Part of me feels wrecked. Part of me feels affirmation.

I say over and over again that I've failed social connections over and over again in the Bay Area, whether by being unable to make them, or by breaking them. The most solid connections I've had were the Oberlin folks that I came out here for in the first place (and then lost contact with), ie, the ones that go waaay back.

A strange, timely set of "coincidences" in the past week got Nobuko, Ansje and me together tonight, reflecting on the past 11 years. I love these people, the connection was all there. Huge pangs of remorse of how things went.

Ansje and I were never really close, but we've always gotten along and liked each other, but our social interactions were always contingent on some Oberlin gathering. Still, our shared education and views always allowed us to connect really well.

Nobuko and I were much closer, close enough for things to go wrong. I've always loved Nobuko (not romantically), we always had a strong connection, we had incredible discussions at Oberlin and many a time she was able to change my view on something or the other, and our connection continued in the post-Oberlin afterlife.

We lived together in a house with two other Oberlin grads from 1995-1996, the stress of which had us go in different directions and we cut contact for several years, and even after reconnecting, it wasn't the same; sporadic, coincidental meeting up.

I thought our split was mutual, but she made it clear tonight that it wasn't, it was all me. And I believe it, as further discussion revealed how much I had blocked out about that time period, or revised in my memory.

I consider cutting off from Nobuko the single biggest mistake I've made in the Bay Area. Well, maybe going to law school was a bigger mistake. But that's how much she means/meant to me. To me, Nobuko gets uttered in the same breath as Madoka, although the different dynamics in the friendships render different results.

We're born into a given family, and then we go out into the world and find our chosen family. If I could choose my family, Nobuko would definitely be in it. No brainer. We let a lot of water flow under the bridge that we shouldn't have. I shouldn't have.

If we had the reconnection we had tonight a month ago, I would seriously consider not leaving. It felt so good to say something, and have someone know you for so long and so well, that they knew about it and its history. When I mentioned the monastery, she said, "yea, you used to mention that as an option". Affirmation. When I mention it to people I've met more recently, they just go, "cool". Good luck.

It's nice being known.

Eleven years ago, we were young, we were passionate, we were stressed, we were angsty, and I add that eleven years ago I liked who I was a lot more than now. Now, I'm much more at peace and comfortable with myself, but I like it less. That's how it works sometimes.

It's timely that we reconnect when it's too late, when I've made my decision. Just like TK telling me about a job opening at his firm after I gave notice on my apartment, even though he had been mentioning an impending opening since February. I'm meant to leave San Francisco. One way or another.

Nobuko and Ansje's support for me going to a monastery really meant a lot. It makes my current conflictedness much harder, thinking about the "another" way of leaving San Francisco. They even said they would be up for going down to Deer Park Monastery for a week stay when they got the chance. That, too, meant so much; like we were cut from similar cloths, that the experience is something they would be interested in exposing themselves to.

Meaning. Connect, George, connect.

I'd like to be a story. Of a monk on the path. And during one particular lifetime, he felt a tremor in his heart. And he came down from the mountains. And stayed. Learning over and over what he already had learned. When he was done, he decided to head back up the mountain. But he couldn't. His heart still shook. It grew and it beat. He learned that he hadn't learned anything. And the mountain path had disappeared. As did the mountain. Meh, now what?

I'm not confused. Just conflicted, but not in a bad way. Not necessarily in a bad way. Not perceived in a bad way. The pain in my leg is finally gone. It's been fading all week.

Conflicted. Two viable, attractive options. The pros of each option are very attractive, one material and physical, one spiritual and ecstatic, both necessarily intermingled. The cons of each option are also compelling, perhaps equally compelling. And the kicker is that in the big picture, it really, really does not matter which one I choose.

It's the same with packing to move. It's a serious pain in the ass, stressful, and has me in perpetual wonder what the hell I'm doing. It's also cathartic, an adrenaline stream, movement, change.

I know my postings have been erratic. That's why I don't like people with an emotional investment in me reading these pages. And at this point, I really don't know what's going to happen in the next few days. Who knows what packing will do to change my reality or perception of it. Getting rid of burdensome furniture, emptying out the dwelling.

I act like it's full speed ahead, pick up the truck Wednesday and drive off. It could be the total opposite. I really don't know. It conflicts and changes, and that's fine with me. Was suicide just some stupid, frivolous, vain fantasy?

crap, crap, crap, crap, crap. Load of crap. It's insidious how through the years, you acquire a little bit of this, a little bit of that, a pot, a pan, a broom, a hat, and then you realize when you have to move how much CRAP you have.

So much crap to my discerning eye. But screw it. Fuck it. I don't have to pack it up nicely. I'm renting a truck that's too big. If worse comes to worse, I just chuck it all the fuck in the back. Not a problem, not a problem. No stress.

I need to liberally throw things out. No attachment. Why do I have this? Why should I keep this? No one wants my junk, it's not worth trying to sell. Screw money, just get rid of the crap. I don't anticipate needing any of this crap later. I will not subscribe to acquiring a similar empire of junk in the future.

I drank a pot of coffee this morning, the first coffee I've had in over a week and a half. Can you tell? Wheeeeeee!

I wonder how many other people find the Tibetan Book of the Dead uplifting. I just find it so re-affirming how the goal in the death betweens is the same goal as when living, at least for people on or searching for the path. Especially the parts when confronted with fierce deities and the recitation is to not succumb to instinctual, habitualized fear (from living), and to recognize that they are you.

I find that makes me happy because it meshes with my belief that my reality and perception of it is my creation, it is me, it's a reflection of my psychology or psychological state. So even though I bought boxes today for the move, and realized how tired I am and I don't think I can make it, don't think I can do it, I can't succumb to negative instincts or make a habit out of them. I don't want that negative evolution, and I'm in a strange person who can actually control that stuff!

I am tired, and I'm doubting whether I can make it, but stay light, don't be despondent, don't be depressed, don't get weighed down. Don't habituate negative instincts. If I die, don't go out in fear or confusion or hate or angst. Don't cling, don't desire, don't attach. What have I been writing all this time, and realize it means something to me. And everything that has been coming to me with meaning, everything that has been resonating in this lifetime, has meant suicide, so don't feel heavy about that either.

I am so tired. I don't have the strength. Now read that again without sounding despondent.

Conflicted and confused now.

The prospects of moving back to New Jersey being a concrete reality now has sent me into stress mode. My stress mode is not a good thing, but it makes me act, react. I'm fully preparing to take the steps necessary to get the hell out of here, contact people, sell stuff, pack shit up, load up truck, drive, drive, drive.

That part of me is taking over and dominating my reality. But I'm just following stress mode slavishly, fight or flight response. Fight and flight, in my case. But it's . . . it's . . . not. It's just not. I need to think, I need to decide, I need to clarify, I need to remember. I need to love, I need to adore, I need to connect. I need to lose, I need to detach, I need to let go, I need to believe.

I said I was conflicted. I am conflicted. That's no surprise to anyone, I shouldn't wonder. It's a surprise to me. I am conflicted. I am admitting that I'm conflicted.

That's the cue for everyone who silently didn't want me to commit suicide to rush in and jam their foot in the door, and if I had comments on this weblog, maybe they would. But I don't.

But hopefully they wouldn't because I've either been so successful in convincing everyone that it's the right thing for me to do, that I should follow my heart in doing it, or people are just so sick of me prattling on and on about it that they'd be telling me to put them out of their misery and get it over with.

Alright, fine, it doesn't take a genius to figure out there was conflict, but I'm no genius, and there's a reason why this weblog is so one-sided about suicide, or at least I think it's one-sided. The coin I keep flipping is one of those one-sided ones. Only it's not. It's one of those two-sided coins which lands on one side 999 out of 1,000 flips. And then there's that 1.

What so specific about this life is so special to live it? It's sitting. Sure, I can do it in a future life, I could even probably do it "better", with a proper community, with proper guidance, with proper training. But sitting is so sublime and indescribable, and . . . this is what stopped me several weeks ago that I wasn't able to articulate. I still can't, and I can't articulate how it's the same thing, but it is.

I won't talk about sitting. I couldn't describe what sitting is, or what sitting is supposed to be. I don't know how or why I got started. I'm sure I read about it and just gave it a shot and realized it was something. I didn't need training, guidance, or community to know I was plugging into something.

10, 15, 20 minutes was hard in the early days, and if just sitting still for 10, 15, 20 minutes was hard, then it must have been something. Now, at 30-45 minutes, difficulty isn't even a consideration, and what it is has changed over the years. It's still a thing, but it's something if I keep doing will become something I'm not even imagining now. No training, no guidance, no community.

It's not that my sitting is unique and that's special, it doesn't have anything to do with individuality, but it has something to do with 'agency'. And that was the word several weeks ago when I stopped. I don't know why or what it means. I vaguely remember a thought of, "I can't die, who else is there to write about it (my dying)". Again, I have no idea what that means, but it's not as trite as it is on the surface. I guess you had to be there.

I know I can't communicate this, and I'm not even trying because it would end up sounding like a paradox, and I would look like even more of an idiot, and it's not a paradox. It's just one. I'm not good at articulating the reasons to live. Funny, I'm not good at even recognizing them. I could use a little help here, but I don't have comments. And I don't want anyone to try and then fail.

I've been so conflicted recently.

If I feel any attraction towards living this particular life, I should live it. Because even though I believe in reincarnation and that dying is a passage, the next life won't be this life. If I can look at specific aspects of this life that I want to exploit, this is the only chance.

It's still not to be attached to. Those things I might want to exploit, things that I want to explore, things that I still want to experience, I might be able to do better in another life; better able, better qualified.

I've made such a mess of this life. Not as bad as many, but nevertheless. I don't mean that cynically, or bitterly, or self-pityingly. It's just the result of how I've lived it, having lived with suicide a professed goal. It's a mess because of decisions I've made, large and small, always having it in mind that I was going to kill myself.

What if things turned out different so that it wasn't a mess? What if I found love, if I found friends, if I found community, if I found a band? Wouldn't I not want to commit suicide, therefore invalidating this belief that it's a mystical compulsion that I have to do to move on in my path?

Maybe so, but then I'd be on a vastly different path. Where I am in life now and the mess I've made of it isn't just a matter of situation or circumstance. It is the result of a carefully put together web, a scaffold framework.

All the elements that have sewn a red carpet for suicide thread back through the years. It's not that my situation and life are crap, I'm not even saying that. I've gotten to this point because it's what I've been aiming at all along. The start of the path was years ago, years gone by is the path walked, and here I am ostensibly at path's culmination.

Whether my situation or circumstances might have turned out differently is not an issue.

What the hell was I saying when I started writing this post? Something about being conflicted.

I can't wait until I'm out of San Francisco and can stop thinking and writing about suicide. Once I'm out of San Francisco, that's it, point of no return, out of sight, out of mind. Even though the basic contours of how I would do it was formulated in Ohio, and even though the East Coast is actually a bit more amenable to that plan, it somehow got tied exclusively to San Francisco. Leave here and the bond feels broken and hanging onto it would just be stupid.

I didn't sleep in my bed last night, and I think I'm not going to sleep in my bed anymore until I leave San Francisco. Get used to the disjuncture from that comfort. Sleep on the couch, sleep on the papasan, sleep on the floor like in the movie "Trust". Sleep in the truck, sleep at rest stops, sleep in motels, sleep on friends' floors, sleep back in my old room at the parents' house. Oh, how is this going to be accomplished?

Yesterday, I woke up from a dream that had me floating in waves of possible pasts and wanting a future. Life and living, the very fabric of it, feels so good. Love is pretty wonderful stuff, too, if you've had a dose of it. The feel of love is also a fabric of reality. Or so it was in the dream.

Breathing in, breathing out, air is fabric, muscles filling lung space with air. One of the side-effects of being into astronomy and cosmology is you do think about this planet as a small place in the vastness of the universe, and how this spheroid of rock is surrounded by this dubious atmosphere that allows our type of life to live; allows us to breathe in this fabric called air because it's how we live.

My parents called this morning. I told them I'd be heading back to New Jersey soon with indefinite plans for the future. I even told them I was thinking of going to Taiwan. I don't know when I'll mention anything about a monastery.

Back when I hated my parents, when I easily put the primacy of friends over family, they said, "Your family will always be here for you, do you think your friends will do that?" I said, "definitely", and I didn't care if they were there for me, I was rejecting them. All of those friends are gone, and here I am returning to New Jersey after leaving for San Francisco to get as far away from them as possible.

Luckily, I don't believe in senseless pride, or else this would be a huge blow to it. Devoid of any community, I fall back on family. I couldn't do it if I hadn't achieved losing a part of my self.

current soundtrack: Tom Waits - "Franks Wild Years"

*sigh* Well, dammit, it's my blog, and I'm not censoring it. The truth is that even having failed, I haven't stopped thinking about suicide. I go to sleep thinking about it and wanting to do it, I wake up thinking about it and wanting to do it.

Throughout the day, my feelings and my strength either way waxes and wanes, even as I slog through my professed commitment to leave San Francisco to figure out what I'm going to do next with my life. When I say strength, it is both strength to do it and strength to not do it.

By extension, I guess there's a weakness component to doing it or not doing it. "Running away" isn't a part of it, although I do recognize an element of "not having to deal with 'it' anymore" (certainly not the way I've been managing it thus far, oy). But I know or believe suicide is not getting away from anything. It's not extinction, not an end.

If anything, it's a doorway through which my journey continues. But whereas the killing of life, any life, has negative karmic consequences generally speaking, I have a gut feeling there will be little if any to my "killing" myself; it's not killing my self. It's not a killing at all.

I don't view it as a "killing", per se; the destruction of a sentient life. How am I qualified to make that judgment? I'm not sure. I couldn't make it about anything else, i.e., killing even a bug is still to be avoided because I don't know anything about that living being or its karmic history.

Maybe that's it. My understanding of that other being is limited so that killing it would be destruction of life. But my understanding or belief in my own being precludes its destruction. I view it is a passage or transformation.

Killing a bug might also be passage or transformation, but I don't have an intimate connection with the bug to have a sense of all other karmic or relational factors or consequences. For example, change that bug to a human being, and it's more clear how that killing would have widespread consequences that would impact karmically. But it's still the same with a bug.

I'm not just saying that the intimacy of my connection with myself justifies suicide, because we all have that intimacy. It's also in conception. If someone commits suicide with the conception that this is killing their/this life, if someone attaches to the notion of this life so strongly that it can be killed, that might have karmic repercussions; if they believe in that sort of thing.

Having nominal Buddhist leanings, I think it's worth pointing out that Buddhism doesn't necessarily condemn suicide, because a blanket condemnation of suicide suggests an attachment to life and living, contrary to the belief and understanding that life and living is impermanent and ephemeral and should not be attached to.

Buddhism also does not condone suicide in my reading of it, because if it is understood as a "killing", the karmic repercussions might very well be negative. As normative understanding of suicide is a killing of the self, it should be discouraged. As negative karmic repercussions are to be avoided in general, suicide should be avoided.

I'm going out on a limb to state that I believe my understanding and spiritual aptitude places me in a position along my path that recognizes that I can't "kill" myself, and doing this thing that normative thinking calls "suicide" is not killing myself. Rather it would be an exhibition of one form of non-attachment. Not attaching to the appearance of this being, this identity, this self.

This is not an across-the-board thing, as Buddhism also warns against attachment to non-attachment. In another lifetime, in another life conception, the suicide as non-attachment equation won't work if it there is an attachment to the idea that suicide equals non-attachment.

I don't think I'm attached to suicide. It's a compulsion, an instinct, a directive, but it's not an attachment, as I've survived this long and continuing with this life isn't exactly unattractive. By living, it can be said that I'm attached to life and living, but I don't think that either. If I had a compulsion to live, I'd have no problem with it and hope it wasn't an attachment.

I reserved a Penske truck for June 30 since all the reviews of U-Haul service are horrible, and who needs the stress? I'm sparing no expense since any blow to my bank account won't matter if I'm gonna enter a monastery anyway. Enter a monastery, enter a monastery, enter a monastery, fixate!

I'm gonna take Rte. 80 all the way to New Jersey, symbolically re-tracing that wretched route that brought me here almost 11 years ago. Enter a monastery.

The only planned stop I can think of is Chicago to visit Carly and Elizabeth, even though Elizabeth can't be bothered to even call when she's in San Francisco. Hm. The only planned stop I can think of is Chicago to visit Carly. :p

Enter a monastery. Fixate. Make it happen. Go the distance. If you build it, he will come. I'm ready for my close up, Mr. DeMille.

Every day is a push-broom, pushing me to the next day. Every day I'm resisting the push, but I said what I said, and I said what I'd do if I failed and I failed, but I'm still resisting because it's not too late, not that I'm going to post any more bullshit about it.

Each day the broom pushes me unwilling to the next day, and since I've given notice on my apartment, it pushes me to leaving my apartment, ostensibly leaving San Francisco. But I still haven't made arrangements yet, and I don't know if it's too late. I'm playing phone tag with the citytocity.com people. It's probably too late to reserve a u-haul. I really don't want to drive across the country in a u-haul.

What will I do if I'm stuck having given notice, but have no arrangements to get my crap out of the apartment? It's such a material consideration, what the fuck do I care except for this damn push-broom insistent against the back of my ankles? But how can I possibly hate the rotation of the Earth?

I'll mention when the pain in my leg goes away. It hurts a little less, but it's still definitely there.

Path. New path. New path has to mean something. I'm still not sold and old habits die hard. Warm weather, warm weather, warm weather. Weather doesn't matter anymore. Live and learn. I lived, I learned. Weather doesn't matte

r anymore. Pain in the leg persists. Pain is supposed to go away. Injury is supposed to heal. New path has to mean something. Still must discover. Still must believe. Any little thing can mean everything. It occurs to me that suicide and anyth

ing else I choose to do, any other path I take or option I choose – they are all the same thing. It doesn't just occur to me, it hits me like a hammer and spins me around. I've given notice on my apartment to lea

ve at the end of June, but I still haven't reserved a U-Haul or doortodoor.com service. My brother did email me today and I told him I gave notice and should be back in New Jersey soon. I haven't told anyone else, not the 'rents. I'm lo

oking into ex-patting in Taiwan. I'm looking into monasteries in Taiwan. Go to a monastery where I can't speak the language. I'm looking into getting there by teaching English and then making the move to the monastery. I still haven't begun gett

ing rid of my stuff, my furniture. I still haven't told any of the people I want to tell I'm leaving, Ed Lee, Lisa, people who are strangely mattering now. There are only people who don't matter and don't give a crap whether I

leave or stay, either way, cheers, good luck. What am I saying? No one matters. There has to be meaning in the path, there has to be discovery in the path, there has to be search in the path, there has to be finding in the path, anything I do is the path. Anything I find is me. "It was you." "No, it was you." Not a g

ood idea. Not a good idea. I'm not sold. It's not a good idea to make a decision when there's no consequence of the decision except the execution of the decision. None of my decisions had consequences, none of my decisions had something next. It's just been decide and execute, decide and exe

cute, decide and execute, decide and execute quit the job, decide and execute quit the band, decide and execute give notice, and the light at the end of the tunnel has always turned out to be. . . just. light. at. the. end. of. the. tunnel. And the Summer sunlight feels good on my face.

My leg still hurts from when I mentioned hurting it somehow last week.

I didn't think it was any big deal. I still don't, but it still hurts the same as it did a week ago. I think it's psychological. Like the time I got hit by an SUV, but my body didn't indicate that it was hurt until over a month later.

I can't even identify what is hurt in my leg now. There's nothing visible, no scrape, no bruise or discoloring. I don't think it's bone, like a light fracture, although I haven't broken a bone in such a long time I don't know all the ways that might hurt. Like I said, I don't know what happened, and the pain in my hand that I mentioned went away.

It hurts underneath the skin in my right shin – muscular maybe, but no bruising. If I run my hand across it applying a slight pressure, I can feel the pain and it's kind of sharp. It also hurts if I stretch it, but the pain isn't so bad that I have to avoid doing it. It's just there. It hasn't stopped my sitting regimen or kept me from riding.

If it is psychological, I'm trying to figure out what my mind is doing or saying. I'd like to think it's telling me to remember that night, but that's wishful thinking. Remember what?

The worst part of it is that I'm disappointed in myself. Who knows what subjective reality is versus objective reality? Who knows what anything is beyond our five senses and our own minds, our own consciousness, and our own perspectives?

We place so much faith in these lives, and we're pulled through the timeline like there's a string attached to our navels, and everything changes around us. Some things we can control and affect, other things we have no control over, everything simultaneously pulled through the timeline to their ultimate end.

I don't remember when the formulation began for me that reality is just a ship in a bottle. It was probably reading "Illusions" by Richard Bach, but of course reading a book does not create a world view. It was just a catalyst, a realization, an articulation of what I already believed.

Who knows what built the foundation in my psyche that would respond to that catalyst? But it resonated wildly that life was more than mere physical reality, and there was more to it than just living it. It was also personal. It is what we design it to be while existing in a state where "we" is not defined, what becomes of us after we die, and what we were before we were born.

It's also karmically driven, but that's another story, never mind...

Then there was suicide which was also hard-wired in my psyche. I don't know how that happened, it wasn't just childhood or teenage angst, although it might have started that way like an egg. It was always there like a strange object in my room, begging to be picked up, examined, investigated, analyzed, understood.

We place such faith and effort into these lives that will fade and pass. And for good reason. These things have meaning; the content of our experience is not empty. The content of my experience is not empty. But what made it something, what gave it meaning, was walking down this path and making sense of these things that have presented themselves to me.

It hasn't been an easy path. Despite being pretty clear on the concepts, I've been walking it often confused and making quite a mess of it. But now I'm telling myself I'm supposed to turn things around. It's over. I lost the plot. Resign and live life the way normal living people envision how it's meant to be lived? Well, what's the point?

So I'm disappointed in myself, now scrounging about, pathetic, to pick up pieces of something I didn't want, don't really care for, and feel I wasn't meant to have.

self-loathing sets in.

It's 5:30 in the morning, and I'm conceding failure. I didn't fail to do it. I failed to reasonably attempt it, and not knowing where the pain in my leg and the pain in my hand came from is no solace. And I did not come home with the board, just as I said I would. *grin*

No. It was an attempt. It was a good attempt. And I even think I know what stopped me. No, wait, I don't, or at least it's gonna take a while to articulate. I vaguely feel like Tom Cruise at the end of "The Last Samurai" "Risky Business". If I'm remembering the end correctly, it's been a while.

I have jury duty today. And there's sand in my bathtub and in my kitchen sink. It occurs to me that in 10 years, I've never gone into the Pacific Ocean. It's a thing that's always been there, always made its presence known, and I've never really touched it. Too cold, I thought. But it's not. It's too cold to recreate in it. And I love it. And I love high tide. It just doesn't love me back.

Oh, and thank you.

When I go out there next, I need to remember there's a reason why I'm out there. There's a reason why I'm at this point. To back away from it should require some change, some great change in my thinking or being, some realization that must reverse the reason why I'm out there. Short of that, I have to remember this isn't about feeling, it isn't about a moment.

At the same time, I should probably balance it out by asking why it's been so long in getting to this point, why it's been so hard. If I've made it this far, why not further? Hm. The short answer is that I've been giving myself all the chances I deserve, and I needed to be sure. Now I'm sure.

If nothing stopped me from getting to that point, there is nothing to turn back to. Right? I've considered everything that is known to consider. The only thing that I haven't considered is what can't be known – the future. And by example, the future hasn't brought much over the past 15-20 years, why should I trust in it now?

I know I still might fail, but before then I have to keep pushing this, pushing this, pushing this. If I do fail, can I visit you after I leave San Francisco?

current soundtrack: Shostakovich, Symphony No. 10

I've been thinking about what stopped me. I've been approaching it as a problem, as something to be trouble-shot so that I can find a way around it next time around.

She said, "Taking my own life, sure, I've thought about. But the concept of suicide, not so much". I, on the other hand, have been more about the concept of suicide, and not so much taking my own life. Theory and practice, theory and practice, theory and practice.

Even my methodology, which I now believe would have a very high success rate, is high on concept, but impractical on execution. I have insisted on that to make sure it wasn't an impulse thing, but lordy, I think I've proven and argued several lifetimes over that this is not impulse.

Then what is it? And what stopped me? What's going to be different next time around? If I figure out what stopped me in optimal conditions, would that preclude a next time? "Preclude", interesting word. It was used a lot in law school, it had meaning in arguments, it was a linchpin in logic, signaling a conclusion.

Does my background preclude execution of the theory? Is that what stopped me? Thinking about taking one's own life is a practical consideration. You're in a perceived unbearable situation, and you tunnel your vision into one thing to the exclusion of alternatives.

Thinking too much about suicide as concept, or high concept, might actually make it impossible to do. Might actually make it impossible to do? Maybe my construction of the whole thing includes an inherent fail-safe against it. It includes a contemplation of life and its value. How much would that suck? What have I been doing all these years?

Fuck it. Fuck it, fuck it, fuck it. Fuck theory, it comes down to either I do it, or I don't, and I'm gonna keep going out there every night until I get a definitive yes or a no. Otherwise this is all stupid. Even for me.

Don't.

Don't email me. Don't call me. Don't stop by.

I'm still alive, but I'm not done yet. Yet.

I'm not convinced yet, even shivering by Castro station, jeans soaked and weighed down with water and sand. Even now my shirt is wet halfway up.

My throat hurts. That sermon wouldn't have convinced anyone. It wasn't meant for anyone else. No one likes to be yelled at.

It's what I thought, it will take several . . . excursions to figure out what I will do, but I admit that each one will decrease the chance that I will do it. Tonight was perfect, what stopped me?

The biggest decision of my life. Not only to do it, but also to not do it. If I do it, that's the biggest decision of my life. If I turn around and walk away, that is also the biggest decision of my life. I'm not convinced either way yet.

Nothing happened. I'm not expecting anything to "happen". Just that I started to consider every little detail, every nuance of the decision, and I'm not done yet, I only began to consider them tonight. To be continued.

Everything, each year, each person, all that I've done, all that I've thought, all that I've felt, nothing should be left unconsidered by the time I decide.

One thing, though. I turned around tonight and came home because I knew I could do it. It wouldn't be that hard. I was soaked, I got swamped, halfway at least, and I knew I could do it. If I had any doubt about that, I would have stayed there longer.

One thing, though. And let's be clear about this. Feelings had nothing to do with my decision. I've already decided on it, that's what I was doing out there in the first place. It wasn't time to feel anymore. It was only time for something to happen. And nothing happened this nochy.