me after all, she's not with me anymore." But she wouldn't go away. No matter what hurtful things I dreamed up about her, she simply wouldn't abandon me.

And being abandoned was what my fears were really all about. Giselle made the comment one day, and I dismissed it at the time, but of course now I realize that she was right on the money. She said that I was so afraid of her leaving because my mother died suddenly when I was ten years old, and I was scared that she would suddenly leave as well. It was so true. I was simply trying to drive Giselle away before I really did fall in love with her, because I was afraid of losing her once I did fall in love with her. And as much pain as I put Giselle through trying to insult her by calling her a slut and a whore, it was very painful for me too. Every night when I tried to go to sleep, I couldn't. I had images of Giselle sucking some thug's cock in those projects she lived in. I had thoughts of her being forced into turning tricks, stemming from her claims of being raped, but then I saw how much she loved sex when she was with me, and I didn't know what I was doing, so I figured she would really love it with guys who knew how to fuck. I was basically torturing myself coming up with situations where Giselle was spending time with men much better at sex than me. No matter how much she told me she was true to me, I refused to believe it, because to believe it would mean to believe in her, which exposed me to the possibility of being abandoned by someone I love again, and it would mean to believe in myself, to believe that I was good enough to make the woman I was with happy, which just seemed impossible to me.

There's not a whole lot much more to the story. We kept going around in that circle for three years, where we'd be happy for a few days or a week, then she would do something minor like say she would find a pay phone and call but she didn't, or tell me she would be at my house at noon but not come until 1P or 2P, and I would blow it way out of proportion and accuse her of being a slut, and we'd argue, and she'd cry, and I'd apologize, and we'd have makeup sex, and she'd leave and I'd stay up for hours wondering if she was going home like she said she was or if she was going to have sex with a real man, and I'd be so worked up by the time I saw her again that another session of me calling her a whore would take place, and we'd go around in that circle again. There were two pregnancies within that three years, and both resulted in abortions at my insistence. Not only did I not believe they were mine (of course they were mine) but I had never held a job before, and I didn't think there was any way we could support a child, plus I really cared what my family thought of me and I had never been in any real trouble, so I simply didn't want them to know that I was stupid enough to have knocked Giselle up with all the birth control methods we could have used. My grandmother died in 1994, so this second pregnancy occurred when I was living with my uncle and his family in February 1995 when I was 19. He found out about that pregnancy because Giselle and I were so mad at each other that we weren't actually speaking to each other, we were writing notes back and forth while we sat in my bedroom. When we left the room, my uncle found one of the notes on my floor, and it referenced Giselle's pregnancy. He was very disappointed, but he loaned me the money to cover the abortion, and we haven't spoken about it ever since. But no one in my family knows about the first pregnancy and abortion, in the summer of 1993 when we were still in high school, and they never will know.

The end came after we got back together after the second abortion and dated the rest of the year 1995. I had a job, so she would borrow money from me often, and in pretty big sums, but even that couldn't stop her from getting tired of me not supporting her and not trusting her, and after an argument over something so minor that I forget what, we separated for a week in December. We'd done that before, but when she called after a week, I didn't agree to get back together this time. Why? Because I was tired. I was tired of staying up at night worrying about where she was and who she was doing. I was tired of being in a relationship period, I wasn't mature enough to just enjoy Giselle's company and not stress about whether she was true to me. And, truth be told, I saw some women at my new job at CBOE, like "Yasmine" and a few others, who seemed to be into me, and I wanted a full shot at them without feeling like I was cheating on Giselle. But how could I trust them if I couldn't trust Giselle after three years? It wasn't about trust, it was about finding new lovers and getting into as many women as I could in order to boost my self-esteem. So that was it. Giselle called a couple of times after we broke up just to see how I was doing, but once I made it clear that I wasn't worrying about her and that I was dating others, she moved on.

We didn't speak or see each other again for six years. We would have never seen each other again had I not been a member of Classmates.com and she had not joined in December 2001. I e-mailed her just wondering how she was doing. She wrote back excited about hearing from me. We e-mailed back and forth for a month, during which time I learned that she graduated from college, had a son, and was engaged to some guy that wasn't the father of her child. I knew exactly what his name was because when she called me from "her cell phone," his name came up in my caller ID. Despite that, and despite their wedding day being set for Friday, February 15, 2002, she claimed one night while talking to me that she still loved me, and we set up a meeting in my apartment just to catch up and see each other again. She looked the same, except much bigger and without those brown spots on her teeth. She now weighed in at about 340 lbs. But one thing had not changed: She still couldn't keep her hands off me. We kissed that day, then she came back the next week and we made love. She told me that she was breaking her engagement and that we would find a place together and raise her son and everything would work out fine. I took Valentine's Day, Thursday, February 14, off work to spend with her. The Monday before, she called to say that she had something important to talk about, but she didn't want to tell me over the phone. She wanted to come by that night to tell me, but at that time it was past 11P and she decided it was too late so she'd see me the next day. That was the last time I heard from her. She stopped answering "her cell phone," she didn't show up on Valentine's Day, and I haven't seen her since. I was crushed that whole weekend. I couldn't believe that, knowing my fear of abandonment and knowing our history, Giselle would do that to me. She called a month and a half later and left a message asking me to read an e-mail she left, but all the e-mail said was that she'd be calling later and would it be okay to talk. I wrote back to never call me again after pulling the shit that she pulled unless she was going to explain herself. She wrote back saying that she would do just that in her next e-mail, but her next e-mail wasn't until another two months later, and it didn't explain anything. All that e-mail said was that she had just gone through a bad situation and could I lend her an ear? I was still so steaming mad that I totally ignored her request, and that's the last I heard from her at all.

I suppose one could say that I got what I deserved after treating her the way I did. While I don't feel bad brushing her off after she totally abandoned me, I can understand why she still had animosity towards me. I don't completely understand why she took the angle of reuniting with me, knocking boots with me again, and then leaving me instead of just telling me how much I hurt her in the past. Maybe she wanted me one last time before she went and married this other guy. Maybe she really was going to dump this guy for me, but he physically intimidated her into staying with him. Maybe at the last minute she finally realized what I'd been telling her all those years, which is she can do much better than me. Whatever the case may be, at least I did let her know how sorry I was for treating her like shit. At least I was able to see my first love again. Long before our little reuniting I had a very strong feeling that I would see Giselle again in my lifetime, and I actually have a very strong feeling that I'll see her yet again. And at least I was able to see and hear her passion for me again, because none of my other lovers have been as crazy about me in or out of bed as Giselle was. When I'm feeling really down, I still think about the way she made me feel any time I was with her. She was down for me. She loved me more than anyone else I've ever been with. I still don't know why, but I don't question it anymore.

Wednesday, May 11, 2005

50-1?!?

No, I did not pick the horse that went off at 50-1 odds and won the 131st running of the Kentucky Derby. I didn't even come close to picking him. Usually I take a handful of horses, since there are twenty of them running in the Derby, and put a little money on each of them, reserving the most money of course for my official pick. But this year the line to make a bet was so long--about a 45-minute wait, and this was several hours before the Derby was to be run--that I decided to make whatever bets I was going to make and not get back in line again. And since I didn't already figure what horses I wanted to make bets on besides my pick, Afleet Alex, I just put down $20 to win, place, and show on my pick, and said fuck all the other horses. One thing I knew I wasn't going to do was put any money on the favorite, Bellamy Road. I just felt that Bellamy was a fluke horse, and sure enough, he finished seventh.

But the horse that won, Giacomo, was a total shock. When I look at the program right now, sitting here at home four days after the race, the only thing I see about Giacomo that would have led me to think that he had any kind of chance is that he was a good closer in his previous races. Not to say that he was winning those races--he only won once in seven lifetime races--but he did show a knack for making up ground late in those races. These were races where other Derby horses were winning, so of course one would overlook Giacomo because he wasn't winning, but make no mistake, Giacomo made up ground late in those races to take second place a couple of times and third place a couple of times. And boy did he make up ground in the Derby. For those that didn't see the race or highlights, Giacomo was in 11th place at the top of the stretch, which is about a quarter mile from the finish line. He just picked off horses one by one and finally stuck his neck in front at the end, beating a 72-1 shot, Closing Argument, and my pick Afleet Alex. Afleet Alex, by the way, led with about 1/8th of a mile left, but he just didn't have enough left to hold on. Killed me too, cause I thought I was going to pick the Derby winner for the second year in a row. But I still had fun. Got to see some boobies from the drunk coeds that start flashing in the infield about midday at every Derby, and even got a couple of pics. I don't think I'm going back without some beads, though. Most of the women flashing want beads in return, like they're at Mardi Gras, and when you have nothing to offer like me, you just feel pathetic. There was one girl flashing everyone who gave her beads and she just didn't care, and she looked right at me with my camera in hand and waited for me to give her some beads. All I could do is look at her and lie and say, "I'm all out baby, but if I had some I'd give them all to you!" She just giggled and went on to the next guy. I won't let that happen next year.

I have to thank my friend Cassandra for going with me, even though she doesn't read my blog. She knew I had an empty hotel room and I would be miserable if I had to make this trip all by myself, so she went with me, and I enjoyed her company. We ran into the usual glitches here and there involved in travel, stupid drivers, crazy people at the car rental place trying to sell us everything under the sun while neglecting what we actually paid for, a crappy hotel room (Howard Johnson Express/Airport
...extremely NOT recommended), and we even almost got into a fistfight. What happened was we saw a flyer in the hotel lobby advertising a family team of three that would shuttle anyone to the Derby or anywhere else in the area for an optional donation, and going to the Derby using that service was fine, because we left a little later than most other people. The races for the day at Churchill Downs started about 11A Eastern, so a lot of people went then, but we didn't go until close to 1P. But going back after the Derby, we called the lady who drove us that morning, and she said that one of the other two cars driven by her family would get us at the same corner that she dropped us at. The traffic was of course unreal, and as a result it was a half-hour before that same lady finally showed up. Since she was actually talking to Cassandra on her cell phone when she pulled up, we assumed that she was there for us, but others were also waiting for her at the same corner, including some drunk white guys in their 30s, and when we got to the door of the van first, one of the guys grabbed Cassandra and said "Oh no you don't! We've been waiting forever!" Cassandra snatched her arm away and correctly explained that we called for this van, but apparently so did this group, and several others as well. The same guy then opened the passenger door as if he were about to climb in anyway, but made the smart decision to back away when he saw me approaching. That was actually very funny, how belligerent and mad he was at first but then how calm he was when he saw a huge black man walking towards him, and I'm sure I didn't look very jolly, because I had just been standing for a half-hour after walking around the Derby for several hours. Cassandra and I agreed to let a few others in the van with us, and we would all eventually be dropped at our destinations. Drunk Guy was not among those we let into the van. The poor girl driving was so shaken, she called one of the other drivers and said that she wasn't answering the phone anymore the rest of the night. So next year it's either drive to the Derby and pay for parking, or find a different shuttle service, a plain old taxi perhaps.

I learned something about myself as well. I knew that I had the self-control to be in a room with a woman and not try to get busy with her, because I had to go through that with a woman I dated years ago who slept with me several times but never had sex with me. But at that time I had only been with one woman in my whole life, my high school girlfriend, so patience was something I had a lot of back then. I didn't know how much patience I would have now that I was used to knocking boots in hotels. But everything worked out okay. We even slept in the same bed, but because it was a king, we never touched each other the whole weekend. I didn't make any moves because if I was rejected the whole trip would have been ruined. Cassandra needed a little break, and we've always gotten along great, and I asked her, so she decided to go. And that was that. Sex was not part of the equation, and that was not only fine with me, but a little bit of a relief that our friendship was not going to be tested by introducing intimacy into it. Hell, maybe I won't try to have sex with anyone anytime soon. Maybe I'll throw myself into my schoolwork this summer, get a job, and figure out the next direction I want to go in my life before I worry about pussy again. At least that would be the mature thing to do.

It was just me and Cassandra all weekend, because "Ronnie" decided once I got a roommate and wouldn't be having him and his girlfriend in my room that he didn't have the money to make the trip. He actually uttered the statement that he needed to save money to get ready to go to school, and I almost laughed in his face because he hasn't ever in my presence mentioned going to school to get an actual degree. He has this certificate from a broadcasting school, and he thought that would be good enough to get him a sports broadcasting job even though his voice is so high he sounds like a girl. Needless to say he hasn't had much luck. So now that I'm in a real school he all of a sudden has to save money to go. Pathetic. He won't admit it, but hell, he got the idea of broadcasting from me. I used to play him my demo tapes from a radio class that I was in during a summer project at Columbia College, and he never once mentioned anything about being interested in broadcasting. Then we stopped talking for about a year and a half between the spring of 2001 and the winter of 2002, and all of a sudden, he had a certificate from the Illinois School of Broadcasting in Lombard, IL. And yes, I have heard him tell people that he has a broadcasting "degree," although he wouldn't admit to that either. I stopped talking to him just because of this childish rivalry that we have, and honestly I don't know why I talk to him to this day. We're so competitive that the reason we got back together in 2002 after so long was to go bowling, and trust me, he and I don't go bowling to have fun, we go to beat each other. But he can't beat me. He doesn't have the skill, and if he did, we'd bowl together a lot because then he could show off, but we haven't bowled in over a year. So if you ever thought men couldn't be as catty and vindictive as women, ask Cassandra. She saw me and Ronnie go back and forth on the phone all day Friday while we were on our way to Louisville. He chided me about leaving town so late, although we tried to leave earlier but circumstances wouldn't let us, he chided me about making a Derby pick before I looked at a program, he called once just to ask if it was raining on us yet because there were some sprinkles in the air, and he kept calling me to laugh at how far away we were from Louisville as it got darker. If my phone battery had not run out of juice Saturday, I would've had to hear him tell me how he knew that 50-1 shot had a good chance to win. How do I know he would have said that? Because he did say that Monday when he finally got a hold of me. What a guy, huh?

So anyway, at least the long-awaited Derby trip is done and now I can calm down, finish off the last few weeks of this school semester, get the 13 credits I will earn once the grades are final, and move on from there. I still don't know what I'm going to do this summer, as far as will I stay in this apartment or move with my family or strike out on my own in a new area, but I'm going to stay calm and make all my decisions with a new peace of mind. There was something very peaceful about spending a weekend with a woman that I wasn't trying to impress or get into her pants. I even managed to forget about hearing the very sad news before I left that "Sarah" apparently tried to commit suicide and was given shock treatment as a result, leaving her with a very foggy memory. "She probably wouldn't even remember you at all," Ronnie told me. He'd like that, since I was with Sarah last year and he was with her daughter. It would be just another way for him to say, "I made the right pick, and you didn't. You lost." But I don't care. I still had a great time with Sarah and I'd still make the same choice. We can't always do everything perfectly. We just have to do what feels right to us at the time.

Tuesday, May 03, 2005

R.I.P. Part 2

"Torrie" will not be going to the Kentucky Derby with me. The half-sister that died earlier this year had two sons with heart conditions, and one of them went into cardiac arrest and died. I am speechless at the streak of bad luck that Torrie and her family have endured this year, and my condolences go out to them.

I was about to give in and go to the Derby with my friend "Ronnie" and his girlfriend and share my hotel room with them, but apparently my good friend Cassandra is going to go with me. She's had a lot of drama lately, a breakup with a long-time boyfriend, a situation in Florida that she had to personally attend to this past weekend, but she still insists that we will rent a car and go together. I think she needs the break from her current surroundings, and I also think that she got sick of hearing me complain about having no one to go with me and is taking pity on me. I don' t think it's a hook-up situation. She has told me how "attractive" I am and how she loves my intelligence, but she had a boyfriend the entire time I knew her, two years now, so she could tell me those things without worrying about me taking her seriously and making a move. And since we have gone out together before and I haven't done anything inappropriate, I think she trusts me enough to know that I'm not going to force myself on her and she can enjoy the trip and relax. I expected her to reconsider when I told her that the time spent between races at Churchill Downs during the Derby is used by drunk coeds to show their tits for beads like it's Mardi Gras, but she says she will enjoy herself regardless. It's ironic that Cassandra is one of the few women I know that is not bisexual and would not enjoy that aspect of the Derby, but she will be going anyway. "Sarah" is very bi, and she couldn't get enough of the topless women last year. Hell, she got more pics of them than I did. And I would love to be going with Sarah again, because we had an absolute blast last year, but alas, Sarah and I haven't spoken to each other since New Year's, and I have a feeling that we may never see each other again.

I was part of the group of Chicago bloggers invited by Sunshyn to attend a get-together at Dave and Buster's last Friday, but I backed out at the last minute because I thought that Sunshyn would be the only person I knew, and I don't deal with meeting new people very well, which is why I will never have another date outside of the internet again. But it turns out that I would have recognized someone else that was there: Keisha, who I went to high school with. I was pleasantly surprised to see her pic when I looked at Sunshyn's album of the event. I distinctly remember Keisha. There were a lot of bitches in high school that thought they were better than everyone else, especially me, being fat and unattractive. But Keisha was very very cool with me and everyone else. What a small world, now she's writing a blog, just like me, and we are connected through Sunshyn, who did not go to school with either of us. Go figure. But now I can make the next bloggers meeting and actually know a couple of people there instead of standing in a group of strangers and shining my social ineptitude on the masses.

Thinking about high school reminds me of my very first girlfriend, the first and last black woman I had sex with, "Giselle," and how many high school classmates probably only remember me because of the large, homely girl with one eye that I was walking around school holding hands with my entire senior year. Now that sounds like a story for the "My History" file. I'll tell you about that when I come back from the Derby.

Speaking of the Derby, I haven't looked at the official program yet, but my unofficial pick before I look at all the data is Afleet Alex. Just wanted to post that so if he wins and I claim it when I come back, there won't be calls of "BULLSHIT!" Afleet Alex won a top Derby prep race, the Arkansas Derby, by eight lengths, and he was a highly regarded horse before some recent bad races, so I'm hoping to get a good price by picking him. I'm not the best person to go to concerning horse racing, but I know a little about it. And I picked Smarty Jones last year. I was very proud of that. In fact, Sarah bought a plush toy horse at a Wal-Mart the day before the Derby last year in Edinburgh, IN (where we were staying because as I have mentioned before it is absolutely impossible to get a room for Derby weekend in Louisville unless you have an extra grand or two lying around or you reserve the room a year in advance like I did this year), and after Smarty Jones won and we got back to the hotel she named the toy horse Smarty Ed, after Edinburgh. *sigh* Sometimes I miss that crazy old woman so much. The Derby is for the best 3-year-old horses overall. The Friday before the Derby at Churchill Downs is the Kentucky Oaks, which is for the best 3-year-old girl horses. I wanted to get to Louisville early this year and go to the Oaks, because I've never been, and bet a horse named Summerly. But she didn't do so well in her last prep race before the Oaks, and on top of that, it looks like Cassandra will not be able to get Friday off work, so I wouldn't be able to attend unless I pulled a "Runaway Bride" (can you believe that shit?? I'm not for beating women, but sometimes...) and abandoned Cass and went on my own. And I'm not doing that, not after all the bitching and moaning I've been doing about not having anyone to go with.

Unless there's other last-minute news, this will be it for me until after the Derby. Wish me luck!