02.11.00 - 16:47:11

What was I doing today? What was I thinking?

I don't say this looking back with regret. I mean these questions literally, not rhetorically. I am losing the catalog of my thoughts, and wondering if that means they weren't worth remembering or just that my memory is getting worse.

Sometimes, when I hear or see something that propels the constant low-grade loneliness I feel into actual heartache, I get physical symptoms. It feels like heartburn or indigestion. I feel it in my chest & stomach and it stays with me for a long time. I don't want to eat anything, I can't concentrate. All I can think about is loss, regret, what-ifs and what-could-have-beens.

I try to find things that make me feel better, or at least forget why I feel bad. These things are:

* music

* writing about it

* talking about it (usually impossible though)

* reading something I'm genuinely interested in

In London Matt Chrisman and I saw a play by Tom Stoppard. There's one part where a man has found out that his wife is having an affair with another man. The man (husband-man) is trying desperately to convince his wife to stay with him, and losing his dignity in the process. The woman is sad, and says to him, "You have to find some part of yourself that doesn't care about me at all. Otherwise I could never love you."