Wow, hard to believe it's been over a month since I last wrote. Time is flying. But then again, I guess I have been busier living my new life since I got to Los Angeles than writing about it. Which should be good in a way.

It's been a wild ride so far, but I don't have the energy tonight to relate everything that has happened since I drove away from my home on the east coast and made the trek across the country to this strange new world. I will fill out those details another day for you. For now I will just say that while it is definitely taking adjustments and there have been sad days...on the whole it's been wonderful. J. is wonderful, and I love her so dearly. For the first time in so many long, long years, I see some hope in my future. It's a nice feeling. :3

Anyway...more to come later.

Well, this is it. My last night on the east coast. Tomorrow morning I pack the car with what small possessions I am keeping and start driving over 2000 miles west to my new life in Los Angeles.

Did the whole birthday thing at my Mom's tonight. Me, family, kids. It was nice, but sad cause there was this whole cloud of goodbye hanging above us all that no one wanted to discuss or address. Everyone acted like it was just another night, just another birthday. No one mentioned I was leaving the next day.

Uhaul didn't want to rent me a hitch for a trailer, even though they used to do that. Now they want you to buy em. I refused to pay 200$ for a hitch I will use once on top of 250$ for trailer rental for a week. So I just came home and started picking what stayed here. The furniture obviously. I will miss my art desk. Leaving even more of my books. The air conditioner, microwave, and lotsa clothes I probably won't wear anyway. Nothing goes with me now except what fits in my car. Seems I predicted this scene months ago...me loading a few important things in my small Kia and driving west to a new life. Strange that it worked out just that way after all.

I will be out of touch for 4-5 days as I travel and get setup in the new place. That will be hard for me. But I am excited as well as scred and hopeful. Hopeful. Wow. Not anything I had ever expected to be applied to me. But it's true. And of course I am so eager to see J. again. I have missed her so terribly this last week or so since I came back from L.A. that it almost hurts physcially. Can't wait to see her. :3

I got back home late last night after about 12 hours of flights across the country. (Well, I suppose this isn't home anymore though, is it? Los Angeles is now home. This is...I dunno. What is the word for a place that you still live in but which is no longer home? Strange that I can't think of a title for such a place.) They lost my luggage in Houston, so I have little in the way of clothes, so I washed what I wore on the plane to re-use. Slept in late to allow my body to adjust and get some rest. i didn't sleep on the planes and hadn't slept more than 2-3 hours the night before, so I was a bit tired I guess.

Seems a daunting task ahead of me. And only ten days to complete it in. Condense a lifetime of accumulated stuff into a bare minimum of necessities to take with me. That may be hard for some, but for a pack rat sentamentalist like myself it seems an impossibility at times. And yet I get these glimpses. These moments of clarity when I see really just how little I need in truth to be happy. Those lucid moments came often while I was with J. in Los Angeles these past few weeks.

I did indeed find a room to rent out west and I settled into a lease. I have job interviews lined up starting the very next day after I return to L.A. so there will be no rest for this wicked girl. Things are moving along so fast still. And yet at times not fast enough.

I had never set foot in Los Angeles, or even California until two weeks past when I stepped out of that plane at LAX. And somehow within hours of arriving, driving down the 405 freeway in my rental car I felt very very much at home. I belonged here in this strange, foreign town; this odd city of opposites that clashed and yet mixed so well to my eyes. I was home, and I knew it almost instantly. And in my two weeks there visiting J. that feeling remained and grew ever stronger. Somehow I was supposed to be here. This place seemed like an old friend. It wasn't scary, strange or intimidating as I had expected. It was comfortable, like a favorite pair of shoes or those worn jeans that fit so nicely. I was shocked at just how deep that feeling ran.

Now I am back east and I am looking at my room here and my things and I feel like I am in an alien environment. I have ten days to pack and start the drive back to Los Angles and my future with what meager posessions I choose to take. I miss the city already, and J. even more. I need her in my arms. She fit there so well.

Time to start this process. I need to get back home to L.A. as soon as I can. So, where to begin?

There are times when I am certain I have entered some sort of relativistic fast-lane in time. In fact, in pondering that description, I wonder if Einstein realized that his theories of relativistic time applies inversely to relationships? In the world of physical objects, the closer one comes to an object of significant mass, the slower time becomes relative to the rest of the universe. In relationships, the closer one comes to a person of significant importance to your life, love and future, the faster time goes. Thus it would seem the Relativistic principle is inverted. In my case, life is racing so fast I can't make anything out at the moment. o.O

It was a mere 6 months past that it felt as if my life ended and was over for good. I was alone again after 8 years, and the world seemed bleak and hopeless. Each day was a long, long, long string of unbearable minutes that wouldn't pass fast enough for me. I slept half the time just to not have to feel so miserable for what seemed 400 hours a day.

Then a short 2 months ago, the impossible happened. I found hope, love, and companionship again. I honestly hadn't expected to ever be in a relationship again. I truly hadn't. And yet here I was. Here she was; in my life, in my heart, and changing everything. We had known and loved each other secretly for years, so the relationship developed quickly. But I had no idea how quickly it would move. I simply couldn't have imagined what has happened in the last 2 months.

It seemed unreal that within a month we were discussing the possibility of me moving out to be near her within the next year or two when my oldest graduated. That alone  was a massive step to consider, especially for someone like myself who took things slow and careful. But then it went from unreal to surreal as the timetable escalated and I planned to move within the span of this very year. It was crazy, it was fast, it was so unlike me. It seemed such a huge risk. To move so soon. 6 or 9 months from now? That didn't seem long enough to prepare myself. And yet...that was nothing. Now, just a few weeks later, I find myself on the threshold of a totally alien world where time has increased for me by a thousand fold and I prepare to embark on a completely fantastical journey to Los Angeles within mere days.

Yeah. Days.

I will be flying out this very weekend and staying two weeks in L.A. to meet with J. and also to look for a place to live and find a job. I then come back to pack my remaining things and drive across the country to my new home before April 1st arrives. And no...this is no joke. Time has sped up exponetially. The closer I get to her emotionally, the more I need her, the more I open up and allow myself to see how deeply I have loved her for so long, the faster my life seems to need to go. It has become almost beyond rational belief.

As I write this I have finished a day long shopping and packing spree. I had to buy new clothes, as I had next to nothing that fit me any longer. let alone anything I wanted to have J. see me in. I have made list after list as is my want to do under such stress, preparing myself mentally and ensuring I don't forget anything important, like my purse, or tooth brush. The choice to make this trip now, this week, and to move by April is still fresh in my mind. Just a few short days ago. Amazing. And here I sit, just two days away from finally seeing her and only weeks away from living near her for...well, as long as she will have me and can stand me. :p It's intoxicating, and at the same time one of the most frightening experiences of my life. I don't behave this way. I don't make snap decisions. I don't rush or take risks. I am slow, careful, carefully planned, and hesitant even. I am not the strange, alien daredevil who is now rushing head-long into some unknown and wonderful future without a second thought. That girl can't be me. Can't be. Or can she?

I was looking over the spotty posts that have been made in the last 6 months and realized they do not paint any coherent picture of what has been going on in my life. Assuming anyone were to read this mess of a blog, the recent entries would make even less sense than the scattered entries before them. Now, I realize that actually no one reads this blog. I am not so deluded as to think anyone out there cares or actually pays attention to anything I post here. I am writing this purely for myself in the end, but despite that I suppose I have the urge to set things straight and post a more coherent and understandable summery of the convoluted and insane roller-coaster that is my life. So, below there will be a hopefully brief examination of the events of the past few years and a more detailed look at the last 6 months just in case some hypothetical and imaginary person were to desire to read and understand this mess someday.

2001 to 2006 - The Backdrop

In 2001 I was newly divorced and alone. A single mother working two jobs and trying to cope with the very recent deaths of two children and the failure of my marriage. I was alone and single again for the first time in many, many years and I was scared and not sure how to manage any of what my life was throwing at me. Depression was rampant, and I was cutting again. I had lost my faith and left the Church. All my friends were also my ex-husband's friends so I avoided them to avoid him. I had no support, no safety net, nothing.

Amid this landscape I was trying to start dating again. Early results were a disaster. The people I was finding were crazier and even more messed up than I was. I had a few relationships last as long as a few months. Many lasted no more than a single night. I was lost, lonely, and  becoming discouraged. I looked in the mirror and for the first time in my life I saw someone staring back at me that was old. I had just turned 33 years old, and while 30 had gone unmarked for me, 33 seemed a death sentence somehow. I looked at my reflection and I saw the grey creeping in and I actually FELT old for the first time. It was not a pretty period for me.

It was during this I met Raivyn. I had desperately put up a lot of online dating profiles, and she emailed me from one of those sites. She lived a few hours away from me, so we corresponded daily for weeks before ever considering the idea of meeting. I had to admit we seemed to share a lot in common, and she seemed more sane than most I had met since my divorce. She was much younger than me at 26, but it seemed most the people I was meeting and dating were in that age range, so I didn't worry too much. We finally agreed to meet at a weekend retreat of drummers, pagans and Wiccans and other counter-culture outcasts. My daughter came, and I had friends there, so it seemed a safe place and time to meet someone. We got along well, and after the gathering she came back up to my apartment and stayed the night...and the next, and the next. Before I knew it we were moving her things up here and starting a life together. Things seemed to have turned some kind of corner for me.

For the next few years we raised our children together, developed a life, made new friends and generally did what any couple does. We seemed very compatible. We never argued, never fought. She was hard of hearing and signed and so we communicated fine and life was good overall. We struggled a bit financially for a time as she established herself here and I tried to find my footing in corporate America, but after the first few years we did okay. We moved to a bigger house...the one I now still sit in alone for another week...and we were as happy as I could ever have expected to be.

I worked for Amazon.com for four years, moved up the corporate ladder, and got to do a lot of traveling because of it. She established herself in management and carved a niche out she was happy with. the kids grew, and things seemed good. My depression and issues came and went as usual, but we coped. Then, after several years of freelance game design and a lot of free modification work on various games to make a name for myself I was offered a job working for a true game company on a in-development MMORPG. It was less money than I was making at Amazon, and a huge risk. But it was something I wanted badly. I took the leap of faith and accepted the job. I walked away from comfortable and safe and decided to go out on a limb again for the first time in over a decade. I worked from home via VPN and  I loved what I was doing, though after a time the regimented, corporate aspects of it did wear on me, and my depression began to grow worse. I was working in game design, and working from home. I saw the kids a lot more and got to be a stay at home mother again. But I didn't have artistic freedom. I had to conform. I had to limit my inspiration. I had to mold my ideas to fit shareholders and managers. It was good, but not the dream I had always imagined it would be.

It was during this period that I had joined Second Life. At that time it was a brave new world. A daring idea. Only a few months out of beta and very small compared to now. Concurrency then rarely reached 2000 people, and there was a grand total of perhaps 50K accounts that had been made. It was a tiny world, a close-knit and fairly tight community. Raivyn and I made friends and it became a haven for us. As I grew more comfortable with it and the prim building system and after some time messing with the limited and oddly arranged UV mapping of the SL models I started doing some small bit of creative work in Second Life for fun. I made stuff purely for myself, and just because I wanted it. I had no thought to selling it, and less thought to starting a business there. But that was about to change quick.

2006 to 2008 - The Seed is Planted

I joined Second Life in June of 2004, just a bare 6 months after it started. I made a few friends, lost a few friends, played about, and then forgot about it for a time. I got the job in the game industry and for a few months I was quite busy and occupied elsewhere. I fell away from second life towards the end of 2004 and didn't return to it until summer of 2005. During that 6 months or so away the lack of socialization with anyone outside of co-workers in my team and my children started to wear. Even Raivyn was rarely home. She worked long hours as a manager and she enjoyed it. She had always been the type A corporate climber sort, and she wasn't cut out for home life. So I the hottest months of 2005 I came back to Second Life looking for friends and someone or something that seemed missing in my life at the time. I did indeed find friends, and soon even Raivyn was sucked back into SL with me. It became our escape, our haven, our social network. Friends from other parts of our lives were convinced to join as well, and soon we spent most our time there.

Towards the end of 2005 my depression was growing worse. Much worse. My work on the MMORPG was now slowing down and suffering, and teammates and co-workers were starting to notice. It was then that I found and joined Support For Healing in second Life. A support group created by and for people with any manner of mental and physical illness by a wonderful group of friends in the U.K., SFH had started as a website support group network and come to SL with an island and weekly meetings for depression, anxiety, abuse, and other problems. I joined the group and attended a few meetings of the depression group, and soon was attached to the wonderful, special and amazing people I met there. I came to the 3 meetings a week religiously and I made some of the best friends of my life there. I talked in time with Zafu about expanding the meetings to be a daily event, and I took over hosting the depression group soon after. These people had saved my life...quite literally...and I was simply returning what small favour I could. My network of friends expanded further, and I was getting better overall. That's when I met J.

She had another name at that time. But it's not for me to mention who she was then. but I can still recall that day in such vivid and clear detail. I recall her. It was a special group that was setup for a certain type of issue I shall not mention here for her privacy, as well as my own. It was invitation only, and very small. The members were all women, and all quiet and rather shy. I knew most of them from the depression support group I hosted. But this one girl showed up I had not yet met...and I couldn't keep my eyes off her. She was in a pantsuit and glasses and had a simple pageboy hairstyle. She was prim, proper, and very bookish looking. Her profile was spare. But I devoured it for details about her. I listened to her story in rapt attention, and I desperately wanted to say hello to her...to say anything to her; to have her notice me. I had fallen in love in the span of one hours time.

And yet, how could I be in love with this girl I had just met? How could I be in love with anyone except Raivyn? I was devoted to Raivyn. I loved her totally. She had saved me. How could I even consider loving anyone else? It threw me, and I tried to deny it and push those feelings away. But the seed had been planted.

It wasn't long after that that I created my first product that went up for sale in Second Life. A cyberpunk outfit that I was rather proud of. Before I knew it I had started a business, Cyberpunk Apocalypse, and rented a store front in a mall. I expanded to a half dozen products that were all related, and had ideas for many many more in that genre. I worked on a fantasy game, and this gave some of my other ideas and inspirations an outlet. Soon however, I had more ambitious plans and ideas than I had meant to have, and things seemed to spiral quickly out of control. I created my first skins after 6 months of work, and then soon after came the neko skins and Jungle Voodoo. I opened Boneflower, named after my long-used pen name for my art and writing, and i made clothing as well. But it was the neko skins that became insanely popular. before i realized it, i had a true business on my hands, and I was making as much money in SL as I was working in the game industry.

I then made the fateful choice to leave my job at the MMORPG I worked for at the time and start devoting myself entirely to Second Life design. I bought my first Island sim, and opened Temenos a few months later. Things seemed to be going well. SFH had helped somewhat with my depression, and I had a wonderful network of friends. I had a secret crush on J. and it wouldn't be long before a friend I confided in told her about that and started a new stage in that friendship. She created S. as an alt, and started doing designs for clothes herself. I gave her vendor space at Temenos, and she launched her own brand and got rave reviews on the blogs. We worked side by side on projects and there was even a hint of romance, though neither of us took it far back then. I was still denying my true feelings for her, trying to stay true to Raivyn, and she was too shy to make a move, and knew I was with Raivyn anyway. It was a crazy time. Things were changing so fast. It was dizzying. It was intoxicating. It was about to end.

2008 - The Year of Darkness

Yeah, overly dramatic I know. But then I am nothing if not needlessly dramatic. Deal with it. 2008 came around and my depression returned with a vengence. I fell over that precipice head first and I didn't come back up. I stopped creating in Second Life. My last release was just before Christmas 2007, and I wouldn't do anything again for 6 months. I dropped out of sight, all but left Second Life, abandoned my friends, and ran away from J. as well. Raivyn and I were having greater difficulties and she was secretly not happy with me anymore, though I would not know the true extent of it for many months. It was the beginnings of what would rank as one of the worst years of my life.

A war started in Gwyndolyn's head between several of us. Lisa...or as she calls herself in SL, Cute Sin...had come to the fore and was trying to repress me, Zoe. We had never gotten along. I consider her reckless, dangerous, and self-destructive. She considers me weak, and a useless relic of Gwyndolyn's past she doesn't need anymore. Lisa is the repository of all of Gwyn's anger and hatred and aggression. Yes, she also is her passion and determination, her dominate aspects and perhaps the strongest pure will among us. But her few times in control have been disasterous to Gwyndolyn. And she is so angry. because of all that, I have longed worked, along with Melissa and Tava to repress and keep Lisa locked away; to limit her influence on Gwyn's life. Naturally that just makes Lisa more angry. It was during late 2007 that Lisa managed to take control for the first time in many many years, and I found myself the one locked away in the back of Gwyndolyn's head. It was a strange and disconcerting time for me, and some of it is still foggy and vague like a dream. But, as usual, Lisa's time in charge ended in disaster.

During that time, Lisa ran wild in second Life, though was thankfully more restrained in real life. To my knowledge she didn't go out and cheat on Raivyn physically, but then what can I say...I had been cheating on her emotionally for years in my heart with J. Lisa tried her best to actually kill me off and bury me this time. She worked to convince the others I was holding Gwyn back, limiting her, and I needed to be repressed or integrated or just simply killed off. She developed her own ideas, goals and plans for Gwyn's life, and tried to push J. away for good. And she made one of the worst mistakes of our collective life by allowing Mimi to spend time out among the crazed world of Second Life. And thus was the disaster created.

You can see a post far below made by Lisa and signed as Cute that dates to just after that period. It was written to Sys, the love of Mimi's life. The woman who after professing undying love to Mimi and promising to never leave her, abandoned the totally devoted young girl and crushed her innocent heart forever. Mimi had been the last truly happy part of Gwyndolyn. Innocent, pure, open, loving in a way only children can usually love. She had no experience of the harshness of life or the cruelty of people. And Lisa let her out into that filth and depravity, and the results were nothing short of an apocalypse for Gwyndolyn. When it all ended as it surely was doomed to, there was no one left standing at all. Tava hid, as she is wont to do at such times, Teiko ignored it all as usual in her childlike self-centeredness, Melissa refused to get involved, Mimi just sat and cried, and Lisa...Lisa retreated again, leaving me to once more pick up the shattered pieces of Gwyn's life.

The depression went from bad to the worse, to a perfect storm of darkness and despair, and in that period the world fell apart for us all. Gwyndolyn retreated from life, from SL, from J., from Raivyn, and the kids. From everything. She sat in that pit of hopelessness for months and months and months on end and did nothing. The business began to fail. No new releases meant no attention on the blogs, no reason for people to come shop, no money and eventually being forgotten entirely. We didn't log in at all. Didn't answer IMs or emails, or respond to friends. We dropped out of sight completely. And in that perfect storm Raivyn finally came to accept that she wasn't happy anymore, and started making her plans to leave.

August rolled around and I tried desperately to pull things back together. I forced us to work, slowly and painfully and clawing inch by inch. I released a few things. brocade pants, the jeans. I started work hesitantly again on the herculean task of reviving the Neko Skins version II I had stopped working on over 9 months earlier. I was trying so very hard to repair the damage. And yet things were only about to get worse.

In late September, Raivyn approached Gwyn and said she had started seeing someone else. She met a guy at a bar. It had gotten physical. She had enjoyed it. She wanted to be free to see other people. After over 7 years together, she wanted out.

We were all floored. We hadn't seen it coming really. I mean, not really. We are all shy, self-conscious, and have no self esteem...save Lisa who is rarely much influence. We had joked from the start that we loved her more than she loved us, and we often in bouts of depression and self-loathing and doubt mentioned that we expected her to leave some day. But she always denied it, said she was here for the long term and was planning to grow old with Gwyn. And we wanted to believe that. So, we were shocked when just days after her last denial of any problems, she came and sat Gwyn down and said she was going to see other people. She wasn't leaving, she said. We had raised our children together. They were like blood siblings. We were a family, and she wasn't gonna break that apart. But the romance was gone, and she was gonna find that with others now. It was the blow that tore down the halting attempt I had made to claw out of the pit. Everything tumbled back into total insanity. Blackness hovered everywhere, and it seemed to us all that life was done.

Sure, that seems dramatic, doesn't it? Perhaps melodramatic. But it was the state of mind. We lay down and prepared to just die. After over 20 years of not being alone for more than 6 months, after almost 8 years with Raivyn...how could we start over? It seemed impossible that at 40...soon to be 41...that I could begin anew in life, let alone in a relationship. I was too old, too broken to date again. Who would want me? It seemed a life that was sure to be empty, black and utterly lonely. And a few mere weeks later when Raivyn came to say she had changed her mind and she was planning to leave and move out on her own, it only seemed that much bleaker and more hopeless. Our life was over, and we literally did just lay in bed and wait to die.

I don't know how I managed to get Gwyndolyn up and moving again. I probably will never understand that part. But by some divine providence I did. I got her up, focused her mind on pure survival, and started working desperately again on the Neko Skins for version II release. Raivyn was leaving. That meant no income unless I could revive the business, and in our state of mind we knew we couldn't manage a job out in the real world. We were not prepared to cope with the realities of daily survival, and yet we had a few bare weeks to get ready. She was leaving in December.

I worked feverishly and finally released the new neko skins. Response was good, but not as good as I had hoped. Sales rose a bit, then fell again, and I soon realized I would indeed have to prepare us for getting a job outside the house. It was unbearable, unthinkable. Going out among people in this state of mind? How would I manage that? I cried almost endless these days...you can't hold down a job while you are sobbing uncontrollably. You can't hold down a job when the very idea of facing another human being terrified you beyond measure. How was I going to get Gwyndolyn through this? She is a survivour. I...we...are testament to that. Rather than break under the horror of her abuse, her mind splintered and created us. We shouldered her loads, coped for her, found the way to survive when she couldn't alone. Gwyndolyn is strong. She is a survivour of things other people would be crushed by. The abuse of childhood, the death of her children, the abuse of her husband and the emotional and sexual trauma of being passed around and shared during her marriage, the divorce, and depression, and now this. Gwyndolyn survives. But how this time? I still can't understand it. I don't know how we managed to get this far this time in this perfect storm of despair. But somehow we did, and 2008 finally passed and a new year started. A year with Gwyndolyn alone again for the first time in so very long.

2009 - Hope?

How can hope dare bloom in such a state of mind? What nurishment could there have been to allow any shred of hope to remain for Gwyndolyn or any of us after the events of the previous year? It seemed impossible. It still seems impossible. And yet somehow the impossible has happened.

We got  job. that was a start. It was unbearable, and torture, and we hated every second of it and dreaded it every night and every morning. But we went and we worked, and we did it anyway. And to this day we are still doing it...and still hating it. But we cope and survive, somehow.

I continued the work in SL, and made a set of dresses. I finished the male version II neko skins and released those, and I started working on my first sculpted prim based outfits. I have tried to stay busy and not allow us time to think too far ahead. Focus on today. Focus on just making it to tomorrow. That's the best I could manage. But we are still here. We didn't lay down and die, we didn't commit ourselves...another option we considered very long and hard. The girls spend most their time at my mother's because its so hard to cope with daily survival and give them what they need. And they don't need to see their mother falling apart this way. Indigo comes over often and we talk and occasionally I even laugh and smile with her. I visit my mom and the girls and even Raivyn's boys, and I see her even on occasion. We smile and are civil and in a way maybe we will even stay friends in time. But it is well and truly over. In honesty...it was over the day I fell in love with another woman in 2006. It just took a few years for us to admit it. She may have left me physically, but I left her first I suppose, even if I tried not to, even if I remained as devoted as always. She knew the entire time, and even sometimes joked about it. She knew I was in love with J. I am sure that is when it ended in all truth.

So, here I was in a new year. I was getting by, barely. Coping on a day by day, minute by minute basis. There was no hope in sight to be honest, and while I knew intellectually that up was the only choice when you are this far down, I couldn't yet envision what was up there to hope for.

But, still, I demanded of myself that I pretend to hope. I made a new year's resolution that this year would be better. That I would rebuild my business in Second Life, rebuild my life. I was sure as anything I could ever know that I would spend the rest of whatever life I made alone. I couldn't see anything in my future beyond a string of one-night stands and short -term flings. No one would want someone as emotionally scarred and broken as I am. And yet I was determined to make what life we would have bearable at least. Sometimes survival is all you have to hope for.

That was the place I was when J. came back to Second Life. She had faded away a bit as well during the time I was gone. She had a job she enjoyed, and for whatever other reasons, she hadn't been on SL during the last months of 2008 when I started working there again. 2009 came though and she reappeared and I hesitantly said hello, and we picked up a pace born of 3 years of friendship and comraderie. It was slow, and hesitant and a little uncertain. But she was there and it felt good. Between her return and my time with Aleksie over the past few months...and it was in many ways no small part due to Aleksie I expect I managed to cope and survive this long...that I entered 2009 and started trying against all odds to hope again.

It was at this point the most improbable and insane thing occurred to me. After 3 years of secretly loving J. ... I was now free to love her openly. Something I had dreamed guiltily about for years was actually now possible...at least theoretically. There was just one small issue...she could not possibly love me in return. I looked at that and turned that realization over and over in my head and I tried to image every scenario and option and outcome...and it seemed hopeless. She was young, beautiful, talented, and full of potential for a bright life. I was middle-aged, broken and deep in a hopeless rut of blackness and despair. i was unlovable. It was a doomed idea. And yet I couldn't let it go.

After a month of turning these thoughts about every which way I tried hard to bury them. I would not tell her. I would not ruin the friendship we had, ruin the illusion. I would bury my feelings as I had for the last 3 years and remain alone, and not risk the certain rejection that loomed. And then...I told her anyway.

"I love you, J. I have always loved you."

It was insane. Why had I said it? How would I cope with her rejection and loathing and anger. How would I cope with losing her when she stormed off and never spoke to me again. Or perhaps worse, how would I handle the pity and sympathy that may worm into her words ever after as she changed now how she saw me? it was crazy to have risked so much. It was totally beyond my ability to fathom why I had gone against all resolve and said it despite myself.

And yet...at that moment a miracle happened. I was not rejected. She did not run. She did not show me pity or anger or loathing. She said "I love you," back. And the world I thought I knew changed forever.

What was this feeling? Was this actual, real, honest hope? Was this happiness? Tentative and fragile, yes...but happiness? Really? Me? Of all people and of all times...me, happy and hopeful? It didn't fit. It didn't seem real. Surely it was a dream, a mirage, a trick of some kind. And yet this new world didn't disappear. I was blown away. I was uncertain what to do or say or where to go from here.

In the days and weeks after, we talked, caught up, discussed, opened up and shared everything imaginable. It started to even seem real and possible. I started to actually believe in this new world. Could, against all logic and odds, there be an actual chance that I would not be alone for the rest of my life? Was there really a chance she may truly be able to love me? Could this work? Could we really be together? I was drunk with the feelings and the freedom and the possibilities.

Of course reality was due to hit soon, and all the doubts and choices and problems and issues that stood between us quickly became apparent. I crashed. I high as I had gone the fall was a bad one. When I looked at the obstacles they seemed insurmountable in the light of day. Her family, our issues, our backgrounds, the age differences, the distance, my kids, money and business, and friends, and...it all came crashing in on me like a sunami. I felt I was drowning. This couldn't be. I had reached for the impossible and I was being slapped down.

I pulled back. I tried to Stay away from her for several days. I became distant and when she finally said something I told her I was worried it wasn't going to work, and maybe we shouldn't try this, and she protested and we talked, and I made her cry, and it wasn't a good scene. I was scared to risk so much. Especially when she seemed to me to be so hesitant about it all herself. There were so many doubts. I was hopeful, but terrified too. But she convinced me to believe and we agreed again that we both did truly want to try to make this work.

Since then we have both had our moments of doubts and worries and ups and downs. She went back to work, and we have far less time to talk in Second Life or in instant messenger and we both grew scared and lonely. Then we got a few nights together and we reassured each other, and plans continue. I expect it will be that way for a while. Periods of hope mixed with periods of worry and doubt. I guess that is natural in a way all things considered.

And so here we are at the present. A budding romance that is over 3 years in the making. A chance at true happiness for perhaps the first time in my life. The things she makes me feel are difficult to put into words. Beyond just hope. It goes so far beyond just feelings and thoughts of what could be together. It is a true and honest sense of purpose, belonging, and fate. Something important is happening right now. Something that will change us both, hopefully for the better.

Tonight we formalized plans for my first visit to see here. There is a real date attached to that concept now. A time to look forward to on a calender. Things are really happening. This dream is real. Where will it go, how will it unfold? I think it is the first tentative and halting steps down a path we will walk together for many, many years. I see a bright, happy future for us, and so many dreams to strive for together now. I have never felt this type of optimism. And I admit I have also never been this scared. So much is at stake. I love her beyond my ability to explain. I have loved her since that first time I saw her over 3 years ago now. And it would seem all those guilty dreams I harboured secretly may actually become a reality soon.

I have procrastinated about as long as I can. This is my last week in the old house. Empty and lonely as it is here alone, I have to admit I will miss it. Six years in one place. That is a record for me. This house is as much, if not more, home to me than about anywhere I have ever known. And now it is time to leave it for good. Saturday...my last day to be out. Six days. *sigh*

Yeah, I know. It makes no sense really to feel bad about leaving. A home is the people, and I am alone here now since Raivyn moved out. Even the kids are almost never here. And, besides, aren't I moving to California in just a relatively few short months anyway? Why feel lonely and lost and empty over leaving a place now that I plan to leave just a few months down the road anyway. I guess it doesn't make any sense. But it feels sad anyway.

I am scared of what comes after this week. A roommate. Someone else around. Someone not Raivyn, and yet also not J. It will be odd, and uncomfortable, and tense. But also better than being alone. But, it's J. I want to be living with. It's J. I need to see, feel, touch and talk to and have near. Not just anyone. It's scary and I suppose that is the reason for my procrastination about moving and packing and waiting til the last week to prepare for it. Just a bit longer, please...just another day to not think about it. Please?

It also brings me one step closer to California and J. however. That is a good thing, yes? It's what I want, and need and pray for more than anything. And yet that too scares me. No, terrifies me. Los Angeles. It's even a scary looking name. The image of it in my head is admittedly not a friendly one. But J. says it's an amazing city, and that I will love it there. I am sure she is right. And there is, I must admit, a great deal of excitement as well. I see opportunity, and hope, and the chance for happiness, and new adventures. Yet that is shadowed by a persistent cloud of doubt that follows my every thought. Doubts about the move, the city, getting a job, an apartment. Doubts about J. Yeah, that is the crux. Doubts that she really loves me, doubts it can work, doubts she will truly try. Doubts that anyone could ever really love me. So many doubts. It's paralyzing.

And yet...if I do not risk these horrible outcomes, what might I be missing that could be wonderful? Love is a risk. A risk of rejection, a chance at pain and loneliness and loss. But the chance is worth it, isn't it? The happiness we could have. That's worth any pain, any risk, right? I think so. I know so. But it doesn't make the doubts and fears vanish or vanquish the black cloud over my thoughts. Until I hold her that first time...will that erase all the worry and terror? Or will it simply replace them with new worries, new fear, new doubts?

Life is hard. Life is pain. But I pray desperately that for once, life can also be happiness and joy and dreams. Is anyone listening to those prayers?

So, after a week away from J. I have started stressing and worrying about every little thing again. The confidence and hopefulness I had managed to latch onto seem to be gone again and I am back to that early stage of focusing only on the bad. How can I swing this far this fast? Honestly, this is pathetic, even for me.

It's only been a week. And even in that time I still got to talk to her on chat a few minutes every few nights. Its not like I haven't heard from her at all. Yet, I am worrying again that it isn't going to work out, that she doesn't really want me to come out to California, and that I am risking a lot for something that seems doomed to failure. I was so hopeful just a week ago. I couldn't wait to see her, was considering going sooner, maybe even packing everything and moving now instead of later in the year. I saw a wide open field of dreams and hopes and options, and I was excited just thinking of it all. Starting over in L.A. seemed fun, full of opportunity. Now it seems frightening and full of danger and dreadful outcomes. The brightness seems dimmed again and the darkness is looming.

I worry I am either crowding her, or being too distant. I worry she isn't that committed to the idea of  "us", and that I will move and find myself alone there when it is all done. I worry about the age difference. I worry about her family, and the issues that will prevent her from really being with me. I worry about work, and my business. I worry about leaving my girls behind to finish school while I start over in another state. I worry that I am giving up too much and getting too little. I worry I won't end up with anything at all. There isn't much I am not worrying about again.

How can I get that hope and optimism back? And most importantly, how can I hold onto it long enough to make all this reality?

2008 will undoubtably go down as one of the worst, most joyless, depression filled pathetic examples of a year in my life to date. My business in Second Life began to seriously decline in sales due to my depression deepening and the inability to work or produce new releases, leading to a 50% cut in our income by July. As my depression worsened and the business and our finaces deteriorated, so did my relationship with Raivyn. To the point that by October she announced she was seeing other people again, after nearly 8 years together. When November rolled around, when had decided to leave entirely, and by December I found myself alone again for the first time in almost a decade.

It was, I will admit, not the harshest year I have suffered. There was one other far worse, but that was nearly nine years gone and life had seemed to have begun to move in a positive direction after that series of events. That is until the last 2 years, wherein my depression returned in such force I was convinced it had an agenda to make up for the few years of semi-happiness I had cobbled together. And in that 2 years, the worst of which was 2008, I watched all I had thought I had unravel before me in a slow-motion silent film that resembled a sick and demented comedy of errors in which I was the fool and the butt of fate's cosmic joke.

So come the end of 2008, I sat in my aloneness and dispair and wished good riddance to the 12 months that had brought nothing but misery to me and those I had loved. It was time to move into a fresh start, both on the calander and in my life, and pray that it would be far better than the last. There is nowhere to go but up I mused, and I still feel I was right in that. 2008 was and will remain a perfect storm of tragic and disasterous circumstances and events, the likes of which I sincerely hope I never will see again.

Go, farewell 2008, and welcome 2009...the year of new starts, second chances, and rebuilding.

What is there of a future for a doll forgotten, cast off, and left behind? What is the point of such a toy if not to bring joy to someone through hours or years of whispered secrets under the covers, or adventures shared? Is there a life for a doll whose owner has outgrown her and moved on to bigger things?

I have been pondering these issues as I sit forlorn, lost and abandoned on the shelf of this empty room, stripped of its furniture and possessions and now filled only with tumbled boxes and memories that I can't help but cling to for my very existence.

What happens to me now that she is gone?

It is a question no toy ever wishes to ponder, and yet the one we all know will come someday. Who or what are we once we are alone? Where do we go from here after we are no longer needed or wanted? And, why couldn't those happy years have lasted?

I was blessed with eight full years with her. They were not all happy, nor all fun, I will admit, but they were full and deep and so much was shared in that short time together. Eight years. Now gone. Over. I sit alone, in a house as silent as I myself am and wonder how it could have ended this way...so suddenly, with no warning it would seem, and no chance of going back.

So, now with her gone, and my life empty of purpose and meaning...what is a doll to do next? I sit and I think, and I remember. But is there more than that? There must be more, surely. Can there be a life for me after being left behind yet again? I have had too many chances already. Perhaps I should not expect any more. Perhaps my luck is used up, and my chances at further happiness as thin and threadbare as my dress...as my heart.

And yet...I need. I desire. I yearn and long for...something. No...someone. She is gone, and yet I still need her even if she has outgrown me. I am seemingly nothing without her. Or at least without someone to provide some joy to. Someone to care for and who will care for me. Yet, have I not had my chance? I was left behind, discarded. In the end I was of little importance. I failed in my only purpose, to bring happiness to her. So don't I deserve this fate? This loneliness?

Who would want  a doll that is as broken as I?

Who indeed?

Hrrmm...Been longer than I thought since I wrote anything here. For a week or two was because I was actually working for the first time in over a year. But now it's cause I am back to just feeling dead, trapped, and lost. :/

It's not that I don't have ideas to work on. That part has never gone away, no matter how bad the depression gets. I have a zillion ideas. I just feel like I am trapped behind a glass barrier that prevents me from touching them and doing anything with them. I can see them, I can see what I need to do, what I want to do...but I can't reach any of it. I open photoshop and sometimes even open the files I want to work on, and then I just stare at them. I can't raise my hand to the mouse to actually work. I desperately want to. I know I need to. But the ability to move physically to do it escapes me. It's a horribly lonely and helpless feeling.

So, here I sit, after a few weeks of positive acheivements, feeling deflated and right back where I was. This shite is killing me. I can't spend the rest of my life living this way. But what can I do? After 40 years I still don't have the answers.

- Zoe