Ever Cursed

Sometimes the hardest thing to do is nothing at all.

I’m sure a lot of us are dealing with this paradox right now. There’s a fucking plague destroying our global economy and killing us by the thousands right now. I’m certainly experiencing that, for sure, but there’s also something else going on in my life.

A few years ago, I posted a blog about meeting a girl who kept leaving me for another guy. Well, after that ended, I was a mess. I started trying to fill the void anyway I could. After a series of flings and an epic amount of drinking, I eventually met someone new. It was a good relationship, but tainted by my brokenheartedness. Eventually it ended too. My melancholy wasn’t the only cause, life is complicated, but I’m sure she sensed something was off about me...

That was last summer.

Since then, I’ve met a few others, but nothing of significance. And then an absolute babe came along. I honestly could not believe my luck. We met just a few weeks ago but hit it off amazingly well. As I write this, I’m over the moon about her. So, of course, there must be a problem.

There are over a million people in the city I live in, yet somehow this girl is entangled with the exact same guy that the other girl kept leaving me for a few years ago. I just found this out two nights ago. She didn’t know he and I had a history either, but once again I find myself vying for the affection of a beautiful woman and in competition with the same toxic waste of human life.

So now I wait. Maybe she will choose me, maybe the other guy, maybe neither. It’s a tough decision and one that I cannot make. The only thing I am sure of is...

I am cursed.

There’s this movie I really love called Phantom Thread. In it, Daniel Day Lewis plays a tailor that makes fancy dresses for wealthy women in 1950’s post war London. He’s an eccentric genius that works all the time and because of this he never can seem to keep a woman around. They grow bored with his distance and indifference.

Eventually, he meets his match with a fiesty German waitress. They hit it off remarkably well and he tells her of the grand mythology of sewing wedding dresses. Women held superstitions that they would never marry if they sewed a wedding dress, or if they touched one before they were wed they would only end up with bald men. Even though Daniel Day Lewis is a man, he holds this same superstition. He explains to her that he often sews things into his dresses that only he knows about - little messages in the lining - secrets.

Later in the story, the girl learns that poisoning him is the only way to keep the relationship stable (it’s a weird movie, don’t let me spoil it, go watch it, it’s been available for years). While he’s sleeping, she finds one of these secret messages in the lining of a very important wedding dress made for an actual princess. It simply says “Never Cursed.”

I find this heartbreaking. He wants so badly to find a real love but knows that he never will. This dress may be one of the most important of all his creations, and woven into it he places a pleading prayer. The romance is that his new belle is the one who finds and reads it and is the answer to his plea.

No one reads my hidden messages in wedding dresses - not that I ever put one there. I pray to unknown gods for this new girl which will likely go unanswered. No, this other guy will probably win. The history and experience of my life all but confirms it.

---

Today is the first day of spring; the Vernal Equinox of 2020. A dark day that ushers in the return of light. Normally, I would be celebratory about the change of season. But with the collapse of society and losing yet another love, I simply can’t. I’m just too sad.

Peace, Love, & wash your hands for at least 20 seconds.

🙏