On Friday I go home, mow the lawn, lift weights, and do the laundry. This isn't quite enough, so I take Nopey for a walk and continue on for a longer walk on my own. I'm refreshed, so I work on a couple of websites. Before the evening has concluded I've become restless, so I take a quick shower and head to Fire Island (even though a number of acquaintances have told me that they are going to be in Las Vegas this weekend).
There is nothing special about this visit to Fire Island. The crowd is down a bit from the last two weeks when the place was jam-packed. There are offers presented but I respond with, "I'm not taking any offers right now". When pressed further, I respond with, "I'm having a period of voluntary celibacy." This is met with puzzled looks, but gets the job done.
Saturday sees a good approximately 30 mile bicycle ride in the morning followed by washing the truck. Because the rear of the truck is brand new it looks great when washed, but the front, because it is almost nine years old, looks...um...old. So I wax just the front of the truck to make it look closer to the condition of the rear. (And I'm not supposed to wax the new paint in the rear for 90 days or so.) I get some shopping in before feeding and watering the roses and lying down for a nap.
The almost hour nap is interrupted by telephone calls from Person M_C, Brandon, and Person T_T. Person M_C and I agree to have dinner and we meet up at a Souplantation. ("We have to eat healthy" is what I requested.) After dinned I relax at home until 10pm when I start driving towards Los Angeles to go to a club having it's five year anniversary.
The club is packed by midnight. I run into Person W and Person D_V. (I like Person D_V. Person D_V and Person T_U have been together for 8 years except for a few months ago when they separated to work some things out. But they are back together and I'm happy for both of them.) Person D_V does not have Person T_U with him, but he has other friends who are recognizable and they are happy to see me. I don't get any formal offers and don't make any formal offers (though I did want to). This is consistent with this period of voluntary celibacy.
Somehow, and I don't quite know how, there is a missing period of time. I know that I left the club at 1:50 am on Sunday morning. And I know that I was parking the truck on a deserted street in downtown Los Angeles at 2:15 am on Sunday morning. (Because it's on the way home, silly!) And I remember saying to myself, "That's a junkie - you can see the sunken eyes, stretched skin over the cheeks, and the junkie shuffle. And that's a junkie too. And there's another one. But that's not a junkie. Why is a non-junkie wandering the streets of downtown Los Angeles somewhat before 3 am on a Sunday morning?" And then it hits me: I'm here too. Looking for something - questions, answers, whatnot. I don't find any of them. Actually, I find everything. And here's the missing few hours: Leaving the club at 1:50 and returning to home in Long Beach when the sun is almost poking through.
I get up at 8 am and get out for a reasonable 20 mile bicycle ride. I read the newspaper, have the London conversation ("I'm a bit nervous about coming to London if we declare war on Iraq." But I wholeheartedly invited myself along when Person M_C said that he was going to visit his mom in Jakarta, Indonesia in May.), and go rollerblading without Person Dao because he has declined the offer.
When I return from rollerblading and buying tax preparation software and prior to walking Nopey, I finally go back and listen to all of the mobile phone messages that have been piling up. I return the one from Person T_T and we end up speaking for about 40 minutes. And I get to the last archived message on the mobile phone and listen to the entire 2 minute message. I absolutely bolt out the door with Nopester in tow when I get towards the end of the message and hears the words, "...I love you...", in the message. And I thought that voluntary celibacy was supposed to make things a bit easier emotionally.
The walk helps though it is dominated by those words. I decide to take the most prudent course of action that could be expected of someone who has had a handfull of hours of sleep over the last two nights, been out for two good bicycle rides, an hour of rollerblading, an hour of walking, and is in a period of voluntary celibacy: I ignore the message and do not return the call.