I had a variation on my recurring dreams last night. I think of them as familiar places that have unexpectedly changed dreams. Often, the dreams are almost identical, sometimes, only the situation is similar. I am most often on my bicycle, but sometimes on foot, and very seldom by car. I start off riding in a safe area which I know well, and that I clearly recognize. Then, I make the same wrong turn, or a similar wrong turn, or the road has changed, and I end up in known area that I know to be dangerous, like very dangerous neighbourhoods in New York City, where I grew up. Sometimes, I am only at one of the confusing three-way intersections in a place like Victoria and always seem to pick the wrong way. Sometimes the wrong way leads me to a longer wronger way, although I had a feeling I was on the right road or direction. Last night, I went through what seemed to be an empty/vacant house and came across a young mother lying in bed with two boys so close in age that they might have been twins, but were not twins. She was not nursing them, but they were laying on her chest and she was holding them and the boys were sleeping. They all had black hair. The woman was not undressed, but was wearing a loosely fitted but not revealing white blouse. Then I thought I found the right way but there had been construction and I could not proceed and I was unsure whether it had actually been the right way. I never have any bicycle problems in the dream. It is always daytime, although sometimes close to the end of the day. I never find my way home. I don’t wake terrified, but unsettled.

I confess that I haven’t blocked their number because I’m waiting to see if they ever send me something real. So far it’s just a lot of casual nonsense stuff so there’s nothing for me to say. I know the chances are slim that they will finally get it, but I’d hate to block them only to find out later that they sent something I’d really want to hear.

She discovered her last Tinder guy was still with his wife. I had just been through a fresh breakup so we cuddled for a night. I shouldered her troubles and supported her emotionally for a few months until she disappeared with the next Tinder guy without a trace.

A crush at my work asked me out a few months ago, and after a few dates things have been seemingly good. The thing is, I worked with her for years. I always defined her as out of my league by a long shot. For the most part, working with her lived up to that. She's had two finances in the time I've known her and both were dudes way better than me. Coming straight from the gym, jacked up, perfectly groomed, expensive trucks, etc. Over the pandemic and after it ended our employment went through a lot of purging and deficits and lot of people who were higher up than me have spent years bitching and been depressed. I am a bottom rung type of employee. I am chipper as hell, and genuine. That's never mattered in my 40+ years. I assumed I was just a rebound or fling for this woman, and I'd have been happy with that, but apparently a relentless positive attitude for a decade plus has made more of an impact on her. I have had addiction issues more than once, owned them and kept going. She mentioned on our last date, she knows my f*ck ups and addictions, and she knows when I fall how I am. Her phone kept going off the last date and rather than look at it privately she stated point "I like you," she then put the phone on the table and slid it over and said "you can read what my clingy ex is saying." I didn't bother to read it. I slid the phone back. She smiled and we went about our dinner.

Did you ever encounter someone who was so thoroughly obnoxious in their routine behaviour that it defied credulity? I have such a person as my neighbour. Everything they do is obnoxious. They can’t go out of or into a door without slamming it. They are totally inconsiderate of others in the building by monopolizing the laundry room, holding loud drunken smoke-filled conversations right outside the windows of other residents, leaving their garbage in the hallways, etc. Every time I think they’ve reached a peak of rudeness, they top it with something else. The last thing I want is to have to complain to the property manager because that rarely ends well. I just live in hope now that they will move out before I’m driven to enact some kind of revenge. I’m a peaceful person and a considerate neighbour and I just want to live in peace. What is wrong with people like this? .

Someone I used to work with started a Go Fund Me for her cat. She earns good money and just bought an apartment with her fiancé. Shit. I live in a basement suite! I'd love a cat. Go Fund Me would be a last resort for me though. Already at 1 / 10 of the goal though. It's impossible to keep up with the Jones and Joneses'. It's hard to keep feeling optimistic and happy about life when cats get more attention than you do.

My fiend received a bit of good news the other day that his stocks went up. He had like a 3K share investment in a small bottled water company for a long time that never really went anywhere and now his 3K is worth 11K overnight. If a company like Coke buys them out he could end up with millions. I've never tried or learned how to do anything on the stock market but I think I'd like to try buying some shares of something but not spend too much.

I look at myself in the mirror, I see what I hold. I see my blue eyes, full of kindness and strength. I see my lips natural soft, just like the words they produce. I see my body, how it carries me through out my life. I look at myself every morning and I know I am beautiful. I know I have a beauty many others don’t have within them and outside of them. I’m a kind good person, I love too much and I think too much. I feel peoples feelings without them needing to speak of them. I see myself at night. Standing in the mirror thinking why. Why can’t someone love me? I love everything about me and I know am beautiful. I see the way men stare at me, how strangers approach me and tell me what they need to say cause I have that soul. I have the soul of holding broken hearts and making them feel whole, even if it’s for a brief second. So why can’t someone love me the way I love others, the world, myself. I just want to be whole heartedly loved.

I confess that I don’t have time for veiled hints or subtle gestures designed to keep me guessing about true intentions. That’s a disaster waiting to happen. If you want me in your life say so. If you’re too afraid of rejection to risk it then you’re not my kind of man.

And I don't regret a single one.