Off! the Top of My Head

by Chad Armbruster

Greetings all from the big wicket next to the mighty brown river of ever flowin' sewage. It's time again for another exciting episode in the overly creative and rarely ordinary life of me. Today I come to you in high sprits, an odd enough feeling itself, and in this case the reason is just as good as the feeling. For over the past week or so I've gotten to know some people very well which in my post divorce world is enough for a ticker tape parade. So, allow me to step back and bring you up to speed, though this story is not with out an unhappy ending but you'll like it non-the-less.

A few weeks ago I decided that it was time to go out and start getting to know more people. After all up until this point I had little to no money and no way to really attract anyone to me. Let's face it how many women want to go out with a guy who has no money, drives an '87 Ford F150 pick-up and lives with his parents? I've not exactly been a marketable property since I've been up here, but with time and hard work I now have some paychecks under my belt and a new car. However, I do still live with my parents, but Rome wasn't built in a day and two out of three ain't bad. (What's a Meta for anyway? Thank you, thank you, I'm here for the rest of my life. Don't forget to tip your waiters.) So, with money in hand and a new car to take me anywhere I decide, it's time to find a woman. (Don't worry this story doesn't end up with me on the eastside in a massage parlor).

So what does a man with my means do? I start in the most obvious place, the place where I spend 40 hours of every week, work. If there's one marvelous thing about my job it's that there is no shortage of attractive women, but there was a certain someone I had my eye on. She's attractive, intelligent and fun to be around. So, I do the guy thing where we hang out and talk outside of the work environment and I think things are moving along in a fashion that is comparable to the modern dating life. I decide to be bold and make a quasi-move. I let her know that I'm kind of digging her company, but if she's not interested she needs to tell me. First mistake, don't ask if you don't really want to know. She proceeds to tell me that while I am a "nice guy" (kiss of death) and I'm fun to talk to (twist the knife) she doesn't find me physically attractive. Ouch, you might say, but that's ok. I'm a new man who's skin is tougher than it used to be. I'm fine with this, I'm fine with this, no really I'm fine with this and soon I'll believe that. But I'm not down and out yet.

The next night I go to a party at another co-workers house with this same girl. After all, if I enjoy the conversation why not at least hangout with her. We go to the party, which is at Lee's house (who is another article all together), but I go in, partake of adult beverages and the night goes on. Before I know it I'm sitting on his couch next to a different girl entirely. Which isn't a bad thing, because this one actually finds me attractive. So I go with this and get along wonderfully. We go out again the next day, away from those mind altering beverages, basically just to make sure that the night wasn't a fluke and again the world is grand. So, we see each other the next night, and the next, and the next, etc. You would think at this point all is well with the world and we would be enjoying the moment but on the eighth, day Chad froze. It's hard to explain but all the things I thought I wanted didn't really take the precedence that I thought they would. I was anxious, nervous, I felt trapped and all I could think about was running like mad far, far away from what was presented to me. Then I became the jerk guy that just stopped returning phone calls, in the hopes that all of this would just melt away and I can sit here in the fetal position rocking away my fears.

You know there was never a time in my life where I acted like the jerk guy who slept with anything that moves or just stopped returning phone calls. I've always been the kind guy, the caring guy, the "push over" guy (which I've been told that girls really don't like. Who knew?), but the point of all this rambling is not just to waste the tree this article is printed on. No, it's more to tell the world that things will change and sometimes it changes in ways you never thought you could imagine. For the longest time I thought that I wanted to be in a relationship again but apparently I need to work on some things before I can jump that fence. And in that realization I found out that I will do things I've never done before to get there. I guess I have more issues with being in a relationship than I thought. So, I urge you all to step back from time to time and ask yourself if what you really want is what you really want. I guess if I had done that I would have realized that I was about to hurt someone's feelings by saying I wanted to be in a relationship when really all I want is to be alone with my dog and writing. So, until next months self-realization I wish you all a wonderful June and may you have your own self-realization because lets face it- I'm tired of dealing with my own, it's someone else's turn.