New tag. Drupal set message "Power dating." Backstory on that is here, and I'll elaborate with new thoughts now.

Well, actually, first I start with self-quote, to illustrate just how sisyphusian this feels at time. From my report back from Baja, which feels like another lifetime:

I realized, for instance, just how blatantly I’ve been keeping myself out of range of romance out of fear more than anything else. Sex and love have always been intertwined in my experience, and avoiding one is a pretty good way to skirt the other. Much as I bemoan my lonely state, it’s my own choices and habits of action that render it so. I’ve been rationalizing this to myself as a kind of jaded maturity, but now I think that’s just bluster.

The truth is I’m afraid of what might happen: of getting hurt, of hurting someone else, of getting into unknown territory where the possibility of both those things just gets greater. It’s weak sauce, really, because this is what life is all about; but as they say the first step towards finding a solution is admitting you have a problem. So there’s that.

I also realized in conjunction with the above that I’ve been looking backwards a lot, for similar reasons, when really I should be looking forward. The possibilities of the future are almost literally endless, and when I begin to entertain them I feel a real true gut-level sense of trepidation — “don’t make plans; don’t invest; shit doesn’t pan out, remember?” — and it feels like it might be that good kind of Allen Ginsburg brand of fear. The kind I know I should pursue.

That was nine months ago. Today I remain in almost exactly the same position. The Girth sort of confronted me with this last night -- in the good way that friends do -- as we were getting ourselves fired up to go out in Berkeley. Because it's true. I am afraid, and even as I can feel my whole being becoming increasingly energized, I have nervousness and trepidation in my heart. I have performance anxiety, concerns about failing to meet my own high standards. More than any of this, I have layered defense mechanisms which are used to rationalize and obfuscate the whole situation under the auspices of reducing hassle.

This is childish. It is time this ended.

So we went out to a nice little drinking establishment where they have ginger beer (great with gin) and soothing live jazz music. I rode my new Mission Bicycle down just for kicks. After a little seat adjustment it feels like god's own chariot, and I'm actually kinda bummed to be leaving it here for a while. Doesn't do me much good in the HC though (or doesn't it...).

Anyway, the speedy ride and sparksplus get me well-primed to hit the scene. Not that we're doing anything crazy, just having a couple cocktails and looking at pretty girls of a Saturday evening. There are two such behind the bar, and as a sign of how high I feel I'm riding of late, I skip on past the Girth's worldly wisdom of not attempting to engage such creatures -- to wit: pretty women who wait tables, sling coffee or pour drinks are virtually un-flirtable owing to their massive overexposure -- I give the one a little friendly sass while ordering our beverages.

Conversation turns to the increasingly bourgeoisie nature of our lives, and my man is nice enough to humor me with some flattering words about how I'm going to be successful without losing my humanity, and to let me spin out my faux philosophical ramblings on our first-world problems. I invent a good bit about Maslow's pyramid of human needs as a series of mechanisms for social control, and the ascending of said pyramid as the sweet road to freedom. We talk about the general fuckedupness of the world. The evils of the prison system. The gradual stripping away of the fourth, fifth and sixth amendments (only true checks against a police state), and the strong chances that we will get a Democratic president and congress, but not universal health care.

The revolution misses us, and we miss it. Part of my feeling better and better about life makes me think once again that there's something good to be done with our cultural capital and freedom to work outside institutional structures. There's a lot of injustice, especially when you're not a financially comfortable, physically fit, straight white male American. What to do with all that dumb luck, you know?

By and by we get another chance to make friendly with the bartender since the gentleman to our left is being a bit of a prick. Common enemies are good at producing solidarity. Her shift finishes at about midnight and she takes a seat next to my buddy, and I think suddenly this has potential, though she spends a good amount of time talking to the handsome long-haired fellow further to the right and at some point a very skinny man with a very trendy haircut enters and exerts some signs of social ownership.

It's at this point that I disengage, and upon reflection I'm a little disappointed. She was obviously at least somewhat interested in me/us, initiating small-talk and asking to try on my hat, etc. She introduced herself, and when we did finally roll out she put her hand on my chest and told me it was nice to have met me. Her skinny/trendy companion could easily have been an affectionate homosexual friend, but I used the pretense of a putative boyfriend to ignore the fact that this girl, who I legitimately thought was attractive, seemed to think I was attractive as well. And this is a move borne of fear, or perhaps even cowardice.

So yeah, baby steps. I've been making some progress. Getting it up to flirt in the first place, and I did an ok job talking to a cute girl down at Coachella, and with a couple of shiny local faces in the elevator at work, and having nice correspondences and the like. But the killer instinct is lacking. As my brothers at Wu-Tang Financial remind me, you gotta play this game rough: in, out, grab, get, bonk. Coffee's for closers.

To that end, I think the next logical step for the plan of Power Dating is Operation Get Real Hot, which involves improving my personal grooming routines and getting into a healthy gym habit for the next three weeks I'm up north. After that it's Operation Get Out There And Mix It Up, which is a little more of an unknown.