Apparently, my good luck, as unexpected as snow in September or a teen pregnancy, has suddenly run dry. I have been thriving on the act of propelling my body into situations that basically scare the shit out of me, hoping that somehow, so fucking late in the game, I might be able to build something that at least looks like self-confidence.To other people.

I never fool myself, but I certainly try.

Frazzled and exhausted, completely destabilized, I am trying to dig out of the avalanche of shit that I am wading through. The “Sleeping With Strangers,” chapter of my existence seems to be coming to a grinding halt. As is often the case, changes like this always seem to come to me at the worst possible times. Autumn is such a vibrant, magnificent season. I would love to really enjoy it, yet as summer tapers off, I always feel an overwhelming sadness. Inevitably, things change with the seasons. There is no use trying to hang on to the last shreds of summer passion. It’s all over now, along with warm evening walks and balmy days at the beach.

So I am asking myself, where should I go from here? It is impossible now to go back to where I came from. I am flailing with the idea that nothing else really awaits me, that I can just give up and silently accept growing old. Hopefully when we are elderly, we lose all of our desires, physical urges…our libidos, more or less. Somehow I doubt this, for me, completely, and for others as well. I imagine myself in a few years, filled with hope and lust, wrinkled and undesirable, and I see little reason to continue hanging around, as incredibly vain and selfish as that sounds. At the end of the day, I guess I am not really all that altruistic. I hate the idea that one day, someone might see me and think, “She must have been beautiful once. Before now.” And then I hate how shallow I am.

I guess that there is no other alternative. We can only move forward. Allons-y.