In JKD...

I'd have written about this much sooner but the tournament happened...then I got caught up in writing a poem about the crush, even though the event I wanted to relay is about her. What can I say? My need to express myself through the poem took over.

I was paired with her in JKD 1. We were practicing responses to the lead Now-Tek (hooking kick). Our legs touched. She scratched me with her big toe. It may have drawn blood. She didn't know it happened. I told her. She apologized. I didn't want her apology, I just wanted her acknowledgment that this moment happened, even if her understanding of it was drastically different than mine. I kept thinking this is the most physical contact we would ever have, and I savored it quietly. She's amiable and likes to laugh. I did not have to hide my smiles, just that goofy glazed over twinkle that effects both drunks and the lovestruck.

The sexual symbolism of her drawing my blood was immediate (to me). Here she is with a chastity ring (I still haven't pressed her if this is a promise ring or a purity right for the wedding) and I'm the one cut open. If I was the virgin in this situation, what was lost/gained? Certainly nothing so practical as my first time working with a girl in a martial context. I didn't reveal anything of import, nor did she. It is more primal than that; she pierced me, and I delight in the wound. I'm supposed to be bound to another and she cut through that carelessly, unknowingly. She barely broke skin, but the force caries on to the center. Hmph, none of that translates into a smooth lost/gained binary opposition. I've certainly lost, but what have I gained here? I do not know.

I'm reaching that point where sincerity turns saccharine. Sincerity, the genuine, is the hardest thing in the world to express, especially when it's connected to love and suffering.

And all the while I am a failure and traitor, try as I may, I have not served G well.

A curse

It's 2 am. In the middle of july, her air conditioner is broken. She's stripped to nothing and the bed cover sticks to her skin. At that moment, when she is alone with her chastity ring, I want her to think of me and thirst....

I need more radiaton therapy

Spent the weekend at the beach house with parents and G. My mom thinks we're soul mates, yet all I see is dusk; the sun setting on our relationship. If G gets this job, she will have no reason to leave Tallahassee. And I don't think I can bring myself to move back there. All the while, an unreciprocated crush has me feeling foolish and distant and alone. I haven't voiced any of my concerns to G, maybe I should.

Cough/Hack

Lord God, the last week was awful, just awful. If it wasn't all the damn fighting, it was the bacteria; largely due to the blinding sunshine and humidity of psychic distress, I was a pitree (sp???) dish of coughing, pink eye, insomnia, and laryngitis. Oh what fun the last week was, I meant to examine the relationship between me and G, but reality forced my gaze elsewhere.


So what now? I don't have a lot of time tonight for writing, so just gonna throw a few things out there:

1. Am having a lot second thoughts about a job in the insurance industry
but without the money, I may never get out of here.
2. Having second thoughts about the U of Phoenix position,
but without the money, I may never get out of here.
3. My sister scares me, don't think I've ever made that clear;
something is wrong with her be it psychopathy or some other related disorder
4. G and I had a fight over my friggin sister?? I would rather G say to me
"I just can't forgive you for leaving/the rape/whatever, goodbye" than to end it
because of the goddamn baby-kicker.
5. Tournament in 2 weeks, under 140 beginner divisions. I am gonna crush the
competition. I have A LOT of stuff to work out.
6. The one benefit to everything, is it's left too emotionally exhausted to
obsess over my JKD crush, I have just enough emotional energy for one
fantasy a day.

Radiation Therapy

So my crush is engaged, due to be married in a few months. I found this out last night during JKD. In about ten seconds, I knew what my next blog post would be be about, title included. I was given a huge dose of radiation therapy.

Knowing she will be married soon places another ethical roadblock in my way; it prevents me from cultivating any sort of relationship with her, which in turns prevents me from destroying my relationship with G. Stupidity is radioactive. One blunder becomes two, two becomes three, and then those around you begin to blunder and stumble. Stupidity spreads like the halo at the base of a mushroom cloud.

In this case though the treatment is radioactive too. It burns, god, does it burn. The school girl crazies giggling through my marrow are ground into Saharan dust. I'm sweating the butterfly fever through my hair; she is my first gray hair, my second, and my third. The bush and tangles clumped in my hand, as I stand in a hot shower. Old guilt, a stirring for someone not named G, is replaced by new guilt, fatigue from the crush itself, because I am still left to wonder: Can it still work between us? Is it too late? Am I still losing her? And the sad answer is an emaciated, forlorn yes.

In retrospect, the high school aspect to the experience is complete. Too often I fell for girls because of some intangible thing I saw, a talent, a dreamy kaleidoscope in the center of their chi. My first crush, my VERY first crush--I was 12 or 13 at the time--was a talented actress and an amazing singer. Forgive me for reducing her to a scale, but I honestly couldn't tell you if she were a 7 an 8 a 9 or a 10. I fell for her because of the way she sang: that dizzying, whirling, out of control barf ride at the State Fair, love, was not returned. She just didn't see me that way. It happened again in high school. In my senior year there was this one girl, smart, outgoing, ambitious, confident, brilliant blonde hair. One day, we were talking. It was inside a McDonalds; I was minding my own business, listening to her, impressed, by her focus, everything she wanted to do and be, and my heart started doing backflips and moonsaults, pirouttes and handstands. It was the Olympics, and my ventricles were doing the floor routine. I was surprised by the suddenness of the thing, its divine irrationality, and as before she was not interested.

There are two things she said to me I will never forget: "you treat me like a queen" (intoxicating even as it followed rejection), and "Tigr, honestly, sometimes talking to you is like talking to a brick wall."

I have been kicked in the nuts, I've been pegged in the nuts by a soccer ball, I've been tackled so hard it tingled from my chest through to my extremities. There's been the referred pain of the hips, and the searing, buckling numbness, of being wacked in a large nerve. What she said hurt more, it shamed me; but I couldn't tell her that, I was a wall, she was right.

And college? College. College. College. At this point a descriptive history of my un-love life becomes tedious, redundant, filled with excuses and cynicism. (In other words I don't feel like writing about it). For this crush, it was her boxing. I was impressed by how quickly she absorbed the boxing, she learned to turn with her hook, in comparison to me, a fraction of the time. (the porcelain, Victorian skin of her thighs didn't hurt either) It was off to the races.

To compare G to all of this???? I am stupefied; forget about doing anything, I don't even know what to make of it. I think this is enough for now. I'm sure I'll be revisiting this in the coming weeks.

Nothing specific

I don't have to say here, just felt like I should put forth the effort to file an entry to the readership of none.

Having a crush on someone, and being in a relationship with G doesn't exactly fill me with pride. I feel foolish. On one hand I am fighting to keep my existing relationship going, an ultra marathon through death valley, under the guffaws of a laughing sun; while at the same time, I feel like a goofy high school kid again because I've gone all ballerina twinkle toes for a girl I really don't know that well, who I speak to a couple times of week, who--and I can't emphasize this enough--probably leads an ideological existence in opposition to my own. Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!

Shouldn't love have a button? What about an emergency brake??? I'd settle for that! I try to remind myself that the shoe was on the other foot not to long ago, that G was the one crushing on someone else, and that I was understanding and believed things would work out for the best. Don't have that sort of faith right now. The human heart is savage in its fickleness, showing no mercy to the raped, the tortured, the humiliated, like God and HIV, it does not discriminate.

Random thought: The story of Job. The trials of Job, were a manifestation of God's love for Job, the whole "where were you when I made the stars" speech was because God didn't think Job would understand how much love could hurt. Probably not, but I'll wager I'm closer to the truth than I know.

Bad news, Good news

I'm not pleased with the spotty posting. Seems every proclamation to regularly scheduled program guarantees 5 to 7 days of silence. So no more proclamations, just determination.

Sigh, so where to begin. Bad News first of course. My father has--
I don't even know what to write. No, I know what to write, but I am enervated. Drained of the energy to write about his whiz bang cherry-banana split of hubris, stupidity, and what is either stubbornness or senility.

He had to send a letter to Federal Court in Texas. He doesn't mention this to anyone, doesn't write the letter, until he's eating dinner with mom the night before it's due. There's more to arc of the story. It isn't worth reciting. The letter didn't make it. Not even close.

More bad news: still seem to be nursing a crush. This has exacerbated a sense of impending doom. That my relationship with G is in waning moments. When I'm with my girlfriend I feel more sad than happy, more agitated and angry than excited. We spent memorial day weekend at the beach house. We had fun. Visited a few of her friends. Spent time on the beach, even went to a drive-in (holy ground as far as I'm concerned). But I snapped at her a few times. Once I even felt the need lash out at her physically. I cannot endure our relationship this way, regardless of whether we're living together or long distance. The only thing worse than the fear of hitting her, is actually hitting her. What would I do then? That rabbit hole is not worth the tumble.

There's been talk of her getting a promotion again. One she richly deserves, but I'm afraid it will be our death knell. She will have no incentive to move, regardless of when she finishes her M.A. I can't go back there, I can't live in Florida, the town of our prime years is tinted by rape and anger and stasis.
As I say this I want to make it clear I have no indication that Chastity likes me; in fact I highly doubt it, even if she did I balk at the potential incompatibilities. She's probably evangelical, I'm coo-coo bananas, and a horny, low tolerance for organized religion coo-coo bananas.

Good news:
I've unlocked the secret of the upper-cut. I won't go so far as to say I've MASTERED the damn thing, but I'm finally punching with my whole body. Not just my arms, not just my legs, not my arms and legs, but my arms legs and CORE.
Drop with the legs, twist the core on a descending diagonal, rise up with legs and core,let the arm poke up just a bit past nose level. Also I took my 2-stripe yellow belt test Thursday, unless I really botched the vocab section, I should have passed.

The word "fantasy" makes me cringe

I delight in the idea of convincing her to remove the chastity ring and hand it to me. I would gloat, "I've taken your chastity," yes, even though its just symbolic.
I'd give the ring back of course, that would be, at best, bitter sweet.

Random Stuff

So this girl, the one with the chastity ring, the one that gives me the school girl crazies, the big bad butterfly fever, the puppy dog mumbles--all of which are symptoms of the hyperbolic verbosity disorder--I noticed she wears stud earrings (I think that's what they are called: simple metal rods with a silver bead at each end. This strikes me as funny, subversive, and possibly grounds for a paradox in the time space continuum. I associate such baubles with pierced lips, prince alberts, and other kinds of genital, heavy metal accessories. In short, they're tools of the bad girl trade, not a demarcation of the Fine Upstanding Evangelical (I have no idea what moral/ethical code she follows, but a chastity or promise ring usually indicates evangelical christian). I don't have much else to say about the issue, other than I hope my girlfriend NEVER EVER reads these entries. And if she does, I hope she remembers the patience and understanding I showed her when the tables were reversed 0:)
(Is that first sentence even close to being grammatically correct??)

Speaking of JKD, Tuesday, Sifu informed the class of my grappling success, praised my development, and stated that if they need help with the grappling portion of the level 2 test I was the one to ask for help. Oh, he also said my grappling was "good" I appreciated the praise and recognition, but I wouldn't call my grappling good...not yet.

My not so secret admirer

...is only 17. A little surprised--no, more like disappointed--not that I ever intended to do anything about it; but you know a person still has a way to mature, when she can't answer truthfully about her age. Although, one could make the argument, seriously or facetiously, that women in particular only tell the truth about their ages from 18 to 25.

I had a really bad bad bad experience dating a girl who lied about her age, lied about everything actually. I met her on the internet in the wild west days of the aol chatrooms. She was pretending to be someone else, yeah it was downhill from there. Hmm, guess this one warrants it's own post at a later date.

Strawberries part 2 (draft 1)

I interjected, “You know what you should do S? Get a shoebox, decorate it, cut out a slit, make it a Valentine’s box, just like in grade school”. If people wanna ask you out, they can do it this way. No anonymous cards obviously."

“Are you gonna make me a box?” Wrong direction, do not want to go that way. My strategy ? Ignore the comment, press forward, like a double leg take down. You shoot, you commit to the move, don’t aim for the legs, aim for the other side of the room, don’t stop for anything. I watched Sean Sherk take big fat thai knee while shooting for a double leg, his head absorbed everything, but he still shot through, he was going to china, so the force went through the body, didn’t stop at the head, and he scored the take-down, granted, he took five years off his life in the process. My variation didn’t require Alzheimer's. Where was I?

“Are you gonna make me a box?” double leg take-down. Shoot for the other side of the room.

“Oh! You know what else we can get you? Cupcakes! They give you a card, and they leave a cupcake. I tell ya, no valentine’s day I spent as an adult tops the ones in grade school. Love and cupcakes, a few pieces of candy, and more cupcakes!

Strawberries part 1 (draft 1)

I'm waiting for her to make my shake. Strawberry shake with strawberries. I need the fruit. I need the glycogen.

A girl, a former student, walks up to her from the side of the shake counter.
"My brother wanted to ask you something."
"Ok, what?"
"--but he wants to do it on Valentine's Day"
Squirm! Squirm! My admirer was caught flat-footed. I was not, hiding a very large smirk behind my palm. My delight isn't sadistic. It just isn't everyday I watch a proxy clumsily ask a lady out, publicly, while the real object of her affection is a foot away. How would this play out? Would she deftly pirouette around the question, shifting the topic to something more comfortable like sports or clothes? I find this can work if you create a bridge topic, something transitional like in one of those mostly useless five paragraph essays they teach kids in school.
Go completely physical, fire up the heat vision and blast her with a silent rebuke and clenched teeth? Effective, but not exactly the best tactic where stealth is concerned. People (me, me glorious me) are watching.
She could go kitchen sink, cram the air with verbage, until messenger did...something, most likely leave. It's neurotic, but sometimes you gotta scramble for position, take what you can get.
"--wants to do it on Valentines day?"
Fumble!
Rewind. The playback function. It's a sturdy all around listening skill, and a time tested convention of english majors shaken by an essay question on a final exam, usually said question will be pertain to the one and only fact she didn't cover in her epic 3 hour cram session.
So yeah, good all around.
But not here.
She was ambushed, verbally breached in a no no place. (There's a certain psychological protection granted by a high counter and control over money). There are many ways to squash a bad moment, a situation on the downward spiral.
Repeating the phrase that got you there doesn't finish, it only extends the debacle.....

There's this girl....

She's short. Shorter than me, and that's saying a lot, must be 5'2 tops. Can't be older than 19. Pretty smile, has this "face like a silvery moon" thing going on.

Cruel joke 1: She has a crush on me. The same me that's a teacher, the same me that's 30 years--wait, sorry--31 years old. The me that has a girlfriend, and enough emotional baggage to fill a Boeing 747.

I'm her "favorite person" at the gym. She even tried to ask me out, obliquely. I pretended to miss the invitation, obliquely.

I told my girlfriend about her; we've talked about doing a threesome, but this would be like juggling fine crystal, so nothing has come of it.

And 19? Still has growing up to do. I still have growing up to do. Yikes.

Oh Cruel Joke 2: Same name as my sister.
That's about as close as you can get to incest and stay out of jail. Hell, that's creepier than having someone dress up. In other words, eeeewwwww.