Monday, May 31, 2010

A Bite with Vampirella

I had a lunch date today – yet another date brought on by the clusterfuck that is internet dating. I think it went well, so let me tell y’all about her. I’m calling her Vampirella, because she’s quite fair skinned, and a fan of the show “True Blood”. She’s also gorgeous, but that’s just a bonus. Anyway, aren’t they all?

She took TV broadcasting in college, and even did a collaboration with the scriptwriting program, to make a film project. She wound up with a real bitch for a screenwriter though. Yes, some of us can be really uptight about our work. We talked a fair bit about the film industry, and it turns out she had seen Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter, and she met the director when he came to speak to her class. I told her I’ve known him since high school. I thought she was so cool for having seen this movie. No doubt so did Lee – she was the only girl in her class who’d seen it. We like the same kinds of shows – things like Dexter, True Blood, etc. I have tentatively invited her out to see some shitty movies at the Mayfair – which, for those of you who don’t know, is the best damned movie theatre in town!

We had sushi for lunch and then wandered around Parliament Hill. Overall, the date was two hours, which is shorter than usual, but she actually had to work afterwards, so we planned it this way. She told me at one point that she’d never been in a relationship. I found it difficult to believe – I mean, she seems so well-adjusted. Then again, maybe that’s why. She says she saw all of her friends dealing with a lot of drama. She says she didn’t want to face the same. She left the dating site after a few months. She claimed she was getting too many messages. I explained as I usually do that the guys send out too many messages because the other guys send out too many, and if they don’t send them too, they won’t get noticed.

At the end of our date, I said I had fun, and she said “Me too. Thanks for not being creepy.” That meant a lot to me. I tried extra hard this time not to do or say anything to frighten her away, which is to say that at no point during our date did I admit to having any feelings one way or the other. I’m working on the assumption that girls are only interested in the guys who aren’t interested. Girls are stupid like that. For now, I’m playing it cool, and we will probably “hang out” again.

Saturday, May 29, 2010

Movie Planning

A man collapsed in front of me today, on the Capital City University Campus. He just fell off his bike for no apparent reason and lay on the ground bleeding from his face and mouth. The first thought that went thru my mind as I approached him was, “great, yet another problem for me to deal with.” There were other people around, but somehow everyone treated me like Jack from Lost. Why do people always assume I should be the leader, even when they don’t know me? Can people not handle this sort of thing – a situation where someone might be hurt, but probably isn’t? I figured he must have been drunk, or maybe he passed out from heat stroke. I asked one young woman to call 911, but she said she wanted me to actually make the call, so I proceeded to talk to the emergency response man, giving him directions for the ambulance, even though I clearly wasn’t from the area. All the while I was also talking to him to try to get his brain working. Eventually he was able to tell me his age, (he was 42, and pretty gruff-looking), and ask what the hell happened. I told him. When the response team got there, I asked if they actually needed me, and when they said they didn’t, I told him I hoped he’d feel better, and then took off. I had a busy day after all.

I met with a lawyer friend of mine who wants to make a short movie about trees manipulating people with spores. She looked at the notes I’d made on it over the last month, and she told me what she wanted me to focus on.

I then met with an actress who wants to collaborate on a movie of the week, potentially to sell to a local producer she has an in with. It turns out I know this producer too. I was a production assistant on another MOW he shot 7 years ago. As I recall, he was a real grouch on the set. I have a clear recollection of him throwing a tantrum when his fridge wasn't stalked with Perrier, and most of my coworkers seemed to think he was some kind of ogre. Mostly I found his antics entertaining. At one point we were missing a walky-talky and my department thought his girlfriend took it. Of course, no one had the courage to confront him – they wanted ME to do it, (it has to be you, Jack), and as expected, I got a blast from him - he insisted he didn't have it or have time for my stupid bullshit and stormed out in a huff. Then I went through his desk and found it. Problem solved. That’s what I do. This is the man I’m going to be pitching our MOW to. Let’s just hope he’s mellowed with a bit of age. Anyway, she clearly has an in with him. She’s super-gorgeous, and he wants her to audition for an upcoming movie.

As the actress and I talked about our various writing projects, I became conscious of just how much of the subtext of my work is my regret of leaving N/A. My actress friend told me about how her ex wrote her a long letter telling her he had feelings for her, long after the fact. He was engaged by then in fact. She gathered he wanted to get it off his chest. She told me he was glad he did, because she always wanted them to be friends in the end. I miss N/A, the friend. Of course, I miss the lover too, but really, she was by best friend in Toronto. She told me I should write her a letter. I told her that I have, in fact, written her many things that I could never bring myself to send, and poetry too. I’m even working on a slam poem to her, one that I may post later. I told her that every time I sent N/A a message in the past, I got short answers. I felt like she was using the fewest words possible – to be polite, but dismiss the conversation as quickly as possible, but now I’m not so sure. The actress told me that if she doesn’t want to talk to someone, she tells them. There’s no reason to assume someone doesn’t want to talk to you when they don’t say anything of the sort. Maybe I read too much into things. She suggested I make this into a screenplay. I just don’t know how it would end… yet. She says I should talk to her, but at this point, I don’t know. I’m afraid. If I message her, I’ll want her back for sure, and I’m convinced she’s dating the bass player from her band. I don’t want to come crawling out of the woodwork now, because if she’s happy with him, I want her to stay that way. I also don’t want to know, you know? Haha… I have a date on Monday anyway. If it goes well, I’ll tell y’all about her.

You know what? It’s the end of a long day, and I’m in a generous mood, so I’m going to confess something that actually might reach the right person, but I suppose only if she cares enough to check back here every so often. A few weeks ago, a friend of hers posted an update about Nurse Betty on one of my 2009 entries.

My actress friend says she wishes more guys would just let their feelings out. Far too often, she says, guys pretend not to care. Personally, I’ve found that letting all my feelings out has tended to backfire in the past, creating tension and distance between whomever I wanted to get closer too, (an unfortunate self-destructive tendency of the “nice guy” – which is part of why women wind up dating jerks – and ladies, they act this way because they know they can get away with it, so this men are entirely your own fault, just so you know), but at this point, I’ve nothing left to lose, so I just thought I’d admit this.

When I got that message from your friend, I cried. I almost never cry, but I cried when I thought about how much I regret everything. I thought I’d finally forgotten you, but one mention of you, and all my regret came flooding back – my regret that I upset you with my blog, and my regret that I could never make up for what happened to you. I thought I didn’t still care about you, but I clearly do, and I probably always will. As long as I’m alive, anyway.

Friday, May 21, 2010

Progress

I went on a date last week that I think went I rather well. I say this because we are still talking, which is good sign number one. I can’t say for sure how I feel about her, but she is fun to be with. We went for food, and then because I liked her company I asked her to the pub. I even paid for her drinks. I actually felt like it. I had believed until recently that I was a bad idea to pay for a woman’s food etc. on a first date, but lately a number of women have told me I’m wrong. At first, it had been my mother and grandma Depressia telling me this, but now women in my program have been advising me the same way. Perhaps they just want free stuff – I don’t know. I’m sure women have enough of they demons to fight. A wise friend of mine recently said you should be nice to everyone because everyone is fighting some kind of battle.

I also acquired my G2 level on my driver’s license, which means I can drive on my own, which means my mother is now training me to become Depressia’s new chauffeur. She just turned 91 this month. She is the matriarch and oldest member of my family.

I haven’t made much mention of this here, but for medical reasons, my father doesn’t drive very often anymore. More an more I’m going to be taking over that responsibility. So you know how I made “the list” in May of ‘08, of my regrets. Well, now I can cross off #5. Looking back at the list, I realize how silly most of them are, but I’d still like to make up for them all. Some day.

Also, accepted a scholarship, and a teaching assistant position for grad school in the fall. Until then, I guess I’ll just keep on doing what I do.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Women!

New Rule! From now on, no woman that I’m actively interested in may ever read this blog. I’ll never tell her, and you won’t either. If you do, I’ll find you. >:D

(Note to self: Insert diabolical laughter here.)

I’ve been good thus far. I haven’t told anyone since Scrapbook Girl. Even in her case, I’m not really convinced she ever gave enough of a shit to read this damn thing anyway. I can’t say for sure though, since anytime I tried to talk to her, she just ignored me. Even in front of our own friends, as if she somehow didn’t hear me. Sometimes she’d act like she couldn’t even see me, and I’d have to holler her name just to get her attention. Sometimes she shot me the dirtiest looks. I was never anything but friendly to her, and honest with her, and I never harassed her or anything like that. That didn’t matter. I’ve since decided she must have some rare form of mental illness, one that is triggered specifically by me for some reason, and moved on.

One thing that still nags at me though; we were friends before I told her. Now, after so many attempts to reach out to her, and get past the whole awkwardness of a rejection, she’s useless to me. We’re in the same program, have some of the same friends, (some of whom are literally my neighbours and ask me about her. Why they think I know anything more than they do about what she’s doing, I don’t know), and we were even in the same class last term. A class I actually had to take! Otherwise I might have just switched out of it. The first time I tried to hang out with her and another classmate after class, she couldn’t make eye-contact with me, and looked like she was couldn’t get away from me fast enough.

At first I thought maybe Scrapbook Girl was trying to spare my feelings, but then I guess I came to realize she just couldn’t see things from anyone’s perspective other than her own. She was presumably miffed at me for putting her on the spot like that. But the words “sorry, I don’t like you that way,” would have been a stellar diffuse the situation. Or “lets just be friends for awhile and see.” Or hell, “fuck off” – I mean, saying ANYTHING would have been an improvement. I had the courage to say something to her. I was the one who would have to feel rejected, right? RIGHT?

Why she then decided that ignoring me completely was the most appropriate response I deserved, I will never know. I think she’s such a coward for it. All she had to do was talk to me, and she’d realize how easily I could forgive the rejection. Hell, I half-expected it in the first place! I get so much rejection that I barely care anymore. That’s as a lover though. She was my friend, and I felt there was value there. There’s usually only one boyfriend slot in a woman’s life, but there’s a virtually limitless supply of slots in one’s life for friends. You have to really hate someone to feel the need to friend-break-up with them.

I had to reject a girl of my own recently, a little under a month ago. Somehow, over the course of the last school term, she managed to develop a crush on me. I’m calling her “Treasure Hunter” because she used to play this repetitive facebook applet with digging and treasure in it during one of our English classes, instead of listening. She is, in fact, also a slam poet, and she was, in fact, in the same class I shared with Scrapbook Girl, but that’s just a coincidence. There were a lot of girls in that class – even Parasite Eve and Bright Eyes were in it. My goodness, do the girls ever love crushing after our pretty-boy professor. Even I think he’s kind of hot – the bastard totally knows how pretty he is – but I digress.

The point is, Treasure Hunter had the courage to tell me she was interested in me, so I, in turn, made a point of showing the courtesy of suggesting we spend some time together doing something, so we could see if there was anything to that. She told me she thought we were similar, which I found a remarkably odd observation, since I couldn’t see it. I arranged a date for us the week after our final exam, during which she spent most of her time babbling about her stupid job that she hates, but, without being interesting about it. I tried asking her about any of my interests she might like, and she generally didn’t even know what I was talking about, which in some cases, was amazing. I finally asked her to tell me about her interests, and all she could come up with was “facebook.” I joked that we’re all a little guilty of spending a little too much there, and then she added that she liked writing poetry. I’ve seen her perform some of it – it’s what I might describe as teen-angsty, which is fine I guess, if you’re still in high school. At the end of the night, I told said “I don’t know how to say this, but I don’t really think we have anything in common. Did you kinda get that feeling too?” She agreed. I knew she wasn’t quite satisfied, but I figured this was the nicest way to tell her – and show a little bit of courage and actually fucking tell her! So, at worst, I had pho and played a few games of pool with a girl I’ve no interest in. At best, I might have been wrong, in which case we might have hit it off that night. It’s amazing how just a little exposure can tell you what you need to know about someone. This is, again, why I think Scrapbook Girl is a total coward. But that’s another rant I needed to get past to talk about what’s really bothering me.

What’s bothering me is the precedent set by these rejections from friends. I like another one of my female friends, you see. I have for awhile actually, and even some other slam poets have asked if we were dating. I can’t say for sure how she feels about me though, not without explicitly asking. (And if I do that, the cat is sort of out of the bag, isn’t it?) As it was with Scrapbook Girl and Nurse Betty, I have every reason to believe she should like me, and I’d treat her like a queen. She makes me smile, which not a lot of people can really do. (Ema always can, but I somehow don’t think that I’m his type. Anyway, he just celebrated his 4-year anniversary with his girlfriend.) Maybe part of it is that I’m doomed to fall for wounded women – I think I suffer from Florence Nightingale effect – falling for women because I feel sorry for them, and think I can heal them. This has, in fact, been what caused me to fall for all of these women – N/A, Karma Chameleon, Nurse Betty, Scrapbook Girl, Diary Girl, Ballet Girl, and the list goes on, but you get the idea. I fall for these women because I feel sorry for them. I feel like I can heal them. For each and every one of the aforementioned women, I felt I needed to prove to them they could be loved by a man who would always treat them with respect, always come up with new ways to make them smile, and who would love them for who they really were, and not who they felt they had to pretend to be. (Scrapbook Girl, for instance, had noted at one point that she had to downplay her intellect to keep guys’ attention. I always thought her intellect was the best part.) I wanted to prove that I could always be there when they needed me. I’d even be there for them if any of them needed me now. That’s just my nature, but as far as relationships go, I can’t afford any more charity cases. Sorry ladies, but if you’re going to continue to get used an abused by assholes, it’s your own fault. Those men continue to behave that way because they know it gets them laid, and they never have to deal with the consequences, you do. I know you’re all intelligent enough to get past it.

Anyway, the reason I even bother to mention all this is that I like another one of my friends now, but after Nurse Betty, and Scrapbook Girl, and Lilith, etc, I’m tired. I’m tired of losing friends because I develop feelings for them. It’s the weirdest thing. It’s like falling in love with them was the biggest insult to them, and they all seem to just hate me for it. Who could have ever thought such positive feelings could have such negative effects with such disgusted reactions. Often I think I must be missing something obvious, but when none of them are willing to talk about it, it is difficult to discern.

I do not want to tell my friend I love her because I do not want to lose my friend. As it stands now, when it’s just the two of us, I feel like I can tell her anything, particularly when it comes to dating, and I can get the woman’s perspective on things. She, in turn, can get my perspective on the guys she and her friends are seeing. Typically, as you might imagine, I think she can do much better than the assbags that harass and text her constantly, but she never has the heart to get rid of them either. I try to encourage her to tell them she’s not interested, because that is exactly what I would want to know, were I the guy. And also, I wonder what will happen when it is my turn. The very thought tires and depresses me.

For now, and in fact, as usual, I have a few other prospective women lined up. I have two dates scheduled this week, both of whom I met online, but who nonetheless can carry on a relatively unstupid conversation. I don’t have terribly high hopes for either of them yet, as the internet is a terrible place to meet women, but you never know for sure, and anyway, the longer I’m distracted from trying to convey to my friend I love her, the better off I’ll be.

It occurs to me at this point that this friend deserves a name. I’m going to call her Social Girl, because she goes to tons of social events, particularly concerts and poetry slams, so we know a lot of the same people. She’s also really fond of Broken Social Scene.

That about wraps up my dating situation these days. I’ve other more exciting news, but for now, I’d like to limit this entry to one “broad” topic. (There’s a little pun there. Did you miss it?)

Sunday, May 9, 2010

Putting Words Together

I’ve been putting off blogging for the past little while, because I’ve been thinking of permanently putting it down. I’ve put up with it long enough to realize that it puts off the very women I might have hoped would someday put out. Now the only thing I find myself putting out are the fires I started years ago when I first put this up.

Maybe I thought I was putting on a show for people anonymously, but gradually, I put together a list of readers who knew me.

This blog is me. My blog of dirty secrets. My blog of successes. My blog of excesses.

I was recently reminded of all of this – of a woman I put off with this blog, because she felt the stories I chose to put up were all about putting her down. I had wanted to put things right, but she was never willing to put away our differences, so she put me on her block list instead.

I had wanted to put this blog down for good, but for now, I guess that the blog can stay put.