Personal Journal

Just about me

I'm kind of trying not to write about Jean with this entry. I'm not going to even try to think about her - I just want to write about me.
I've done a lot of painting. If I had it to do over again when I re-immersed myself into this hobby, I might not do it, because it's been about 2 or 3 times as expensive as I expected it to be. Paints, brushes, and peripheral stuff added up. The miniatures themselves I knew roughly the cost of, and I bought too many. But the putty and the knife blades and such, I had forgotten about.
Still, it's pretty serene to do it. Especially when it goes well, and especially when I listen to music. I can see myself doing this in the future for a long time. I only seem to wish I could do it outdoors.
I can see myself living alone again in the future, not because I have to, but because I want to. One of the things I've noticed about life is how the greatest serenity in my life came in periods or instances in which I was alone.
I enjoy solitude, and I've begun thinking that women are just different enough a species that I'm starting to wonder, if not fully believe, that the only significant reason that I personally redirect my life to associate with them is because I have a strong sex drive.
I don't dislike women at all. I actually think they are the far more refined species of human (I think it's obvious that we each, men and women, are absolutely sub-species of the greater species, and that's not a bad thing in my judgement). But I do have a strange sexual appetite, and frankly, this culture just does not build women to enjoy the same sexual appetites as I do while still retaining those aspects of femininity that I consider the most charming.
And so, I have to admit, I do think of life after Jean. I think I'm obligated to, though I can't say that I'm "planning" on it. I'd call it all contingencies, because if I could give up anything from my present or future to have her cancer-free, believe me, I would.
But yes, as a person who has always espoused and lived the proverb "Hope for the best, plan for the worst," I have to admit, I've looked at what possible plans there could be for me. And one of the things I've focused on is living alone, because that's what I'd like to do. And, if there is life insurance money, which I think there will be, leaving this life here in this house and going back to school for my Master's in Classics - beyond that, I don't know.
One of the questions Jean asks of god is what this cancer might be for, and I don't think anyone can give an answer that can be of any comfort to her. I think it's obviously a reminder - to everyone - to take stock of those things that fill the human spirit in this life, and what betters our lives. And so when I think of what it means to me, it means that the most important thing I can do is to love her, accept her, and strive so completely to understand her. I also hope to comfort her. If I can somehow save her through any act of piety on my part, so be it. I know that I would give anything to make her cancer-free. And if that's not to be, I know that no one she knows can better comfort her in her sickness than can I.
And if Jean goes... beyond, I guess you'd say... I think I have a duty to live up to the best of her, and getting out of the crappy rat-race I loathe and into teaching people about the humanities, well, that would be something worthy of her.
It's difficult living a dual life, but I've had lots of practice. I live with the hope that she'll beat the odds, but I also live knowing how unlikely it is.
In some way, a part of me wants me to feel guilty for thinking like that, but it's a part of me that has a child-like incomprehension. How can you think that, it says? Well, I say... I'm an adult. You just do. You take stock of possibilities and outcomes, actions and consequences. I'm very objective and analytical in this regard.

I wish I could get some alone time. Obviously, Jean is always here, and she won't leave without me because there's no one else she trusts. I'd love to sit up here at this computer and listen to music and write, like I did last summer, and a little over the fall and winter. There's just no way that can happen right now. But I sure wish it could.
It's not the same to leave and be by myself away from home. I'm a home-body, I treasure my sanctuary. And it's still a bit of a sanctuary with her within. I just don't seem to be able to get the room to really think and breathe and truly relax like I have when I was truly alone in the house.

I'm sleepy. I must go to bed.

It is never too late to be what you might have been. -- George Eliot
Courage to start and willingness to keep everlasting at it are the requisites for success. -- Alonzo Newton Benn