One of the reasons it’s been so difficult for me to find dates is because I don’t have a very active social life (which is to say, I have no social life whatsoever to speak of.) I used to have a close knit group of friends that carried me through high school and beyond college for a while, but eventually we began to drift apart for various reasons, until one day I found myself living the life of a loner again.

I was never one for attending social gatherings though so I could maybe gain some new friends, mainly because there were, well, people there. And I hated people.

Ok, I wouldn’t go so far as to say I hated them, maybe that I just didn’t get along…no I hated them.

Unfortunately, if I was ever gonna meet girls then I was gonna have to go where people were, sooner or later. With a mindset like this, it’s a small wonder why I was always holding out hope that I would meet someone at my job instead. After all, I’m forced to be here, and there were people here too, soooo….

For the longest time I used to entertain fantasies of meeting the girl of my dreams at work, so much that it started taking on a life of its own. I even nailed down what she would look like too: deeply tanned skin, big brown eyes, and luscious brown hair. She would be as sweet as an angel, maybe assigned somewhere close to me so we’d run into each other on a regular basis. Things would be strictly platonic at first, but before I knew it she would eventually warm up to me… and love would blossom out of nothing at all.

Out of nothing at allllll….. Out of nothing at… *ahem* but anyways, that’s how I imagined it. From that we would eventually become engaged, get married, and live happily ever after. Oh how I prayed and begged God that this would all happen for real. My fantasies here were so vivid that I could have weaved a cheap romance novel out of it. Probably could have made some cash from selling it too.

I had been churning over this latest fantasy of mine for a few months, when something weird happened: we got a new coworker assigned near us who had… deeply tanned skin, big brown eyes, and luscious brown hair. I swear you couldn’t make this stuff up. Our department doesn’t attract a lot of young workers to begin with, so just getting another coworker around my age would have been odd unto itself. She was a year older than me, but single and beautiful, and had a mellow, pleasant personality about her. In her previous job she worked with kids who suffered from various disabilities too. It was perfect! My dream was actually coming to life!

Except she hated me.

Well, she didn’t really hate me. She just had no interest in me whatsoever. I tried everything I could think of to woo her too, all in the futile hope that eventually, sooner or later, she would warm up to me in very much the same way her alter ego did in my fantasies. I kept her company when things got quiet during our late shifts. I helped her out whenever she needed to learn something about the job. I helped her find her keys when she had lost them and was freaking out over it, and at her request I burned dozens of her CDs into MP3s so she could use an MP3 player she bought for the gym (even though she didn’t have a computer). I changed my hairstyles, clothing, and yes, I’m ashamed to admit it, during my low points I even tried using TAG body spray (I’m suing those bastards for false advertising by the way.)

Yet despite all my efforts, when it came to asking her out to lunch, or even just coffee, she had no interest at all. The more she blew me off, the more I pined for her love. After a couple of months of this I eventually gave up. I decided I would continue being a nice guy as always, but I resigned myself to the fact that she would never be interested in me. I was just a pathetic loser who could never be good enough for her. My fantasy was not to be.

And that might have been the end of it, except that shortly afterwards she fell madly in love with another coworker, and within a few months they were engaged to be married.

My fantasies were coming to life after all… but for somebody else. Honestly, mere words could not convey the state of my emotions as I watched some little bastard boy enjoy what I previously could only experience in my dreams. Every day I had to come in to work and see those two nuzzling noses or holding hands at a picnic table (just as I envisioned it), and it was all I could do to keep myself from screaming at the top of my lungs and stepping on the gas at a nearby red light hoping an 18 wheeler would plow into me.

The best though was when the wedding itself was soon coming up, and she asked me if I had any suggestions for wedding songs she could use. I ended up making a CD of what I considered to be my most favorite love songs, songs I probably would have picked for my own wedding too. From what I heard my CD turned out to be a big hit, though I wouldn’t know, since I wasn’t invited.

I’m not one for bitterness though, so here’s a toast to their new life together. May their imminent divorce be appallingly messy and violently ugly.

No seriously, I do hope they’ll be happy together, I guess. I don’t begrudge anyone getting married, but for the love of kindness, did it really have to F*&%ING play out EXACTLY like I imagined it???

When I saw that, I guess I went through something of a system shock. My feelings went numb and I succumbed to a state of deep depression. In a way, I had given up on life. I no longer took care of myself, no longer went out as much as I used to. My clothes would get worn and start showing holes, but I didn’t care. I started suffering from health problems, but still I didn’t care. It wasn’t uncommon for me to sleep for 12-15 hours a night, and even then I just had no energy to get out of bed at all. I used to be punctual and on time for work, but I became so lethargic that if I ended up being only 10 minutes late, it was a miracle. It was becoming a regular tradition for me to hit the supermarket the night before my days off from work, stock up on groceries and DVDs from Redbox, then head home and hole up in my bedroom with my tub of popcorn, TV and laptop, where I would stay unmoved in my jammies until it was time to go back to work again.

I became utterly convinced that God hated me. After all, He wasn’t going to simply ignore my prayers here. Nope, He was going to twist and twist and twist the knife in so deep that it would all but ensure my psyche would never recover from this. It was almost like He recorded my fantasies and decided to orchestrate it in real life so that someone else would become the beneficiary of it, right before my very eyes. I mean really, what were the odds of something like that happening, down to even using the same collection of songs I dreamed would be used at my own wedding? (Which I say at the risk of sounding like a weenie girlie boy.) About a billion to one??

Why? Why did I have to endure that? Why did God have to hurt me like this? I know I can be a wiseass and all who deserves to get smacked around every now and then, but this was bafflingly cruel. It’s part of why I’m so slow to get out of bed every day, because I absolutely dread what new punishment He might have in store for me. My pathetic life must be a source of constant amusement for Him.

But… and before you Christian dweebs start berating me here, let me be quick to note that I don’t really believe this now. I know there’s a purpose to everything, and I’ve seen enough to know that for whatever reason God is keeping me safe from a lot of the evil that’s in this world. I guess that goes to show what a foregone conclusion I must be, that in spite of the complete embarrassment I experienced, I still believe God cares for me and has only my best interests in mind. Maybe it’s Stockholm syndrome?

Still, this one really got to me in a bad way, and even now I’m still nursing the wounds. Just when I think I’ve put it behind me, every now and then somebody will stick a finger in the wound, like when I run into her and she talks about her “husband” (just hearing her say that makes me cringe.) Ironically enough, the most recent jab came from my mother, of all places. My Mom never knew I had a thing for this girl, even though she met her a few times at work. One time we had a conversation afterwards and Mom said, “She is SUCH a sweetheart, Linc! How come you can’t meet somebody nice like her? She would have been PERFECT for you!!”

Poor Mom. She had no idea why I ran out after hearing that and started ripping and chewing on the grass on the front lawn.

Ah well. I guess the only thing that will make the pain go away for good is when I finally do meet someone for real. It’s hard to imagine even after all that how I could still retain hope that somehow, somewhere, she’s out there waiting for me, but I do. I guess I’ll always be a romantic at heart, no matter how loopy I get.

I still fantasize about meeting her though. But trust me, I have learned my lesson. Now I imagine meeting her in scenarios that are so outlandish that they cannot POSSIBLY happen to me in real life, much less to anyone else. Currently I fantasize about meeting her as part of an undercover operation I’m doing for the CIA. Oh, and I have superpowers. And the girl of my dreams is an alien from another planet who gets captured by the U.S. government. We fall in love and I spring her loose, then steal the USS Enterprise starship and together we make our way to the Alpha Centauri system, where we spend many steamy, romantic evenings on the paradise planet of Gimmegoomajamjam.

Let’s see y’all beeotches try to turn THAT one into reality, yo!

This might come as a shock to you, but I hate Valentine’s Day.

Ever since Donna Costello kicked me in the shinny after giving her a Valentine card back in the third grade, I knew this holiday was going to bring me nothing but grief.

It got worse during my high school years when some evil bastard of a bastard came up with the brilliant idea to have flowers and Valentines delivered DURING CLASSES. So I’m sitting there at my desk minding my own business, trying to learn the intricacies of the periodic table, when lo and behold there’s a knock on the door and in walks this delivery guy holding a huge bouquet of flowers, meant of course for the ONE girl I happened to have a crush on. And then when class is over I get to watch her throw her arms around her darling love while I grab my chest and try to endure the agony of having my heart get ripped to shreds as I made my way to Spanish class.

Year after year it was like this, even as I continued to hope in vain that maybe, just maybe, next time things would be different. Nope. Unfulfilled love, loneliness, pain and anguish continued to rule my Valentine’s Day.

Then a few years ago, something happened that would forever seal Valentine’s day as a day of infamy for me. I came home one night to find an eviction notice had been posted on my door. An evil relative had stolen the house that my family bought and paid for, and then had the courts rule in his favor to get us thrown out so his granddaughter could move in with her skank boyfriend. My family unfortunately had no money for an attorney, so we were left defenseless against this onslaught of pure hatred. And, (almost like it was his parting gift), our relative poisoned our pet cat, who died shortly before our eviction.

The worst act of hatred that had ever been commited against me (and left me homeless for the first time in my life) happened precisely… on Valentine’s Day. That experience changed my life forever. I no longer had a place to call home, and the ruinous trials that resulted in that destructive aftermath left all of us with no assets except the cars we drove and the clothes on our backs. My parents will never be able to retire, and even with our resources pooled together we had all been effectively priced out of the housing market. Even years later, I can still feel the dull impact of that devastating day.

So yeah, I f*&#ing hate this accursed holiday.

The only way I’ve managed to survive in the years that followed was to basically hide under the bed and pray the demon-spirit of Valentine wouldn’t come get me. Then when the morning of the 15th finally came, I’d come out and breathe a sigh of relief in knowing I would live to see another day.

Of course, last year I made the mistake of thinking it was finally safe to come out again, and met someone online (on Valentine’s Day) who seemed to be the perfect girl for me. Educated, funny, intelligent, had a good career, loved to travel, shared the same political and religious beliefs I did, and most importantly, had blonde hair .

The perfect girl ended up stringing me along for 2 months, and then after sending her flowers for her birthday, I get texted a terse “thank you” and never hear from her again. I mean sheesh, if you’re gonna be like that then at least pay me the difference for the flowers I bought you cheap miserable mother#*&%ing bi___

I hate Valentine’s Day.

But… you know, whether it’s because I’m a glutton for punishment or because I’m just a dumb schmuck (or both), there’s a part of me that’s still holding out hope that this Valentine’s curse will someday be lifted. That maybe, just maybe, there’s a special girl out there who can finally break the hex and make this day a day I no longer have to fear or despise again.

Until then, I will continue to hide under the bed and rage against the pink machine.

I was kinda in a really bad mood.

I do have moments like that (more than I’d care to admit), but after I calm down, a kind of melancholy then sets in. I really don’t want to be this angry with Him, but it’s hard trying to make some sense out of the events of the last few years, and since I’m the kind of guy who wears his heart on his sleeve, every bad thing that happens in life tends to cut me deeply.

There are times though when I suspect that I’m personally the butt of some sick, heavenly joke. I’d pray I meet someone at work for example who could be “the one” for me, and when I do meet that person, she ends up rejecting me and marrying another co-worker. If the answer to a prayer has to be no, fine, but why rub it in my face? Why humiliate me like that?

And that’s what life seems to be like these days: a series of prayers that not only go unanswered or rejected, but also seem to require some form of divine punishment for even daring to make them. Why?

It’s a simple question, but one that I don’t think will ever be answered.

Well, I did have a nice six day reprieve from work, but that ends tomorrow (uhh, make that today.) Joy joy, joy joy joy.

Seriously, I don’t think I’ve ever hated my job as much as I do now. An awful boss running us into the ground, an awful coworker whose useless, fat wide load of an ass takes up valuable real estate in our section, a workload that’s spiraling out of control, and colleagues with frayed nerves that makes me wonder if my bullet riddled carcass might soon end up on the news.

I guess it’s no surprise then that I’ve thrown everything into getting this blog off the ground, not only to boost traffic levels, but also to make some serious coins out of it so I can get the holy hell outta here. 7 years I’ve been at this job, with no end in sight. Something’s gotta give.

I really thought I had something going though by deciding to apply for law school, and I can’t believe how it all turned to crap, even in spite of almost two years of praying, seeking, knocking and begging for answers. Instead of being shown the way, I get jerked around by a God who really seems to be doing His darndest best to show me how much He hates my filthy hide.

Fine. Message received. Way to show the world how You take care of your own by screwing them over when they need Your help the most. Sheesh. I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not Lord, but I’m feeling pretty fricking abandoned and betrayed right now.

Ok, calm down Linc…. breathe in… breathe out… serenity now…

To be honest, it really is disconcerting to feel this deep seated rage boil up within me whenever I think about the events of the past few years, from getting evicted out into the streets, to getting stuck in a dead end, soul sucking job, to watching my health deteriorate and my prospects dry up, even while everyone else around me find their true loves, marry up and move on to greener pastures, and here I am, still stuck in first gear, partly because I was stupid enough to believe God had something better prepared for me, and that I need only be patient enough to wait for it. Sure, all fine and good, until I finally realized that only applies to people He actually gives a rip about.

Well ok then, how about this: You hate me, I hate You, so let’s just stay out of each other’s way from now on, and maybe, just maybe, I’ll be able to salvage the remaining pieces of my almost completely destroyed life, mmmmkay?