You know what sucks the most about not being married anymore, aside from not being able to see what was (and may still be) my best friend everyday?

Going to bed alone.

Not because of sex, but just having someone there … it’s very comforting. I don’t think I’ve had a really good night’s sleep since August or September 2006; at least not one that wasn’t drug-induced.

I think I miss that more than anything else.

I’m mired in a pretty deep funk, and I don’t know what to do to get out …

I want to quit my job.

I want to sell my bikes.

I want to simply disappear …

Instead, I think I’ll go try to get some sleep.

I’m taking a few days off from work because, well, I just needed to take a few days off.

I was originally planning to go down to Fountain Hills, AZ (where my mom and stepdad live), to cheer on Kathy Sherwin, et al, at the NMBS race down there, but due to finances (and lack of planning, other than requesting the time off), this didn’t happen.

Now I’m just trying to relax and decompress. Unfortunately, like my normal work week, I’m still only getting 4-5 hours of sleep per night. I need to get out on the bike, and yet, I wasted a perfectly good riding day yesterday.

What’s worse than knowing what the solution to a problem is, and not being able to motivate yourself to do it? My life is so decidedly un-Big Ring these days, it’s unreal. Dysthymia in action (or is that dysthymia inaction?).

I did go to the Bike Porn showing at the warehouse last night; which was really quite interesting in the various ways that bicycle pornography can be interpreted; from the slightly erotic panning of sculpted lugs on a handcrafted steel frame, to the comedic idea of two bikes making love to each other, to a freak-bike builder lusting after high-end boutique racing bikes, to actual hardcore porn involving a bicycle … certain aspects of the latter were erotic and well-done; other aspects were just disturbing, at least to me.

You can view the trailer on Blip.TV … be forewarned, it is definitely not safe for work, or for people who don’t want to see nudity or anything remotely explicit.

Ran into the Wolfe, just after the screening and chatted far too briefly. Sometimes it’s interesting how easy it is to “talk” to people online, yet how difficult it can be face-to-face, when you’re not really sure what to say.

Shortly thereafter was an impromptu running of the Salt City Sprints with a number of exciting match-ups; in a few of the races, in keeping with the theme of the evening, a number of people (men and women alike) stripped down to skivvies, or less in a few cases, to try and gain a competitive advantage over their rivals (or maybe just to give the audience a thrill) …

The most exciting match of the evening was the fully-clothed face-off between Legal Messenger, Inc. (LMI) owner/dispatcher Jason Copier, and LMI messenger Patrick Beecroft which finished in a dead heat at 13.74 seconds. The battle for sprint supremacy between messenger and dispatcher was not settled last night.

The evening broke up about midnight, with many heading off to the Gallivan Center for a Midnight Mass, while I drove home (because, as you know, I drive to bike events rather than actually riding), and sat on the couch for another 3 hours watching stupid late-night television (I don’t even remember what was on) before finally wandering off to bed for a fitful 5-hours of sleep, waking up this morning at 8:30 to face another bleak, boring day … I’ve got to get out on the bike today, even if for only a short 10-miler, before the weather gets shitty.

You know you’ve got issues when even your therapist is bugging you about starting to date again …

But it’s like this; I’m scared. I’m scared to death of repeating the same mistakes that I made when I was married. I’m afraid that I will still not be able to open up and share who I am with the person I love. So right now, it’s easier to just avoid the situation.

And then there’s this … my competitive days are long behind me. I’m not intimidated by women who are better at something than I am; in fact quite the opposite, I find it extremely attractive. I prefer active, fit women, but my corresponding fitness is not there, and it will take time to retrieve.

I’m not looking for a training partner; if you’re racing, I’ll be the guy on the sidelines who makes sure you’re being taken care of during the race. Need food/water/clothing hand-ups? I’m your man. I prefer to be behind-the-scenes making an event a success for others, rather than killing myself to finish mid-pack or worse. I want to be with someone who wants support from her partner, not competition.

But it seems that most of the women I am meeting not only have this huge competitive streak in them, but are looking for the same in their partner; which just doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t see how two people can have a healthy relationship when they’re always competing with each other, and yet it seems like when athletes get together, much of the competition is within the relationship as well.

And to me, that’s just wrong.

I ride my bike to ride my bike … and the main reason why I seldom ride with more than one or two other people (when I’m not riding alone) is because most group rides turn into some sort of big swinging (virtual or actual) dick contest. That’s not what I’m about. If I’m not paying money and pinning a number on, then I’m not racing … and it’s really easy for me to just say “see ya!” when the people I ride with start acting as though every ride is a race.

The downside of this is that I spend a lot of time alone … which when you are dysthymic is not really healthy either. I reach out to my friends, but unless we have made specific plans, I tend not to follow-through and nothing happens. And thus I get lonelier and feel like my friends don’t want to hang out with me; when in reality, they could very much feel like I don’t want to hang out with them either, because I don’t follow-through or flake. I know that friendship is a two-way street, but I find it very difficult to offer much of myself, even when I think that the people I’m with are some of the nicest, kindest, and coolest people I’ve ever met.

I’ve been this way nearly all my life … and I know that much of it is a protective measure from how much I used to move around when I was a kid; a different school every year or two doesn’t lend itself to long-lasting relationships … and when I do start building a relationship that means something, inevitably I feel like I’m going to sabotage it somehow.

And so I keep working on myself; keep seeing the crazy doctor, keep taking the happy pills, keep reaching out … and keep trying to follow-through.

I don’t know if it’s the changing weather (like it is for the Mistress), or if there is something else going on, but I just cannot get my head into the game.

My motivation levels are near-nil, and I find that right now I’m basically just on cruise control. I wake up, I go to work, I come home, I eat too much, watch some TV, and go to bed. On weekends, I may give myself a respite by heading up one of the canyons, but the past couple of weeks, even that hasn’t really helped a whole lot.

I’m looking for inspiration from without, because I’m certainly not finding any from within.

I can’t write, at least not expressively … my pens and journals are just sitting there. I’m not feeling artistically inclined towards my cameras … I’m just carrying them around, but not pulling them out and using them.

My bikes are in the closet, or leaning against the counter in the dining room, tires flattening, chains drying, and even the last couple of days I’ve been skiing have been less than exceptional.

I’m deep in a funk, and I don’t know how to pull myself out right now; and I’m not sure how everyone else can put on such a happy face all the time. I listen to what other people tell me about what’s going on in their lives, much of which is often more difficult than what I’m having to deal with, and yet, they seem like they’re able to just deal with it and move on, while I find myself wallowing in in the muck that is my mind.

Definitely not doing the Big Ring thing these days. I dunno, Train, maybe I should give up the “Flahute” monicker and put away the Ferlinghetti and Kerouac, and start pulling out the Maya Angelou and Sylvia Plath.

JPMorgan Acts to Buy Ailing Bear Stearns at Huge Discount - New York Times
March 16, 2008
By ANDREW ROSS SORKIN and LANDON THOMAS Jr.

Bear Stearns, pushed to the brink of bankruptcy by what amounted to a run on the bank, agreed late Sunday to sell itself to JPMorgan Chase for a mere $2 a share, narrowly averting a collapse that threatened to cascade through the financial system.

The price represents a startling 93 percent discount to Bear Stearns’ closing stock price on Friday on the New York Stock Exchange.

Bankers and policy makers raced to complete the deal before financial markets in Asia opened on Monday, as fears grew that the financial panic could spread if Bear Stearns failed to find a buyer.

The deal, done at the behest of the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department, punctuates the stunning downfall of one of Wall Street’s biggest and most storied firms. Bear Stearns weathered the vagaries of the markets for 85 years, surviving the Depression and a dozen recessions only to meet its end in the rapidly unfolding credit crisis now afflicting the American economy.

Reflecting Bear Stearns’s dire straits, JPMorgan agreed to pay just $236 million for the firm, a figure that includes the price of Bear’s soaring headquarters on Madison Avenue in Manhattan. At $2 a share, JPMorgan is buying Bear Stearns for a third of the price at which the troubled firm went public in 1985. Only a year ago, Bear’s shares fetched $170. The cut-rate price reflects deep misgivings about the firm’s prospects.

To me, there are two very scary things about this deals.

One of the scary things about this deal is that the the company is selling for WELL less than book value, so far less than book value that the price of the sale doesn’t even cover the entire value of Bear Stearn’s headquarters on Madison Avenue, which was built for $280-million, and currently is considered to be worth about $1-billion.

The other is, of course, the speed at which it went down. When Nick Leeson’s rogue trades bankrupted Barings Bank in 1995, it was only 8 days from when the damage was discovered (on 23 February 1995), until ING purchased the bank for a mere £1 on 3 March 1995. That this deal was cut even more quickly illustrates the extent of the damage to Bear Stearns, and makes me wonder even more about the health of other companies in my industry.

The company that really scares me is Goldman Sachs, which created and sold many of these self-same securities, and simultaneously sold them short (effectively selling them twice) in a declining market, cleaning up on trading revenues and “profits”.

It’s going to be an interesting week.

There is a theory in cognitive therapy that people repeat the same patterns because our minds become used to traveling particular neural paths; and thus seek those paths.

It’s sort of the mental equivalent of commuting … where you always take the same route to work, even though you know that sometimes traffic is really going to suck, instead of seeking a new/better way of getting where you need to go.

This also helps explain why people who have certain maladaptive schemas tend to keep being attracted to the same types of people. For example, the emotionally deprived (like my ex-wife) are constantly attracted to the emotionally inhibited (like me), and vice-versa.

The former believes that their desire for a normal degree of emotional support will not be adequately met by others; and this is reinforced by the latter’s inability to express spontaneous action, feeling, or communication — usually to avoid disapproval by others, feelings of shame, or losing control of one’s impulses.

By the same token, since the former is constantly seeking emotional approval and support, the latter begins to shut-down emotionally because they’re afraid they won’t be able to fulfill their partner’s needs.

It takes a conscious effort to break the patterns, but generally unless/until you understand why, you’ll continue to repeat them.

Some people can do it on their own, but to really understand why and change, most people need therapy. The problem is that few actually admit this to themselves and seek it out.

I don’t want to repeat the same patterns in my next relationship … my marriage falling apart was the most devastating thing ever to happen to me, and yet as far as divorces go, it was one of the easiest, as we had nothing to fight about … and so I am actively in therapy, and still on happy pills just to deal with the daily anxiety about my own self-worth.

Does this make me a weak man? I sure hope not. In fact, I believe this is making me a stronger man in the long run.