It took me this long to realize this... ???

Revelation: My ex-fiance's mother signed up for a "suicide hotline" over five years ago so that she could subvert and derail our engagement. I learned of this seemingly insignificant fact of her volunteering for a suicide hotline through my fiance. I didn't think it was significant at the time, even though my fiance's mother specifically requested my fiance to be her "debrief support channel" after the calls during midnight hours. I honestly didn't care, didn't think it was significant, didn't even respond when my fiance told me about it other than "Oh, that sounds awesome. Very cool of your mother to volunteer". But, holy shit, how stupid do I feel after five years of reflection? Consider these facts:

-My fiance's mother did not want her daughter to ever get married.
-My fiance's mother did not want her daughter to ever get married due to the fact that she was afraid my fiance might actually form a family of her own with another and neglect the enabling responsibilities her mother required for codependency.
-My fiance's mother did not want her daughter to specifically marry me due to the fact I was planning on starting my own family with her.
-My fiance's mother broke into my fiance's email account to read our correspondence while I was away in India. After reading a particularly troubling email containing some of my thoughts about her and her family, my fiance's mother immediately brought it up to her husband and left it up to him to confront my fiance about what he/she "randomly stumbled upon while using the computer" (fiance's mother's words, exactly) in terms of how troubling it was to their family.
-My fiance's mother confronted my fiance EVERY SINGLE DAY with reminders of why she should never leave her family to start another while I was away in India,.

Considering that context, and the fact that I wanted as much to be a part of fiance's family as she wanted of our new family, the simple subversive actions of her mother completely alluded me. How could I be so blind? How could I miss this simple fact for the past five years? I don't know.

Five years ago my fiance's mother called a "suicide hotline". She said she wanted to volunteer as a suicide hotline operator, at least, that's what my fiance told me she said. This occurred while I was in India and my fiance was living with her mother. Furthermore, my fiance's mother specifically requested the midnight-4am shift for the hotline, and asked my fiance to be her "debrief support" after every phone call during this time. It just so happens that this was the only time frame that I was able to contact my fiance during her available hours in the local time zone (since I was calling from India). Fuck me, I cannot believe I didn't realize this until now.

Since my fiance was a codependent object of her mother's emotional needs, EVERY SINGLE CALL her mother took necessitated the use of my fiance's debriefing skills. Every day, at midnight, 2am, 1:30am, 3:30am, 2:15am, etc. my fiance was woken up from sleep by her mother to debrief her on the latest suicide call. As such, when I called faithfully at 8:00am local time every day (like I promised I would), my fiance was either asleep, too tired to answer the phone, or delirious from lack of sleep. Guess who answered the phone at her house every day at 8:00am? You got it, my fiance's mother, informing me of my fiance's inability to talk on the phone.

Despite the context, I did not realize until this very day (January 16, 2011), that my fiance's mother put herself and my fiance further into a codependent relationship to prevent our relationship from ever continuing via this act. I thought volunteering for a suicide hotline operator, especially for the midnight-4am shift, was awesomely sacrificial. I didn't even suspect an anterior motive. I didn't see what she was trying, and succeeding, to do. The effect of her actions were that I could never talk to my fiance during convenient times for her while I was overseas in India calling from a telephone booth two miles walk from my residence. Good fucking Lord, I'm still figuring this shit out.

To sum up: Even five to seven years after a marriage fails, you still do not know the whole truth behind the people who made it fail. Not your fault, people are just that subversive and complicated.

How...How is it

How is it that I can accomplish SO MUCH GOOD while drunk/drinking/under the influence of alcohol, and yet, FEEL SO GUILTY for doing it because of HOW I did it? My God, I did so much good today. I repaired my car, fixed the problems of two of my soldiers by chewing out my superiors for their mistakes, resolved deeply seeded family problems that my sister had with me, exercised, went for a walk, play some games, wrote a philosophical paper on education (that a department director approved) for submission to the SD City College Dean...

I did wondrous things today, but I'm under a cloud. How fucking retarded.

Let's Just Turn This Shit Right Around

Problems with your relationship? Life getting overwhelming? Moments of trouble for you....ladies? Girls, ladies, women, do you believe in feminism? Or in equality between sexes? Want to be grown-up women? Then I'll treat you like one:

I'm not a doctor, but I'm prescribing you 500ml of cowgirl the fuck up. Awwwww... how cute, it's Pity Me Elmo in its natural habitat. You, the natural evolution of women who have killed large animals with crude spears out of their bare hands and built nations with families of offspring are afraid to approach some random sausage-swinger because a guy from the time when mobile phones were used to call people rejected you?

Boo bloody hoo. You won't get anywhere feeling sorry for your teenage self, and if you keep this shit up you'll be back in ten years saying you're a 38 year old girl who has never been in a successful relationship because once upon a time when computers weren't sentient she was told "no" by a guy who was lost in World War 4.

Tonight you're going to put on a shirt that doesn't say "twenty-three year old virgin", you're going to look up one interesting thing on Wikipedia, and then you're going to tell that interesting thing to no less than three men. Doesn't even fucking matter if you want to shag them or not, you're going to tell them that interesting thing and then you're going to see how long you can hold a conversation with them.

If you're rejected, you look that sausage-swinger dead in the eye and you say "my ancestors ate mutton with their fists", then you walk away and try it on a new one. Don't sulk away, that's expected. That's probably typical of you. You're going to sway away like this happy son of a bitch and you're going to do it with a womanly cocktail in your hand. Ooze estrogen on the ground and proudly declare yourself a sexy bitch, because if you fuck this up then I'm going to half-assedly follow you around from shop to shop yelling a crude "Pussy Bitch" in front of you whilst showing a sign of you in a fugly position having your little hairy legs broken by a monster made of vaginas.

I'll even make this easy on you so you don't boohoo any more than you already are. Erathosthenes, this ancient Greek god who was far better at being a woman than you are, drew the first accurate map of a rounded Earth and knew that we revolved around the sun. Fucking Greeks, they invented democracy when the rest of us were wallowing in our own filth.

Now it's time the boohoo caboose is derailed by Maoist rebels and a whole slew of Indians die. Anything anyone says that doesn't make you angry isn't advice you should bother with. It's going to push you further and further into the delusion that you're anything other than a little black lamb that only gets calls when the handsome lambs need help with codependent care or personal grooming advice.

You're probably highly disinteresting, like so godawfully boring that you tell your finest moment to a guy and he instantly loses any shred of respect he may have had for you. Middle-class white suburbanite who did well in high school but never really fit in with any of the cliques and who was always friends with a guy she longed for but never made any sort of advance so he never really knew you existed? Maybe traveled to Europe or Cancun once after high school and learned so many valuable things about life before returning to hopeful self-reflection and masturbating to previous boyfriends? You meet new people, have one conversation that lasts ten minutes, and then they kind of stop responding to you and you have to fight the urge to ask them if they're still at the keyboard, and when you finally do facebook says "xx is no longer online"?

Your ego is in shreds because you confuse confidence with smuttiness and have to actually justify your looks as "not hideously ugly" on a text-based website where nobody can see you. You shy away from prolonged eye contact and freeze up when making small talk with the till clerk at Subway. Your proudest social moment probably evolves alcohol, bad music, and a few friends who either don't talk with you anymore or who only talk when you initiate the conversation and then only stick to "HAHA I LIKE THE WEATHER. IT IS SUN." because they don't like you enough to learn your opinions on whatever it is you think you're passionate about.

Here's your advice, and I don't expect you'll follow it but maybe if I say "do it." you will because you're incapable of standing up for yourself.

Tomorrow you're going to call one of six guys, any of those in your phone contacts, whichever one you like the most. You're not going to sound angry, nor are you going to sound dejected. You're just going to sound like Audrey fucking Heburn because she's a better woman than you. Here's what you're going to say:

"Heeeyyyy, Audrey Heburn to cute guy. Cute guy, come in. Tonight we're doing dinner and I'll pick you up at eight. Ms Heburn, over."

Why are you going to phrase it like a super model diva voice transmission? Because it's better than "so umm... hi would yOu l..wold, HAHA WOLD I MEANT WOULD, like t-t-to go to dinner please? no? okay...", and of course that's your go-to because you've tried six different times to form a relationship and ended up as a footstool in all of them.

Now you're going to think about one thing you really like. Does he like it as well? If not, think of another thing. Don't you dare think about HAHAUNIVERSITYISFUN^{_^} or any uninteresting quip about the weather or your humanity major. Brush up on this thing, make it sound interesting in a mirror, and then read up on Audrey Heburn so you know just who you're supposed to be tonight.

That's right. You're going to dinner as Audrey Heburn. Why? Because I told you to. Do it. Wear a nice dress, take a long shower, wear flip-flops unless you're one of the few chicks who only looks good in high-heels that make your legs look longer (which you probably aren't, ms. "not hideously ugly"). Clean your house , your car, and brush your teeth twice (once in the morning and once at 19:30) followed by a proper rinse.

Take him to a restaurant that features a cuisine that isn't hollywood romantic or typically American. No chain restaurants- I swear to god I will hunt you down with a sniper rifle if you take a date to TGI Fridays just to put you out of your misery. Maybe go to a local Russian place or a nice Korean barbecue- anything that sets you apart from other girls. Hell, Ethiopian is fucking delicious and nobody even knows that Ethiopians have food.

Make eye contact, smile slyly, chew with your mouth closed, and mind your legs so you don't bump the table with them. If you're going the "proper" route, do it like it's nothing. Make jokes that you find funny, keep a good conversation pace, and say something interesting about the restaurant's cuisine. Think of yourself as Audrey Heburn, and immediately go back to that persona if you slip up and find yourself in a bout of awkward silence.

After that, take him for an adventure walk in a park if it's warm out or ask him to come watch a movie at your place if it's not. Simple, cheap, and a chance to get closer to him. From there, pace any physical contact well. No "oh hi he looked at me BEND OVER AND FACE DOVER". Be assertive but not overbearing.

If you don't get at least a kiss and an offer of "I'll treat next time" by the end of this date, go through the rest of the guys until you do. If none of them work out, you're doing something wrong and should write off men until you're as interesting as Audrey Heburn.

I just spent ten minutes writing this out. If you puss out like ALL OF THE OTHER GUYS/GIRLS IN YOUR SHOES and stay a bitch, I'm not even going to follow you around half-assedly and remind you to be a woman because quite frankly you're just not worth the effort. Houston to Audrey Heburn, godspeed. Over and out.

How's that for equality? Try that chick.