I'm sad right now. I'm not depressed, but I am pretty tired. I hope none of what I'm going to say is too much of an exaggeration based on staying up too late.

 

I just watched Riding the Bullet, a Stephen King movie. It made me think about my life. That, and my ongoing writing of John Milliner's story, which is in some ways a fictionalized account of my own thoughts and feelings, if not my life.

 

I've built a life of making sure that nothing ever changes unless I let it (and I seldom if ever let it). I don't let people close to me because I'm afraid that I'll get stabbed in the heart. I was going to write "face," but I figured the revision was more poetic. If I do let people close to me, I make sure that I'll be able to stab them right back, or even get them before they get me. I try not to jump the gun; a friend is a friend until the prove to me otherwise, and sometimes even after that.

 

It shocks me to think that I don't know--for sure--if I love anyone. That's a little scary. I know, and I've felt very deeply in many instances when I'm alone, that I have a lot of love to give. I know that I'm capable of more than this.

 

I also don't know if life is a happy place. Lately, I've felt happier--but I don't think that my life has been a happy one, and I know that much of that is my fault. I've been criticized--harshly--that I'm too staid and "old" for my own good. I can't agree with these accusations 100%, but there might be something to them. I am a master at control and responsibility; it's for my own good, I feel. I think I've denied myself a lot of happiness in the name of stability and absolute certainty of safety. I can't say I entirely regret that, but I can say that I might have been happier.

 

Maybe, say, 10 years ago, or 15, I was happy, and I just can't remember it. I also seem to be a master of blocking out my own memories and muting my feelings, because a lot of them over the course of my life have been painful. In 10 or 15 more years, will I remember the happinesses that I have now?

 

I can't really say, because I don't like to speculate without enough data. It's just too risky.

 

I really want to break down this barrier that I've put inside me. I don't care about having more fun, being the crotchety old man that I am at heart. But happiness, that I care about. I would like to be happier. I'm making myself a little promise right now that I want to try harder at that.

 

I went out and enjoyed myself last night with some friends (you know who you are). We dropped into a local bar and they threatened to make me go talk to some girls that were in there. I was, of course, mortified. I couldn't even think of doing it.

 

This is an enormous problem in my life. I recently read that nobody wants to have their problems solved; people love the melodrama of their own problematic lives too much. I don't know if I hold any truck with that stance, though: Perhaps not gladly, but I would trade my current set of romantic problems for the ones that come along with actually dating.

 

But there's one big question that hunkers on my mind like a fat toad: Why can't I get the ball rolling? I don't understand why I can't just ask somebody out, or even carry on a conversation with the vaguest suggestion that I might like a girl. Nevertheless, experience has proven that when it comes down to it, I don't.

 

A truth about this sort of struck me as I sat here reading a book and playing Bejeweled 2 on MSN Games.

 

I don't believe that it's possible. I mean, deep down in my gut, the marrow of my being, I don't believe in it. My mind itself shies away from the very possibility. I don't believe that I can be "liked," let alone loved, or any of the things that go along with a committed romantic relationship. I think that a lot of people I know think that I'm a prude and sexually repressed, etc. The fact is that I'm a combination of two things: absolutely nonplussed at my own potential to be genuinely loved, and too respectful to ever ask anyone to show affection towards me that I deeply believe to be a lie. So I'd never ask for casual sexual contact from anybody; why would I? All it could ever be is wrong.

 

If I really believed that there was a benefit to be salvaged from dating, I would be a lot less afraid of any of the negative consequences; I just can't see it, though. I cannot possibly imagine someone loving me. Even as I type that, it looks stupid. However, it's the truth as I see it. If I thought I could get a few minutes of anything but nervousness, fear, discomfort, and sadness from spending time one-on-one with a girl, I'd be there. It doesn't happen, though, because of my fear. I can never let down my guard enough to enjoy that.

 

This is quite depressing. I don't really want to type about it any more. I'm going back to work. Right now in my life, competing with my fear of opening up to a girl, is the fear that I'll spend my life alone--extremely alone--all because I may never get over this fear. I've always been very proud of my self-mastery, but sometimes I forget that my mind isn't all clean white paper; there are some parts in there that I have trouble wrangling, and this is one of them. Without conquering this fear, I'll never be able to take charge of my romantic life. Believe me when I say that I'm terrified.