This is the fourth or fifth time I’ve opened a window and stared at the page, trying to clean up my thoughts into words. The last few times I’ve decided to install Linux or browse Facebook instead of actually writing.

I’m having a hard time expressing myself because I don’t consider my current concerns to have high stakes. They are meaningless in the bigger picture. Petty and small, yet somehow they are still managing to cripple me.

Not to long ago, I looked at a thread on reddit asking people why they were really single. While I thought about what my answer would be, I scanned through the list, plenty of people with answers along the same lines as mine would have been. Obviously I’m not alone in being alone.

A friend was trying to help me with my OK cupid profile the other day. She’d found a great guy on there, and figures I should be able to have the same luck.

I appreciate her support, but a big part of the problem is that while I’m lonely, I’m not sure how ready I am to actually be involved with anyone.

A few months back I met someone from the site and we got along well. It seemed like it was something, but suddenly it was gone. Before that I think I’d made various attempts at dating, but my recollections aren’t overly clear.

I know at one point I’d thought I had chemistry with someone at a kink event and then been told that the person didn’t have time for any other relationships in their life. Not long after, that same person started complaining in her FetLife status posts about a lack of sadists in her life. At that point, I could have approached her, I could have commented on it, or a few other tactics. Instead, I removed her from my friends list, as it was my discomfort that was the issue.

Perhaps that is a cowardly way of dealing with the issue, I likely would have considered it that a few years back. On the other hand, it was my problem. I was the one bothered by what was communicated and I had no real investment in the “friendship”, so best to move on.

Is this a pattern of avoidance on my part? There is one girl that I’ve been talking to for a year or more, who I originally tried to help get out of an abusive relationship. We’ve hung out a few times, talked about it going somewhere, but it hasn’t gone past teasing. She also has an fwb who she is loyal to, but who doesn’t seem to deserve that loyalty. From what she has said, their relationship has violated her boundaries a few times, and she’s accepted it. It bothers me. She showed me what he got her for Christmas. That was a wake-up call for me. I’ve told her that I’m going to be distant for a while, that I’m probably going to be getting more distant. It bothers me that someone I am fond of is taking part of something that makes her sad.

I’m sure I could talk longer about this, but I’ve run out of time for now.

Back from dinner with the family, attempting to recover my train of thought.

I have a handful of people that I’ve managed to open up to, but the amount I’ve opened up has probably been reshaped over the last few years. It’s probably deceptively shallow, in that the stuff I’ve gotten comfortable with has gotten broader, but the specific details have faded away.

Apparently my psyche is best compared to a bog at this point. Random patches of solid ground surrounded by a mess of unstable soil, punctuated with random sink holes.

The girl I’d mentioned earlier got upset with me for posting about her, rather than talking to her about the issue. I posted about it because I’m trying to understand the pattern that I’m going through. It was about her, but only in as much as she was someone who was there for it. The bigger issue, the thing I was writing about, was how I was handling things. Rather than making an attempt to compete, I’m backing down and wandering off.

I’ve been doing that lately, but it’s also something I picked up a while ago. I don’t see the point in competing for people. Part of it is that people aren’t prizes, so competing for them isn’t something I’m comfortable with anymore. Part of it is that I’ve gotten a negative view of my own self worth.