7:30am I looked through the hand written journal I kept for a week in January. The writing got smaller as the week went on. January seems a long time ago. One theme stood out. the desire to be known/the desire to be anonymous. I write this publicly. Anyone can see it. I want people to see it. Yet I am terrified people will see it. I could be accepted. Or I could be rejected. Which is worse? The expectations that come with acceptance or the bile that comes with rejection? Being known brings energy. Positive and negative. I am scared of that energy. I am writing now, this exact moment, to be known. To share myself. To connect. I am almost finished writing. When that happens I will touch the little “publish” button in the top right corner. My device will vibrate and tell me the post is live. At that moment I feel satisfaction. I put my phone away. That is it. I don’t think about this post again. I don’t think about this blog for hours. Am I accomplishing anything? Do I want to accomplish anything? This is the heart of my most inner existential question… “do I act to truly succeed or to simply say I tried?” Reflexively I say “to succeed.” On so many levels I believe that. But results don’t show that. I want the “success” of being known. Of feeling the good/bad energy. Yet i am not really communicating/connecting. I am going through the motions. The only chance of salvation is that the record keeps growing. I keep posting. Maybe someday when the time comes I will be known. Simply because I wrote. Have written. And will continue to write. This blog is my only chance to truly be known at some point in history.

5:06pm mood = “I am still living with your ghost. Lonely and dreaming of the west coast.” everclear, Santa Monica

9:49am this morning is the first time I have felt “normal”(?) in a long time. My body is getting back into shape. I weighed myself at the gym. I was sure I was over two hundred pounds. I weighed 196. I still feel gross in my clothes but I don’t feel fat. I am not thinking about work right now. That is a relief. I am not anxious about down time. I streamed comedy acts and dramas all morning. The only thing of note to happen so far today is I sobbed uncontrollably in the shower for five minutes. I was thinking about the WIL. I always think about the WIL. I have a recurring thought. I imagine the WILs husband is filming a documentary. The climax is confronting me. Before the final face off I am allowed to be alone with her. We meet in a small room. I am waiting. She walks in. The door closes behind her. That scenario is seared on my soul. It is a re-enactment of the most sacred. Her entering a room. The door locking behind her. Us alone together. That is literally my heaven. When the door shuts. When we are alone. When we embrace. That is beyond any happiness I have ever felt. will ever feel. Will ever want to feel. When I was in the shower this morning I pictured us in the make believe private room. Hidden cameras filming. We stand still. Looking in each other’s eyes. Tears begin to flow. In make believe and in real life. I imagine us coming together. We embrace. I whisper how much I love her. how much I miss her. How i think about her every fucking second of every day. I tell her I can’t let her go. That I just want to die in her arms. And even if we can’t be together in this life please let me be with her in eternity. I want cameras to see it. I want the world to hear it. For so long we had a secret love. Now it is known. But the knowing has come with the worst price. God I miss her.

11:29pm honest… I don’t have the ability to accept loss. Age, lockdown, experience has changed me. In the past When a job ended it meant new possibility. I would find something better. I would make more money. Work with better people, enjoy my job more. Now losing a job is rejection. It is the equivalent to being shoved outside in a blizzard. I am immediately in a struggle for survival. I mean that Literally. The mental exposition to the circumstances are as immediately dire as the physical exposure to the elements. This week was draining. My daughter doesn’t feel well. I am staying in Arizona this weekend.

5:37am I have restructured my mindset. New understandings of work. Reward. relationships.

7:24pm another busy day. Not much time to think. Probably for the best. I believe I wrote this exact post before…

5:37am one year ago was my one year work anniversary at the job before last. I had not had a “work anniversary” in four years at that point. The jobs before that lasted 11 months, 3 months, four months and eight months. With a six and two month period of unemployment in there as well. The work anniversary was meaningful. I had some stability. The job didn’t pay enough to cover my bills but that didn’t matter. I needed peace of mind. Since that work anniversary last year I left my job, my wife and daughter moved out (on the same day as my last day of work) I started a new job. my mom had a major accident and came to live with me. I lost my new job. I moved out of state and started another new job. Lock down has become less strict. I still have talked to the WIL or know anything about how she is doing. I have become numb. I don’t remember what it was like to feel joy. Or sadness.

“There is no sense in trying to overcome the dead point of your life by further work, by trying to steel or stiffen your character… If a (person) is on the wrong track, it is no use running faster.” Thielicke, Out of the Depths, pg 64

5:52am I am in the moment. I wake up, walk, workout, sit at my computer, get ready for work, work, come home, eat, go to bed. I will do that for the remainder of the calendar year.

2:37pm at work. What is better? Believing a perfect life exists and not having it or being at peace with the life i have with limitations and resignation? Often I am glad I don’t search in vain. But I miss the feeling of hope. I miss believing I was progressing toward salvation.