Why is it that, occasionally, all of us are struck by some incredible desire to punish ourselves? Call it love if you want but really its all that there is, some form of self-infliced idiocy that we cling to in the hopes of it turning into that romantic move ending that someone, somewhere has figured out how to actually achieve (if only for the two brief years before the marriage breaks up).

Lets face it, there's no better punishment that walking around day to day, torturing yourself over something you cannot control. Its probably how we get all those Chinese spys to talk--tell them, I'll give you two more letters from that American chick that you met three days ago, if only you'll tell me where your country hid the nuclear weapons. When you're in love, especially with something that you aren't certain has ever actually given a second thought to you, or is currently worried about anyting remotely involving you, even if its cursing your car for parking in the last available space in the lot (espcially then), you've effectively engaged in a bitter contest to see how far you can drive yourself to distraction before you give up.

Take, for instance, me. Should I have known ages ago that I was in for it? Of course. But its so much more fun to sit here, day in and day out, thinking about things, especially when my mind has a chance to wander. If I'd only said this more enthusiastically, or not been deathly ill the day that it disappeared into thin air, would things have changed? I can't predict, I can't relive, but the hindsight and the constant sight beating me over the head is no less painful for it. Even if I were to decide today to forgo all thought alltogether, there's no telling at what moment the words I could have spoken would come back to me. And that somewhere out there, there's someone who's keeping this hope alive, even if only to draw me into another day.

We do so many things to keep people by our sides--so much to draw that one last drip of water torture, that its amazing anyone loves at all. Of course it would be easier if we couldn't. If by some freak of natural selection we'd stop growing apart, and start figuring out how to do it all on our own, never needing anyone else, but that's just fear talking. The fact of the matter is that all of us, in one way or another, love, are compelled to it. Its in denial that we find the same torture. That same empty feeling, only instead of pulling it toward us, we're pushing it away.

We get hurt both ways, and that's what's the killer. For me, its the ongoing broken heart. For others its the ongoing broken heart. Go Figure.