i’ve been told that everyone dreams. everyone. people dream in order to refresh their minds and to keep from going crazy. the body does it naturally, like breathing, or taking a big crap. while i may dream every night in my restless sleep, but i can count on one hand the number of dreams that i’ve actually recalled upon waking.

have you ever had a dream that seems so real, that when you wake up you wonder whether it was real? these are the only kinds of dreams i seem to have. i mean, of course i have others, every night. but these are the only ones i remember. the dream i had last night was so real. there were smells and sounds and feelings, people in know in my waking life. when i woke up this morning, i was completely disoriented.

one might think these kinds of dreams would be great to have. people who think like this are the same type of people who like bungie-jumping. i hate having them. i wish i never woke up remembering my dreams. i don’t remember dreams about flying or being a millionaire or something like that. of course not. not me. instead, i dream about the girl that crushed my heart and left me a broken person for years. or, like last night’s most recent incarnation, i dream about being in love with another girl, a new girl.

i’ve imagined falling in love for years. to keep from sounding exceedingly strange, i won’t tell you just how many years. it does go without saying, however, that i am, in many respects, a hopeless romantic (though some of my friends may say otherwise). dreams, such as the one i had last night, leave me completely shaken. aside from feeling a bit lost, confused, and disoriented upon waking, i spend the rest of that day (at least) feeling not quite myself, not to mention a bit depressed and cranky.

i mentioned this particular dream to a good friend of mine, hoping for some consolation and comfort. i guess i didn’t make that clear to her, because her response, after i explained the dream to her, she told me that carl jung believed that the people and places in our dreams are really just all representations of different aspects of ourselves. i never liked carl very much.

so, at this point, i’m not quite sure why i’m writing this. i started writing a post a few different times throughout the course of the day, but always ended up deleting it. i mean, i don’t know that this is going to make me feel any better. i can’t see how sending this out into the endless abyss that is the internet is going to help me feel better. i can’t expect a response, i mean in the two or three years i’ve been posting to this site, i’ve gotten two comments. two!

i could try to describe the dream to you, but i don’t know that it would make much sense. while i say that i still remember the dream, i just remember bits and pieces. i remember the girl, including her name. i remember seeing friends and sketchy details about my surroundings. mostly, i remember the feeling. i remember the feeling of being in love and having someone who is in love with me. and i remember the feeling when i woke up and realized it had all be a fantasy.
i can’t even begin to describe how frustrating that is. i can’t give it a vocabulary.

emotionally speaking, i’m the strongest and healthiest i’ve ever been. ever. i feel like for the first time in my life, i don’t need someone to love me so i can feel good about myself. and yet, still, i continue to think about a lost love and dream about a love that might not ever be.

don’t ask me how i came up with this, or why it seemed to occur to me when it did, but i recently came up with this new theory regarding men, women, relationships, and marriage.  take it for what you want….

i think few people would argue that one of the primary driving forces for men is sex.  you hear about studies which suggest that men think, on average, about sex something like every five seconds.  maybe fifteen, but whatever the number, we get the idea; if men aren’t thinking about sex, their either watching football or their asleep.  and to be honest, i don’t know that the latter is a true exception.  as this is the case for most men, it is, i think, fair to presume that when they get into a relationship they presume (whether correctly or not) there will be at least a fair amount of sex for them.  otherwise, why, given their affinity, would they choose to enter a relationship with a particular woman?
women, on the other hand, have a wholly different drive and wholly different expectations of a relationship.  women want a baby.  women want a pet: dog, cat, gerbil, goldfish, etc.  their primary motivation isn’t sex so much as it is being a nurturer, a mother, or dog owner.  they want something/someone they can fawn over, pet, play with, feed, dress up, and so on.  when women get into a relationship, their presumption is the man will let her play that role with them.

following this line of thinking, a long-term relationship, or marriage is a joining of two particular people, who have both agreed to these terms: the men agree to play the role of trainable pet in exchange for regular sex.  women, on the other hand, agree to dole out regular sex to keep their pet playful, amenable, and docile.

now obviously, there is more involved, because both men and women generally go through several relationships before ‘settling down.’  presumably there is some attraction involved (particularly for the woman, who is usually more picky about with whom they go to bed).  while men may not be as particular about with whom they sleep, they are more interested in who the woman acts between romps on the sack.

underlying all the personality subtleties, there is this basic compulsion: men want sex, women want a pet.  when they find someone they can tolerate beyond their unspoken drive, a relationship develops.  over time, the fine points of the agreement are unconsciously negotiated until the contract is ready to be signed, at which time there is a wedding with cake and flowers and lots of presents.  the man, in exchange for having to go through such a ridiculous event is, in exchange, guaranteed an abundance of sex for a predetermined about of time following the wedding.

i just finished watching one of my favorite movies: garden state. if you haven’t seen it, go out right now and rent it. while it occurred to me tonight that not every one can appreciate it the way i do, i nonetheless think that its definitely a movie that every one should see at least once. zack braf is brilliant and the sound track kicks ass.

have said all that, i feel the need to expound a bit on the notion that while the movie is brilliantly written, it is geared toward a certain demographic; people like me. more specifically, twenty-somethings with issues steming from low self-esteem and a stranged childhood. of course, i didn’t think my childhood was strained or abnormal at the time, but looking back, i have to believe that there was something about my childhood that has caused me to constantly doubt myself and my self-worth. i think without that experience or realization, while you can certainly enjoy garden state, i don’ think you can appreciate it in quite the same way. i don’t think you can relate to it.

along that same line of thought, i don’t you can relate to, or appreciate the ending without having some of that same self-doubt and lack of self-worth. without spoiling the movie for those of you that haven’t seen it, the ending is inspiring for people like me: those trouble twenty-somethings. the ‘moral of the story’ is that life is life. its good, great, lousy, frightening, fucked up, and very much worth living. bad things are going to happen, things are going to suck occasionally, and you’re probably going to fail from time to time. but things are also going to be good, fun, funny, happy, and interesting. the trick is, according to the movie, is to take the good with the bad. life is life and, for better or for worse, its worth living.

of course, the trick is to actualy live: to learn to take the good with the bad, the successes with the failures, the joy with the sorrow. unfortunately, despite the movie’s unique and brilliant lesson, this is something that, in 27 years, i have been unable to do. i guess i should put so much hope in a movie, no matter how inspiring it may be.

drugs that alter my brain chemistry didn’t work.  now my shrink thinks meditation is the way to go….

i don’t even know how to respond.

you may or may not be aware, but i’m not a terribly happy person.  that’s not to say that i’m unhappy.  i used to be able to say i was unhappy.  depressed is a better word, but in this instance i don’t want to associated with the clinical definition, so let’s stick with unhappy.  i used to be unhappy, but i’m not anymore.  i’m something else: something between happy and unhappy.  a limbo of sorts?  i have no word to describe the feeling.  discontent?  maybe.  i don’t really know.  what i do know is that its not a feeling that i’m particularly fond of.

my mom seems to be of the opinion that this is normal, that most people go through life feeling like this.  and she may be right, but i nevertheless have a hard time believing it.  i mean, if most people walk around in their lives feeling like this, it might explain some of what’s wrong with the world.  i mean, shouldn’t we enjoy life?  i mean, isn’t that the theme of so many countless books, movies, and songs?  even the most famous latin phrase would suggest otherwise….

and maybe that’s my problem.  maybe i don’t know how to seize the day.  i haven’t learned how to enjoy life and to make the most of it.  i think i’ve spent the last 27 years waiting for something to happen.  have i been putting off life because its easy to do so?  i think its safe to say that i’ve been drifting through life to this point.  could it be that i’ve gotten so used to floating that i’ve forgotten how to swim?  or, is it that i never really learned how?  regardless of the analogy, one thing is very clear; i’m terrified.

i’m terrified of everything it seems: of failing, of disappointing my father, of being hurt, of change.  i’m afraid that all this fear is going to keep me from being happy.  more than anything else in the whole world, i just want to be happy.  i’d say that i’d gladly give up everything i have in exchange for happiness and self-esteem (you could use the word confidence as well).  i’m convinced at this point that the two go hand in hand.  you can’t have one without the other.  it makes sense, because in all the length and breadth of my life, i’ve had neither.

i’ve been in therapy now for a little over two years and recently was prescribed wellbutrin (an anti-depressant).  after taking the medication every day for nearly eight weeks, it was doing me no good, so i my doctor told me to stop taking it.  i always said that medication would be a last resort if nothing else could fix me.  well, my last resort didn’t work.  what the hell am i supposed to do now?