My Mom was born in 1946 and my Dad was born in 1944.  It’s now 2018 so that makes them 72 and 74.

My parents, in my eyes, hadn’t had a decent restful period of no-stress joy since I’ve met them 38 years ago.  They’re always coping with something shitty.  At least one shitty thing at a time.

And the shitty thing they’re coping with now is my Mother’s sister who has dementia.  She’s been living with us for quite some time now.  Each day getting progressively worse.  Shitting her pants kind of worse.

My Mom lacks patience.  She’s not nice to her sister with dementia.  And dealing with all that other compiled stress from over the years, she’s not nice to my Father either.  There’s constant screaming and bickering going on in my house.  It’s not a happy home.

I read on Facebook that people with Alzheimers and dementia can benefit by raising chickens.  I pictured my aunt raising the chickens, tending to them, until one fateful day when we find her laying on her back inside the chicken coop with a chicken pecking out her eyeballs.  This image made me laugh – seriously, I laughed.  What’s wrong with me?

I deal with stress in an oblique way.  I refuse to own it, to claim that it is my own stress, but rather something separate that doesn’t belong to me.  It’s not my creation, but someone else’s that hasn’t been tended to properly and therefore it snakes its way into my life – Like I’m the one who must confront it.

It’s true though.  Every ounce of stress I deal with has to do with other people’s anger and inadequacies at handling their own misfortunes.  As far as my own misfortunes go, I calculate a solution and see it through.  It infects no one.  I cauterize that shit.

I haven’t written in a while.  When I’m not with GF, I’m working.  Today is actually the first real day off I’ve had in a very long time.  I’m exhausted and would Love nothing more than to lay in bed all day and sleep.  That’s all I want to do.  Sleep.

I taken GF to New Haven yesterday to spend the day.  New Haven always ensures a good time and I’m familiar enough to know a few cool places to go.  We had a blast as always and even made a new friend, Chiti, who looks and acts just like the Chiti from The Good Place.

Being with a girl romantically, is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced.  When she stares into my eyes, I can feel her love coming at me like a freight train.  I’ve never wanted to stare deeply into anyone’s eyes before, I’m not that kind of person, but now I can’t get enough of it.

In the beginning when she first started staring, she made a game of it.  A staring contest to see who can go the longest without blinking.  But the truth behind it was that she just wanted to stare into my eyes.  The game was just an excuse.  Little by little, she’s chipping away at my cold exterior.  Grabbing my hand while I’m driving and placing my palm on her soft cheek – those little details are so powerful and mean more than any sex act can.  My palm on her cheek is blissful especially so when she places it there herself.  Her cheek is so soft and her hands are so small and delicate.  Her eyes warm me from the inside.

She told me that she’d take care of me if I’m ever a quadriplegic.  I told her I wouldn’t want her to.  It would make me happier if she moved on with her life.  And it’s the truth!  I fully believe that what I’m experiencing is true love.  I don’t want or need anything from her.  If she falls out of love with me, I’d want her to leave me.  I think that’s an indicator of real love.  Being able to let go.  Ayahuasca told me that I can only know true love if I’m able to let it go and I didn’t understand that until now.  All else is about need, fear, addiction, ego.  I didn’t think much on it because finding love was/is the lowest of my priorities.

When she’s not here with me, she feels so distant.  Like an illusion.  Like maybe in reality, I’m laying sick somewhere in a mental facility and GF is a made-up fantasy I concocted as part of my delusion.  The idea of GF being a delusion is more probable than reality.  It feels more real to me for her not to be real, and I am in fact, sick in the head.

It’s 3:30.  That means it’s nap time.  Sleep is a precious commodity these days and I can’t waste this opportunity.

I still can’t get over how love-struck I am.  I don’t think it will ever sink in or feel real.  It amazes me how it took 38 years on this planet for me to feel this way about anyone, while most of the population is already married with kids at my age.  It just seems so unlikely.  It’s too rare for everyone to experience this.  I don’t buy it.

I didn’t go on any travels this year, but I unknowingly embarked on the greatest adventure of my life.  I didn’t think 2017 could ever be topped, but this year is far more amazing than anything that came before it.  I had no idea I was capable of loving anyone – I didn’t think it possible.

As awesome as all that sounds, there’s still a piece of me – the majority of me actually – that wants nothing more than to stay home and be alone with myself.  I’m swept up, knee-deep, in a fairytale romance but I still want to be alone with myself.  I think perhaps that I’m just tired.  Or the remnants of these last 38 years cling on like gorilla glue.  Never washing away my true hermetic nature.  Just wanting to hang out with good friends, not think too much.  Drink my beer and play pool.  I never wanted this.  But I now have it.  And I find myself wanting to place GF’s happiness above my own, just as she does for me.