Sometimes I wish I could just date to date, and have fun and not be too concerned about the future. But I can't. I am this point in my life where I want to be with my true love, and if can't be with him then I'd rather be alone.

I have enough guilty conversations with myself about time and what I need to be doing, that I don't need to complicate my life even more by mindless dating. I wish I could date and not care, but I can't. Believe me, if I could change my attitude towards love I would.

It sucks to be alone, to not have companionship, to not have someone to do things with like watch football or baseball games with and just hang and drink beer and laugh and make out during the breaks. But if I can't have true love, then what's the point.

I have so many other things to occupy myself with like my writing, taking classes, reading, working out, and all the other things I manage to fill up my days with.

But wanting true love is such a hard way to go. Plus I have requirements now that I won't compromise on like our religious views have to compatible. I am so not going to live the rest of my life with a guy that I'm going to have serious religious differences with.

I will compromise to a certain extent on politics, although I draw the line at any guy who voted for Nader or other types like him. I would rather marry a loyal party republican who voted for the Shrubmeister than someone who was silly enough to go green in 2000, and who now complains about the state of the country.

But who am I kidding? When do I have time to date? I don't even have time to do the thing I most want to do which is writing, so it's not like I have any time to spend dating and getting to know someone.

I hate having this ongoing conversation in my head about not having enough time for the things that are important in my life.

I've been reading again, and I'm excited. 7 books since about April I think. That's a book a week for me. Granted they're small paperbacks that I can keep in my purse, but still a book a week is good for me.

Finally made myself finish "Silas Mariner" by George Elliot. That book made me cry. I think I'm going to end up like poor old Silas Mariner one day, with no Eppie to rescue me. Sad, sad, sad!!! The ending of the book made me cry, but it's TOM time so my mones are raging. There were a couple of chapters I just skimmed because they were just dialogue, and it was hard to get through, but other than that Miss Elliot made some very good observations about life in her book.

Now I'm reading this book about a mentally ill patient's journey from insanity to sanity, called "I never promised you a rose garden". The book has reaffirmed what I've always believed, that mental illness is a defense mechanism that the brain uses to survive reality. The human body is built to survive. So if you're in a seemingly threatening situation that your mind can't handle, your mind will do things to enable you to keep going. What we call mental illness is just one of those defense mechanisms that the mind creates in order to help the body to survive traumatic events. Some events are so traumatic and scary to some people that if they didn't find a way to mentally escape, they would literally collapse and die. And yes sometimes they do, but most times a mental illness just develops.

You know how there's "fight or flight" syndrome. Mental illness is the extreme of "flight". Your mind literally collapses in on itself to flee, and creates worlds for the person to survive in, creates people to help the person survive. Of course they're all in the person's head, made up and not real, but the affected person doesn't know that.

I'm reading this book and wondering if I'm crazy, if there aren't places or things I've made up in my head to shield myself from a harsher reality. I had this same kind of feeling when I finished watching "A Beautiful Mind". I wondered for awhile if the people I knew were real or made up. Russell Crowe's character figured out that the imaginary people don't age, even when you do. But everyone I know has aged even quicker than I have, so I guess this must mean I really don't have an imaginary friend.

Sometimes I wonder what I do all weekend because the time seems to go by so quickly, but here's what I did.

Saturday:
Woke up late and didn't get out the door till noon
picked up drycleaning
took 3 skirts to tailor to be hemmed
went to the Asian Art Museum to have lunch and check out the exhibits. There was a great exhibit by a Thai artist, where you walked through a small temple with curtains of beads filled with herbs and incense. The smell was so cool!
worked out for 1 hour.
went through clothes hamper to get clothes read for laundry
cleaned up bedroom

Sunday:
woke up early
went to 8:45 am mass
worked out for 1 hour
went to Whole Paycheck at 4th and Harrison to buy products and have lunch
did laundry
went Trader Joe's to do grocery shopping
opened up laptop and worked on two spreadsheets for a meeting I had on Monday at work and watched Harry Potter

I know I did alot this weekend, but I have the feeling I could be doing mor. Like writing. I did no writing this weekend, which is so bad for me. I made plans on Saturday and on Sunday, but I couldn't fit it in.

I think I need to do this exercise I did in a seminar once, where you keep track of your time by the hour for a week. The purpose of the exercise was to see where your time went, and to see if there things you were doing that were either time wasters or if there were holes where you could fit something in.

I hate having a conversation in my head about time, and this is the only way to put a stop to the noise.

I went to Starfbombs the other day to write and ended up picking their CD of an hour's worth of Willie Nelson's most influential songs, Wille Nelson's Artist Choice. They've also got cds by Sheryl Crowe and Johnny Cash.

I seem to remember posting about this before, but since I had to do warm up exercise before my writing ... here's my artist choice pick of songs for my cd.

1. Boys Don't Cry by The Cure
2. Head by Prince
3. Wouldn't It Be Nice by The Beach Boys
4. She loves You by The Beatles
5. Candy Says by The Velvet Underground
6. Man in the Box by Alice in Chains
7. Happy Shiny People by REM
8. Jane Says by Jane's Addiction
9. Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd
10. Blowing in the Wind by Bob Dylan
11. Suite Judy Blue Eyes by Crosby Stills Nash and Young
12. Love Will Tear Us Apart Again by Joy Division
13. Ghetto Superstar by Pras Michel featuring ‘Ol Dirty Bastard and introducing Miya
14. Let’s Stay Together by Al Green
15. It's My life by No Doubt
16. Fool in the Rain by Led Zeppelin
17. Crazy for You by Madonna
18. Brown Sugar by The Rolling Stones

I think it's supposed to be an hour's worth of song, but I haven't added up the time. This list is so hard and I keep wanting to change it, but these 18 songs mean something to me. I could write a biographical short story about each song, and why it belongs on the list.

Today is national prayer day. If you pray, pray to whom or whatever you believe in for peace in this crazy world of ours.

So many bad headlines ....

there's a new way of transmitting SARS

some economists are predicting another bear market gas prices are going through the roof and there will be
a huge trickle effect to the price of everything else because of this

world grain production has fallen short of consumption

experts see new animal diseases hitting humans

experts keep chiming in on the likelihood of a real estate crash

then there are the wars, all the wars, and the constant threat of terror everywhere in the world.

I pray for peace. I think of all the bad things happening in the world and the bad things people are doing to other people and I release them to Holy Spirit and God's justice. I pray that people everywhere find the love and all the intimate connection they want. I pray that I'm fulfilling the divine purpose for my life. I pray the health and economic well being of all my friends and acquaintances daily. I pray that I spread love and kindness instead of hatred and unkindness in my words, deeds and thoughts and pray that everyone else do the same.