Dammit

Why can't things ever just be, you know, good?

In my more patient moments, I understand that the dichotomy of the universe extends to all things, and that lightness and darkness constitute two sides of the same mortal coin.

In this particular moment, however, I am just annoyed.

Now, my life is not as bad as some. My friend Bill comes to mind, who listed off about three or four mega-depressing things that hit him in the span of a couple days: a memory slip at a big audition in front of his old piano teacher, marital crap, a $165 parking ticket, rejection, plague, pestilence, etc... But when bad things happen to you, you being you and only capable of being you, measure those bad things against the other things you experience, so regardless of how many bad things you've been through you're only ever really relating them to the good things that are going on in your life.

I've begun to question my competence as a relationship partner. Jessie and I seem to be on two different levels of existence, both saying the same things but the wet goo that is air and distance and time garbles the words so we end up shouting just to get a message across. It's like trying to talk underwater sometimes, and its only when we can put our arms around one another that we get any real sense of connection, can feel the real and palpable love that is between us.

This polio project, which is exciting and challenging and time-consuming, presents a difficult question. My job now is to assemble a trailer that will knock the socks off of potential donors and champions. If we get funding (six figures worth), then not only does my compensation go up significantly but I'm a shoe-in for staying on the project until its completion. That would also mean, however, that I would have a strong tie to Pittsburgh for another year, and so it would be difficult to make the move that Jessie and I are planning to Chicago or Washington, D.C.

Why not stay in Pittsburgh, you ask? Lemmetellyahsomething.

I love Pittsburgh. It is a great city. The best thing about the polio story is that it showcases my awesome city. I love its rivers. I love its skyline. I love its people and its roadways. I love its story and its problems. I love my steps outside my apartment. I especially love my friends, dodgeball, my family. But, that's the problem with Pittsburgh. When you're born here, they implant little teeny tiny tractor beams that keep you connected to this place no matter where you go. It's like the Shire and its little rivers. And if you don't leave, if you never leave, then you will NEVER leave. You might as well start that family, add that new garage door, and pick your plot, 'cause you is gonna die here.

Now. That is not bad. This is a great place to live. Seriously great. Lot of character. Way too many stories that need to be told and not enough people to tell them.

But Jessie and I have only ever really lived here, and if we stay, we're under the influence of her parents, of my parents, of our friends and our old habits. What we've never really had, not in six years, was a chance to share a space, share the sunrise and sunset, share the mundane things like dishes or laundry or shopping for towels. And even when we did live in the same place, Jess lived at her parents and I lived at my mom's. It wasn't exactly a verdant paradise of relationship bliss, let me tell you, especially when you're trying to not get arrested for making out in the back of a car.

So now I'm presented with this very interesting set of waves that my little Life's boat has to navigate. Somehow I have to make all these oblong puzzle pieces which are dearer to me than anything fit together. They don't have to make a pretty picture, they just have to hold together if the cat walks on the puzzle. It's asking a lot, but everything depends on my being able to do it.

You see, once you get to know me (and you do quite a bit, if you read this thing), you realize that my laissez-faire approach to things is actually a calculated, deliberate defense mechanism against the very stress I'm feeling right now. I can't make everybody happy all the time, but at the end of my life I have to answer to two people, one of whom is incorporeal and the other one is God.

I don't want to look back and go, "If only..."

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