Wandering

I have been wandering through life these last few months looking for a sign. Happiness is found in simple everyday things. I have decided to rejoin life. It's time.

It's Time

"It's so hard admitting when it's quittin' time" sighs Mary Chapin Carpenter. "It's the end of a long good bye" sympathises Beverley Mahood. "It's not about blame" Holly Dunn whispers in my ear. All songs that say the same thing and remind me I am not the first person nor is it the first time I have reached the point where a relationship is ending. There is a significant amount of sadness. So I will feel sad. There is disappointment. So I am disappointed. I will not cover my true feelings. I will embrace them. Experience them. I will grieve. And then I will move on.

It has not worked out with the dogs. I adore them but I am not the right home for them. I now must begin the task of finding them a new home. I will miss them. Sometimes. I won't miss those early morning walks in the middle of winter. I will miss having Cookie curl up beside me when I watch tv. I won't miss Oreo's mild craziness. I will miss their excitement when I come home.

Perhaps the thing that affects me most is that this is just another ending I am facing at middle age. It seems that when you are younger it is all about new beginnings. Going off to university. Your first apartment. Your first job. Your first car. Your first relationship. Your first house. Your first, your first, your first. As you age it becomes about endings.

There really is nothing good about good-bye.

Happiness Trap

From the "Witch of Portobello"

What the boy was experiencing in front of the television - a gateway into a different reality - is the same state I am going to induce in Athena. Everthing is so smple and so complicated! It's simple because all it takes is a change of attitude: I'm not going to look for happiness anymore. From now on, I'm independent; I see life through my eyes and not through other people's. I'm going in search of the adventure of being alive.
And it's complicated: Why I am not looking for happiness when everyone has taught me that happiness is the only goal worth pursuing? Why am I going to risk taking a path that no one else is taking?
After all what is happiness?
Love, they tell me. But love doesn't bring and never has brought happiness. On the contrary, a battlefield; it's sleepless nights, asking ourselves alll the time if we are doing the right thing. Real love is composed of ecstasy and agony.
All right then peace. Peace? If we look to Mother, she's nenver at peace. The winter does battle with the summer, the sun and the moon nenver meet, the tigar chases the man, who's afraid of the dog, who chases the cat, who chases the mouse, who frightens the man.
Money brings happiness. Fine. In that case, everyone who earns enough to have a high standard of living would be able to stop working. But then they're more troubled than ever, as if afraid of losing everything. Money attracts money, that's true. Poverty might bring unhappiness, but money won't neccessarily bring happiness.
I spent a lot of my life looking for happiness; now what I want is joy. Joy is like sex - it begins and ends. I want pleasure. I want to be contended, but happiness? I no longer fall into that trap.

Things.....

As you grow older you identify the things that you need to let go of and you do. You remember back on some pretty spectacular experiences and hold those memories so close to you. You have days when you feel all that you have are those memories. And you lose things that you want back. Desperately. There have been gaping holes left in your heart that no amount of living will ever fill. Each night you silently pray to a God that you don't understand. Tonight I quietly reflect on the things that I have lost and have left gaping holes in my heart. Holes I have tried to fill but they are bottomless.

My Grandmother, Forestine. I wish that everyone in the world has had someone like my Grandmother in their life.

Ben. My dog. I hope everyone has a pet at some point in their life that loved them like Ben loved me. And I him.

My innocence. I have learned about HIV. Genocide. War. Poverty. Rape. Guns. I know too much about the world.

My ability to Trust. That is a subject and list in itself.

My ability to love freely. That too is another subject and several lists.

The human spirit is remarkable. Tonight even with all those holes my heart feels whole.

Timbits, HIV and a Cigarette

This is a story about a timbit, HIV and a cigarette that proves that on some level we are all connected.

A couple weeks back there was a bit of an uproar that took place over Tim Horton's offering to provide some coffee and timbits at this "family day" in Rhode Island....or something along those lines. I only half paid attention to the whole thing. For the most part I would have missed the whole thing were it not for a friend, Fred, sending out a mass email sharing that the group behind the "family day" did not support gay marriages. He encouraged us all to write and stop supporting Tim Hurton's. I love Fred and his believes. Not being a Tim Hurton's customer my impact would have been zero. But go gays....whatever floats your boat.

This issue did not float my boat but it did stir up some deep rooted feelings that I have. As I write this someone is probably bare backing. HIV is on the rise. What the fuck? What are we doing? HIV is not a good thing but we seem to be closing a blind eye to it. In fact more energy goes into making living with HIV a great experience than preventing the spread of the disease. This is not complicated. Keep it simple. Always put a condom on. Always. Otherwise they are really winning. Sure "family day" went on without their timbits. Big woo. We certainly didn't change their believes. But how could we? We lack so much creditability. We have become a group of society that spreads a disease amongst ourselves. No timbits for us either.

And finally how does a cigarette fit into all this. Well I once had a friend, who is positive, tell me that he wouldn't date me because I smoke. Again. What the fuck? We have made HIV that much of our friend that being a smoker ranks below being positive. I have stopped smoking. You can't stop being positive. So again....put a condom on it, put a condom on it, put a condom on it. If not for yourself for the other person.

We seem to be making the wrong enemies and the wrong friends. Stop HIV. Put a condom on it. HIV is worse then timbits. HIV is worse then "family day". HIV is worse than smoking. It is time to stop kidding ourselves. We look foolish.

Grey.....Everywhere Grey. Grey. Grey.

When did everything become so grey. All the designers say it is the new hip colour. Out with beige. Grey is in. But it is all so grey. It never used to be grey. It was black or white. You were positive or negative. You had the virus that causes AIDS or you didn't. Now you are grey. I fail to understand why gay omline sites have so many options. "Needs Discussion". What does that mean? What is to discuss? Are you positive? If so don't we all pretty much know what that means? How long could that discussion last? Positive but really healthy. Counts are good. Be that as it may you are still positive. Perhaps the discussion is that you have never been tested and bareback all the time. Well that opens a door for a discussion alright. "When Appropriate". What does that mean? You are positive so bareback with other positive guys but will wear a condom if you are fucking a negative guy? Does it mean you only wear a condom when fucking at a black tie event? When did it even become appropriate to not wear a condom? Well it has. That is what I face everyday. Grey. Grey. Grey. I hate grey. It is nothing. Black and White. That is where the real drama is. Why have we decided to settle for grey? I thought at one time that we could do better.

Be Afraid of the Monster

Every little kid is afraid of the monster under the bed or the bogey man in the closet. We shake under the covers wanting to believe that our parents are right and nothing is there. Our little imaginations run wild. Where do these crazy thoughts even come from. Television in my case I guess. Perhaps boy scout camp fire stories. I guess it doesn't really matter. As an adult I know they are not true. But they are true. There are scary monsters and bogey men out there. They are in front of us every day however like the fable says they are wolves in sheep's clothing.

What makes them really scary is that we invite these monsters into our homes. We break bread with them. We prepare the guest room. Put out fresh towels. We constantly justify why they should continue to stay. We will even start fighting for them thinking that they are no longer monsters but our best friend. They aren't. They are just monsters.

The gig is up. I am on too them now. Perhaps that is the real gift of being in your forties. The ability to see the real monsters in your life and ask them to leave.

I gave notice today to one of my monsters. I have told it to pack it's bags and get out. I have never seem myself so calm as I quietly told the little monster not to even look back because I wouldn't be there this time. I am finally finished. I am the first to admit we had a lot of good times but the good times are really over. I have given it three days to pack and get out. Why three? Based on everything I have read it takes three days. So for the next three days every time the monster creeps into my thoughts, every time I hear it whisper you still want me, every time a familiar sent drifts through the air I will stand firm and say no....go. I have smoked my last cigarette.