02/14/00

Valentine Special

Or: "(Why and How) I ain't gettin' laid again this year"

I guess I should have expected it. I made no plans , bought no flowers , put forth no effort, and, lo and behold, I didn't get on Suck 's list of the biggest VD losers again this year. Oh well...

At the very least I can take comfort in the fact that I fit at least four of the "men and women to avoid" personas...

But this pouting-over-lost-glory (while simultaneously pouring glory upon those who don't deserve it ) is not what you, my fine reader, have come to read. "No, smartass, tell us of your romantic exploits on the most romantic of days in this, the most desperate of years!"

Well, my petits cabbages, it goes a little something like this:

I've had this epiphany: I don't have a real job, nor have I gotten any in an embarrasingly long period of time . Not only does the former support the seeming eternity of the latter, but I also happen to think (and here comes the epiphany) that they both spring from the selfsame font of psychological pathology.

--Forgive me for the following bit-o'-funny (weird, not haha). Or don't. Hell, it's Valentine's; one more little rejection won't break me, I swear.--

And so but anyway, the epiphany is as follows, still awkwardly worded, ill-thought, &c., but, regardless, the epiphany is as follows:

I've spent too much time waiting on The One, The True, The Good, The Beautiful to fall into my financial and fornicating lap. Conversely, I haven't seen any of the Trees in the Forest I'm apparently seeking.

Evidence: I use the same phrases for both potential lovers and potential vocations: she--yes, I use "she" for both--she won't last a lifetime ; she won't inspire me to achieve my potential--she is no muse; she just isn't interesting enough; she'll force me too seek satisfaction in an involved mastabatory triste avec moi, et moi-même seulement .

Which enthusiastically brings me to another epiphany. My vast and unending love of me, my unabashed autosexuality, are well documented elsewhere . But (and here comes the epiphanous part, again) even my well-publicized private habits aren't nearly as well-promulgated as my my Work on developing my-Self . My [narcissism] is so deadly , it goes forth to bridge the gap between the mortally incommensurable Freudian benchmarks of Love and Work. Which would sound like a fine solution to the problem of becoming a fine and functional member of Freudian society, if it weren't all quite so juvenile .

On top of it all, the stars are against all this self love to boot.

And so, then and therefore, I have done this, to find the devil-in-the-details, to become an Grade-A Tree-Hugger--looking for fetish fulfillment in The Several, The False , The Naughty , and The Grotesque :

In the week preceding Valentine's Day ( Mon. Feb 14, for all you non-Catholics ), I threw myself into the fray , the hoi polloi were asked to "Be My Valentine", ^*

and they were asked to sign a contract to that effect [see figure 1, above]. Don't get mad me for being so heartlessly litigious, it's not like they didn't get anything in return. Each participant--um, Valentine--was given a red posterboard heart, 1/2" to 1" in breadth, with some Valentine-appropriate message inscribed upon 't.

My favorites, for the record:
"Try James , He's easy!"
"Like hell" (plagiarized, but popular with the ladies)
The one with the cigarette burns
"You'll never be as dear to me as TV"

Considering that these three were the best I could do, and considering I was getting lazier and more beer-addled as the game progressed, I started to have my Valentines write heartfelt messages for me. These ranged from the lazy and beer-addled "I'm Gay" to the clear winner for Surreal Cupidity: "Scripture Panties: Taking the world one piece at a time."

Granted, this Valentine game lasted a little longer than I ever expected (until about a week past V-Day), but an informal count of signatures and sweet nothings still reveals over one-hundred hapless-types willing to sign their hearts over to yrs truly . Not bad, but not one phone number either.

Perhaps my classic fear of intimacy kept this thinly veiled attempt at meta-flirting from going where it should, or perhaps its goal, culturally dictated, just ain't right .

Regardless, in an effort to more effectively sew the seeds of my boundless love, I've stolen another silly bar-game from an unremembered source of pop-culture: I hope to design and deliver a post-flirting satisfaction survey. Suggestions for survey items and statistical analysis (not to mention volunteered hours of data entry) should be sent to ¡smartass! .

Oh yeah, even if this survey in some freakish way helps to solve the Love problem, there's still that whole Work thing to figure out...

* Two things: 1) The heart-collecting game started as a contest with a man whose legal last name is Love. He conceded defeat early on (before a trophy prize had been selected) when it was obvious I was beating the living shit out of him. 2) I don't feel to guilty or shameless or anything about this project. I figure most people go to bars and get drunk in the hopes of being entertained; this is (generally) the state in which I accosted most of them; the worst and most sin-filled outcome being that I didn't entertain them in the least; but, fuck it, I was drunk and in the bar and in need of entertainment myself...
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