S.E.P.

Twice in the last seven days I've gotten phone calls or emails that have been like a solid, well placed punch in the abdomen, just above the stomach but below the rib cage. I suppose that places it on the diaphragm, not that it matters.

It's funny, I've joked a bit over the last few months about how I've given up on connecting with people and decided to be a workaholic. I've only been a tiny bit kidding. It's just seemed easier to focus on what makes me feel good about myself and leave the ambiguity and continual issues around rejection aside. But that, of course, is easier said than done.

These alerts from the outside world ultimately have nothing to do with me. That's what hurts the most, I think: the fact that they have nothing to do with me. "Hello. Nothing to do with you, except that I thought you should know."

Pretending that you don't care anymore, that it doesn't hurt, that everything is smashing and who needs a heart anyway... it's not as helpful as it is on paper.

I wish it was. I wish I could hear things without immediately placing them in the context of how they hurt *me*, or how they make *me* feel. But I do. Then I feel bad about that reality, even though I know very well that there isn't a person on the planet that doesn't react the same way. I guess the real question is "how long before I stop being a selfish twit and focus on the real issue here?"

For me, it's usually only a half second or so... maybe a tiny bit longer. But then, later, it comes back. That's when I wish I was as disinterested and cold and hard as I like to pretend I've become. That's when I keep trying to push my heart back down my throat before it manages a grisly but impressive suicide dive out of my largest oriface.

No one buys my little charade of indifference, of course.

I'm not really that good an actor.