Well I have returned to American soil, LAX to be specific. I've got a nice four-hour layover before I can catch a wing up to Portland, hop in my truck, drive down to the Euge to crash out at my mom's house, then get up at 7 and hit the road for the HC on Monday.

My hand and arm are healing steadily. It's looking more gnarly than ever as you can see, thanks to the fact that we've reached the "crack n' peel" part of the process. I'm trying to keep the outer layer on as long as I can but all it takes is a bump or jostle to create a new grisly-looking sting spot. I'm covering these with ointment as they appear, which is helping, and the areas that came exposed yesterday are showing promise. It just needs some more time, but I feel increasingly like a freak walking around with my hamburger-hand here in the first world.

Speaking of the first world... some thoughts from Baja

My experience with medical care, where I was able to roll into a clinic at 8pm, get treated right away, get antibiotics and a prescription anti-inflammatory, and walk out paying $14.50 total stands in sharp contrast to your typical US ER experience. I wouldn't want Benito to perform surgery on me -- until he's finished his studies, that is -- but the truth is that the majority of urgent healthcare concerns aren't on that scale. In spite of what Michael Crichton's brilliant TV series would suggest, not everything you'd go to the ER for really requires a hospital. Throughout Baja I saw lots and lots of small "24 medical emergency" clinics; storefront type operations, really. This decentralization of urgent care seems like a good idea. Jamming everyone who needs quick attention into one place creates all sorts of problems. Maybe there's something to be learned here.

So another long post, but this one because I stumbled upon an old cache of never-blogged textfiles from 2003 and before. Dynamite stuff from the archives -- like these old artistic source texts -- and some of it still topical!

Here's a bit from deep inside my mind back when I was still a Young Buck, and right before I fell in love again, it's interesting to note. Borderline arrogant, true, but that kind of free and open state of mind is something I think it would be very positive for me to reconnect with.

h4. Dancing.txt (1/27/2003)

There was dancing, and I overheard a fairly nubile 20-year-old tell some lucky chump. "I want sex. I like it. It feels good to me. I don't do it a lot, but I want someone who will give it to me now."

He seemed at first to be too much of a weify wannabe hipster/jock hybrid to step up to what she was pitching, and for a moment I entertained a fantasy of "cutting in" so to speak. She and I had been dancing somewhat in sync earlier, and lustful thoughts had been propagating for some time. But I hesitated. In the moment I became plagued with doubt; about who I was and what I was doing; about who she was and if I really wanted her; doubt about the very nature of my own desire.

During the intervening doubtful minute, the lucky chump realizes the what score is and decides he knows what to do. Soon they are gone, and thinking it over I'm not all that bothered. You see, I realized if I were going to try it with her, it would have to be something like this:

Josh: Sorry, I couldn't help but notice the proposition you just made to this gentleman, and I'd like to make my services available to you this evening, should you be so inclined. I'm good, and I'm leaving town for New York City in two days. There will be no complecations.

20-y-o: Ummm ok. [resumes talking to other guy]

[But then... 20 minutes later]

20-y-o: Ok, are you game?

After a pretty intense weekend, I feel a low drop. The physical exhaustion is expected (and I have some minor injuries to heal), but the emotional rebound is harder. It's like the day after Disneyland. I'm so bored!

One of the things I've been mulling over lately is just what it takes to get me excited these days. There are several threads to this introspection, so I'll try to tease them out with some kind of order.

Inhibition
I'm coming to realize that in certain important and meaningful ways, I've developed a range of inhibitions, in the form of insular routines, reflexive skepticism, and internal checks. This is kind of a contrast to my life age 18 to present, which was largely about the shedding of inhibition, tapping into self, going a Dragonball-Z with my chi and that kind of shit.

Maybe it's a weird thing to say as the proprietor of a website that's blocked by many major parental-control (or workplace-control) filters, but there it is. This has been a theme in my writing for the past several months, but I didn't hit on the specific word "inhibited" until someone used it -- or rather, the inverse, "uninhibited" -- the other day to describe an ideal way to be.

That's something I agree with, deeply, being uninhibited. It's in some of my favorite hip-hop lyrics and it stands at the center of what I construe to be personal liberation. Emancipate yrself from mental slavery and all that jazz. The point is, it's a bummer and a wake-up call to realize that's part of what's been going on.

The above image is from a French AIDS awareness campaign. I saw it somewhere and it stuck me, so I saved it for a racy mental-exhibitionism post like this. Gotta love those people and their culture

So, as I mentioned before, I'm "adrift on the seas of celibacy." It's not a bad thing, and (again) as I said I don't like to complain about it; I've had a lucky life in love, and somewhere deep down I trust that this will all work out.

What I do feel like writing about though is the psychological state/journey that I find myself in/on as a result of this moment.

There's a critical lack of desire, of fantasy. I believe intellectually that sex can be fun, but at the moment I don't seem to be living the belief that it can be fun for me. I don't know why this is, really. I haven't had some bad or souring experience, just a period -- approaching a year now -- of relative isolation, self-imposed.

The self-imposition, by the way, goes beyond my choice of where I live. As much as this place is small, the overwhelming empirical evidence shows it's not without a population of babes, and yet I do nothing. Why is this?

This feeling of "not believing in it for me" reminds me of a point a couple of years ago where I felt the same way about love generally. That was a darker point, at the nadir of a rebound. This is nowhere near as dire, but the lack of an apparent reason is frustrating. What is it that's keeping me from feeling the flutter, from fantasizing, from having some fucking fun?

I was lying awake last night trying to really follow this thought. "What is your fantasy?" I asked myself. I'm not sure right now.

One of the things I do of late when I come back to NYC is see women I used to be involved with. I'm a big believer in maintaining connections, especially the ones that have meant a lot, and it's been a point of pride for me that I'm friendly with virtually all my lovers and girlfriends.

Life in the Woods is more romantically lonely (lots more) than my urban days have been, so I really enjoy these dinner dates, remembering what it was like. I've no real agenda in mind, but it does wonders for my psyche to sit down with a beautiful girl and have a good conversation and realize that I'm still a likable guy. My day-to-day doesn't offer me much evidence of this -- again, speaking in a romantic context -- and my self-confidence is fragile enough that after spending enough time without positive feedback I begin to regress.

So last night I was having a great chat with this tall, enterprising, quick-witted beauty at the still-excellent Great Jones Cafe, and the topic of nostalgia comes up; my saw being that it feels depressingly premature to be looking back like that at the tender age of 27. She has a really great insight: the devilish thing isn't reminiscing for "the old times" as it's inevitable and arguably proper to cherish your own personal history, and anyway if you want to do the things you used to do, the odds are you can do them again. That's just a question of will. The real bugger is missing the person you used to be.

This is sort of a juicy post by recent standards. I'm not entirely comfortable with the exploitive possibilities that come from writing about my romantic life, but I've gone this far. Back in the day I had some pages about girlfriends, and at the time Christine said that this was charming. I hope that's still true.

It's a trip, you know? I'm in unexplored territory here, being a single man off in the woods. If I'm honest, this is part of why I moved here, to get away from women, to clarify what it is that I want. It forces the issue, being on your own.

It may sound cocky, but I mean it humbly: I've had a very lucky and blessed life in love. One full of mistakes like any other, some heartbreaking idiocy and some plain-old heartbreak, but also great moments, charmed times, high and heady runs into what's created between two. I can't say I've always been at my best, but I think overall I've been Good, and people have been Good to me.

I catch myself thinking about faces from my past a lot these days. Recent lovers and old flames and ones that got away. The other night I was watching Reds (the Warren Beatty film), which gave me a nice jolt of that old revolutionary spirit, but which really affected me most in that young Dianne Keaton looks an awful lot like The Peach, the beauty who came out to visit me last Summer. The film brought back strong flashes of that. We had a pretty lovely week, and I saw her in New York afterwards, but it wasn't the sort of thing that could really work with her there and me here. We're still friends, or at least honestly friendly.

For reasons lost to the dream I'm having dinner at the White House. It's not really the White House of course, and the part of George W. Bush is (natch) played by my father, but for the purposes of the dream it is the White House and he is the President.

I'm sitting in the dining room alone at a bare eight-person table, shortly joined by a kind of schlubby companion, known to be an obsequious courtier and who I also somehow know is named Josh. Annoyingly, he takes the seat next to mine out of all the other seven . This will be awkward because I won't know if people are speaking to him or to me at dinner.

The Bush daughters arrive, played by somewhat more vampy versions of themselves. Dumb-blond Jenna briefly flashes us two Joshes in the style of girls gone wild followed by Barbara (the more intelligent and ergo more attractive), who crawls across the wooden table to the far corner seat with the exaggerated, cat-in-heat style hips of a stripper working the rail.

The table is set, and various "grown ups" filter in. Laura Bush is Laura Bush. For some reason there isn't enough wine or wine glasses to go around, and Dubya/My Father rations out tiny quarter-glasses into various mugs and short cups from the dregs of a magnum bottle. For reasons lost to the dream I know we will still all become drunk, although I also find it improbable in the moment that there isn't more wine, a functionally unlimited supply, to be had in the White House, and that what we do have to drink is rotgut.

Conversation is indistinct. There is discussion of a legal brief -- schlubby courtier Josh is some sort of lawyer -- which will have to be approved by Cheney. He is never seen but rather felt as a presence, perhaps just in the other room. George makes a comment about how "we don't like being disturbed in the mornings around here," and -- scene missing? -- the next thing I know I'm waking up on a couch with a hangover.

After posting that last bit from Bryant Park, fortune smiled and I got a call and my date worked out; good improv comedy + wine bar x good conversation = just what the dr. ordered.

Also, second round of meetings also went well, almost too good to be true.

I lead a charmed life.

I'm witting on the side of an ice-skating rink near Times Square, getting down with the big free wifi.

I've been seeing people I think I know everywhere, long-lost people. It's not really them, just similar humans, but something in my brain is making me think it's them. My dad in the little bar at LAX. Kayla Van Allen on the Subway. Rachel Goens skating around Bryant Park... who knows who's next.

It looks like my date for tonight is a no-go. I had dug up and old old flame -- one of those ones you wonder about forever -- on the myspace (once you start, it's hard not to keep going) and seen that she was back living in NYC and single. The last time I saw her she was leaving the state with a boy, and I made a bit of an ass of myself. So naturally I asked if she wanted to have a civilized cup of coffee while i was in town, and it seemed to be working out, but the thread went cold after settling on this evening as the time.

C'est la vie. I didn't expect anything, but it would have been neat to see.

My spirits are still high. My meeting went quite well and I have another tomorrow, and after getting a solid 7 hours of sleep I no longer feel like an alien in my skin.

Anyway, I'm loving the city energy. More than the 24-hour nature, more than the presence of hundreds of thousands of beautiful women, more than the art and architecture and culture, I miss swimming in ambition. This is missing in the HC, and I think it's part of what I missed in San Fran (where the only ambition is weirdo computer "get rich" ambition... not my cup of tea), or at least that's what I'm feeling now.

Anyway, public goods are good. It's good to be in the mix.

Goddamnit I want to go deep. I'm feeling all charged up, filled with turkey, yes, but hardly down for the count. I am full.

I want to talk about it and work on it. I want to find a stronger peer group for my pursuits; currently worry about boring my friends with my latest revelation, realizing the distance the exists with "normal people" when I stray into my specific interests.

Also worry that being kind of pent-up leads me to have weaker human ties... my heart's not not always in it to try and overcome that social distance. I'm impatient. The pent-up ball of energy and thought becomes an impediment to normal being. It burns away much of my ease, consumes my capacity to listen. Needs expression.

In my head it's all connected to girls. The romantic barometer weighs heavy on my overall mood, and my luck and fortune with the ladies figures deep into my own personal Tarot, my sense of momentum. Clearly I'm back into looking. It's a more purposeful kind, but it's still looking.

Oh how I long for some pillow-talk. Is that too much to ask? Hot oral sex and pillow-talk? Seems like a decent place to start.

I remain a romantic at heart. I believe in that internal gyroscope, that sensor of momentum. I want it to go crazy, wild so's I can feel it; one of the reasons I've always been so in love with velocity. Speed itself conjures forces, but that's not enough anymore. I'm looking for the long run here. It's a marathon, not a sprint.

But it's getting better all the time. It helps to write about life, and in addition to getting back into autobio-blogging, I'm working on reviving my correspondence -- the better to fan old flames from afar, you letch... what, like there's anything wrong with that? -- and trying to dig into my professional tangle of ideas through other outlets. Writing works.