Tuesday, November 29, 2005

123. viva la revolucion!

I, in my naivete, used to believe that being a kind, generous person meant that kindness and generosity would be returned to me. I don't mean if I helped someone that I expected that specific person to be available to help me in return on some future date. I guess I believed in a kind of grand karmic bank account where good deeds deposited could be withdrawn from in times of need.

I've found that this is an exercise in frustration. The world is like a black hole for kindness - it goes in but it's a one-way trip. Now it turns out that apart from x-ray radiation, black holes do kind of leak minute quantities of mass due to quantum effects. In the same way, sometimes kindness does return but it's at a much, much, much smaller level.

The realization that kindness and generosity are bad investments has been a source of much frustration for me these last few years. I felt lied to. I had believed all those church/Bible study lessons that told me it was better to give than to receive, that JOY meant putting Jesus first, Others second, and Yourself last. I believed those things and put them into practice. And then I kept trying to figure out how giving was any better than receiving; and I kept wondering when the joy part of the JOY formula started kicking in. I can't say exactly when, but it finally dawned on me that those sayings were/are bunk. Receiving is better than giving in every way, and putting yourself last is a surefire way to kill joy.

It's been hard for me these last few years. I'd been a generous person for so long, that it's just a part of who I am. It didn't matter that the foundation on which I had built my generosity was made of sand, it was there to stay. Sometimes friends tell me to just forget about helping people and to just do what makes me happy. Well, helping people is the thing that makes me happy.

But doesn't that contradict your critique of JOY? Perhaps I'm not explaining myself well. What I mean is, I grew up believing that being kind and generous would cultivate a life where kindness and generosity would return to you - it would create an atmosphere of good will, (kind of like terraforming - turning the hostile air of cynicism and greed into sweet, breathable mercy). The realization that's been killing me these last few years is that there is no guarantee of return, in fact chances are good that kindness will never be returned. And that made me pretty salty because it's like I've been investing in a start-up that had already shut down. Think of those people in New Orleans who pumped money into hurricane insurance year after year only to have their home destroyed in a flood which is not something their policy covers. "Well then what good is all that money I've been paying for hurricane insurance?" That's how I felt about kindness and generosity.

So I get to the point where I realize that kindness and generosity are bad investments. I figured there were only a handfull of things I could do in response:

1. Stop being kind and generous. Switch to live and let die mode and just look out for number one.

2. Stop being kind and generous. Switch to being selfish and greedy instead.

3. Keep being kind and generous. Live with the frustration I'm feeling now, grin and bear it. Try not to go poastal.

4. Go poastal. Do not go gentle into that good night, go with a big fucking bang.

None of those options appealed to me because none of them were sustainable. Even option three, which is pretty much the way I've been living for years, was unappealing because it seemed pointless, stupid, absurd.

And then...

And then the skies parted, light broke through the darkness and the fog. The little bulb over my head flickered to life. I had a eureka moment.

I realized that I could be kind and generous DESPITE the fact that it was a bad investment, despite the fact that it offered no yield. I could be kind and generous knowing full well that it would likely never come back to me, that it offered no guarantee of good friends, good jobs, good wife, not even a good reputation. I could be kind and generous as an act of sheer rebellion, as a subversive act of open aggression against a greedy, needy world. I could be the leader of a rebel force of one. I could strike out with guerilla attacks of random kindness. I sow the seeds of a revolution that seeks to overturn a world stuck in the trap of consumerism - where everything is seen as a transaction with one party profiting and another suffering a loss, where even free car washes are not really free car washes, where we are defined by what we own rather than what we give a way.

Yes, it's futile. Yes, I'm just one little man and my revolution of kindness will go unnoticed, ignored, perhaps even exploited by those who will take advantage of my cause. I acknowledge all those things, but I don't care. If I am just one tiny flame of light in a dark world, so be it. If I can allow the Kingdom of God to trickle into this fallen world through my life, I think that's as noble a cause as any.

It's mad, but it's beautiful. I just hope I'm up to the task.

Sunday, November 27, 2005

122. how to make Randall happy

1. Make sure he eats breakfast.
I think breakfast is one of the most easily accessible sources of joy in my life. Unfortunately, it gets trumped by another even more easily accessible source of joy called sleep. Thus, when confronted with the choice of sleeping in or making breakfast, I choose sleep.

2. Show him, don't tell him, he's loved.
I've got lots of people who will tell me they love me. I appreciate and believe every one of them...well, most of them, but I won't go there. Unfortunately, to paraphrase Morpheus, no one can be told what love is. You have to experience it for yourself. So how do you show Randall you love him? Well, as far as I can tell, my love language is girlfriend. Now I know most of you can't speak to me in that language so you'll have to find some other way. Good luck.

3. Play him chess. Play well, but let him win...but don't let him know you let him win.
I bring up this last one because I've been in a generally lame mood this week. Even this morning, there was this Pigpen-style cloud surrounding me. So this morning, I bought myself breakfast from I Love Country Cafe in Kahala Mall and while I was waiting for it to cool down, I fired up the iBook and played me a game of Yahoo Chess. I ended up playing someone who was ranked somewhere in the mid-1300s (I have no idea why these 1300+ players hang out in the Beginner rooms, maybe they're the type who liked to bully nerds in high school). Now the average chess-playing chess player is ranked somewhere around 1200. At the time I had a rating somewhere in the mid 1100s which makes me somewhat of an embarrassment, which is why I usually play in the "Beginner" area, where I don't feel so out-gunned.

Anyway, I'm playing Mr. 1300 and he's busting some ninja chess techniques I've never seen before. He took control of the center pretty quick and was sending a pawn storm up my queen-side where I had castled (me likes castling queen-side). Anyway, I'm not exactly sure how I pulled it off, but I made a couple bold stabs, took some risks, sent up a pawn storm of my own up his king-side, traded off some pieces to poke holes in his defenses and before I knew it, I had nabbed his queen and got to a point where all he had was his king, some pawns and his rook. I still had my queen and my rook and after trading rooks, he resigned.

I couldn't believe it! Because I had beaten someone ranked in the 1300s, my rating got kicked up to the low 1200s, which means I don't look like a complete loser anymore - just an average loser. On top of that, my bad mood all but disappeared. It's hard to describe what a rush a victory like that feels like. And I know it's kind of pathetic to know that my mood can be altered by something as small as a chess game, but I'll take happy however it comes to me.

Friday, November 25, 2005

121. where've you been?

I haven't been posting a lot here because I've been working on my futile NaNoWriMo attempt. (For those who don't know what I'm talking about, see blobs 106-108 for an intro.) I say "futile" because there's no way I'm going to reach the required 50,000 word mark unless I make like Jack Nicholson in The Shining and just repeat the same line ad infinitum.

Looking back now, I can see that my style of writing is not a good fit for this event. This event is mostly geared towards plot-driven novels. The idea is to get the story out of one's head and onto the page. The pace of the event is based on this one fact - "plot happens." In other words, the very act of throwing words at the page will inevitably give birth to some kind of story.

Unfortunately, plot doesn't play a big part in the things I write. My main concern is not so much with story as it is with language. I like playing with words, trying to come up with new uses for old words. I also like to try and make small, ordinary events sound more epic. I mean the way I see it, things that may be small in the grand scheme of things are still huge when they happen to you. For example, couples have fights all the time and so in general, that's no big deal as far as movies and novels go, but if you're the one fighting with your boy/girlfriend then it's a huge, emotional deal. I want to treat these "small" events with just as much care and attention as other authors give to big, larger-than-life type stories.

Truth be told, I write this way because one, I like this kind of writing (Raymond Carver, Douglas Coupland, T.C. Boye's short stories). And two, I haven't lived a very epic life so I'm not very interested in epic stories. And three, in order to pull off big epic tales convincingly, you usually need to do a lot of research...and I'm lazy like that.

But in the end, it's the experimenting with words that keeps me writing.

Here's an example:

"He remembers the sound, a squishy thud, nothing like the concussive sound foley artists made for movie fight scenes. He remembers the surprise and then the shock in her eyes. He remembers how plastic, clay-like the side of her face felt as his fist poured into her flesh. He remembers the bones in his hand compressing, the newtonian exchange of forces. He remembers the follow through and the recoil as her head turned back towards him. And then there was the sound of her scream, short, sharp, piercing him, slicing straight through the center of him. And then the blood. And then the absurd realization of what he had just done." - from the chapter titled "Domestic"

See, that line about his fist pouring into her flesh - that's a way of describing a punch that I've never seen before. It's unorthodox, but it's still clear - it's a new way of describing a relatively common event but written in a way that feels fresh.

Okay, I just realized that I'm going on and on about my own writing, which is kind of an egotistical, megalomanical thing to do...which isn't like me, so I'll stop.

Originally, I just wanted to pass on the link to this novel thing I've been working on. It's call Anonycity and you can find it at anonycity.blogspot.com. Because it's a blog, the newest chapters are on the top. To really get a sense of the novel, you have to start at the bottom and work your way up.

A lot of it is sub-par, in my opinion, but some of it is salvagable. It's a work in progress so all the storylines are left dangling. But anyway, if you're wondering what I've been doing lately, take a look over there.

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving.

Monday, November 21, 2005

120. holding on/letting go

So last night I kind of went off about some of the frustrations I've been feeling about life and Christ and the awkward space between the two. I was sharing these things at a home church that a friend started up (more on that in another blog) and the people there were kind enough to listen and to try to help me out, and while I appreciated their attempts, it wasn't resolving anything for me.

On the drive home (Mililani to Makiki), I was ranting and raving at God. I hurled questions at him and waited, but there was no reply, at least none that I could discern.

Sleep that night was fitful, frustrating. I got up a bunch of times because one thing was coming up again and again and I didn't want to be thinking about this thing (sorry I can't be more specific...it's...aw, fuck it, I'll share). This thing was Orange. See, Orange goes to the home church, and as I was sharing my frustrations, she was the only one who seemed to know where I was coming from. And the thing that kills me is, why her? Why does she understand?

Anyway, Orange keeps making appearances in my dreams and I keep waking up because even in the unconscious soup of sleep, my brain is aware enough to bolt at the thought of Orange being any kind of answer to all the angst and frustrations I've been feeling lately.

Bottom line with Orange and I, I'm too scared to do anything and I don't trust God to pull me through. I know that's fucked up and it's the cowardly way out, but that's just where I'm at.

Okay...

Back to the original reason I started writing. This morning, I get up and I felt different. Not better, but different. I still had the same frustrations from last night but they were more blurry, harder to hold on to. Strange thing is, I wanted to hold on to them because I felt like the issues between God and I hadn't been resolved yet. I wanted to hold on to them until I received an answer.

And then I realized how futile that was. God doesn't have to give an account for what he does, not to anyone or anything, and certainly not to me. I was holding on to the frustrations because...maybe an analogy would be useful here. Have you ever had a problem with your car that only happened every once in a while? Like maybe the air conditioner makes some random shrieking noise, but it only happens a couple times per week. When it happens, you hate it and you push buttons and turn knobs to make it stop, but nothing works except for turning the air conditioner off but once you turn it on again, it's there again, and then the sound just goes away by itself. And you're happy because everything is working normally again, but you're frustrated because you know that if you were take the car in to the shop that the mechanics wouldn't be able to hear the sound and so they wouldn't know how to fix it and so you secretly wish the sound would come back and stay so you could get it fixed...but it doesn't, it just comes and goes as it pleases.

Well this morning, I wanted to hold on to the frustrations even though they had dissipated. I wanted to latch onto them, keep them close to me so that I could share it with friends in hopes of getting some kind of resolution. If I thought about it enough, I could conjure up some semblance of the angst, but it lacked the visceral, icicle-through-the-heart impact of the real thing. And after a couple attempts to hold on to the fake plastic version, I realized what I was doing and just let it go.

And then I decided to blog about it.

Enjoy.

Friday, November 18, 2005

119. thoughts on thinking

Frustrations have been weighing heavily on my mind this week. I won't go into details (not yet) but I was hanging out with a good friend of mine sharing these frustrations and he said something like, "yeah, you think about those big issues don't you?" And I kind of let it slip by me, but it did get me thinking...about thinking. What if I stopped worrying and thinking about all the things I think and worry about. What if I just go from day to day, not worrying about the widening political divide between liberals and conservatives, about the worldwide spread of consumeristic hedonism and the church's blatant adoption of that culture, about all the everyday injustices (mostly perceived rather than actual, I'll admit) that plague my life, about the problem of being thirty three and single.

What if I just stopped thinking about all of this and just didn't care about any of it. I mean it's not like I can really do anything about any of it, so why care? I mean, sure I have to live in a world and those problems will impinge upon me in more or less concrete ways from time to time, but for the most part, I could arrange my life in such a way as to minimize the intrusion. So why not? Why care?

Of course I can't just do that. These are things I care about and that makes up a part of who I am. I mean, what else would I think about? What else would I do if I wasn't thinking about these things? These are the things that I'm interested in, and I doubt I could content myself with just living apart from them. And it's a moot point anyway because it's not like I'm talking about a vase on my shelf that I can just throw out and be done with.

If I could just abandon this way of thinking, I think finding a girlfriend would be a lot simpler. See as it is right now, I'm looking for someone who shares my concerns, maybe not the exact same ones but someone who is thinking about the world and what's wrong with it - someone whose thoughts extend past the area immediately around them, someone who wants to see past the surface of things. Without this burden, I could simply woo the first pretty face I see and go about building a blissfully ignorant life full of non-weighty movies, cheezy reality television, and ultra-lame corporate-drone music. That doesn't sound so bad, does it?

Geeze...I don't know the term for it but I know that all of this is the kind of thinking that socialists would blame on the luxuries of the bourgeoisie. There's a verse in Billy Bragg's song, "Waiting For The Great Leap Forward," that goes like this:

It may have been Camelot for Jack and Jacqueline
But on the Che Guevara highway filling up with gasoline
Fidel Castro’s brother spies a rich lady who’s crying
Over luxury’s disappointment
So he walks over and he’s trying
To sympathise with her but he thinks that he should warn her
That the third world is just around the corner

What I mean to say is, I can think about these abstract problems in the abstract (I mean, ask me what I'm doing about any of it) because I have the time to do so - time which I have because of the comparatively cushy life I live (not that you're going to be seeing me on VH1's show, The Fabulous Life, anytime soon, but still, compared to most of my friends I've got it pretty good).

I don't know, I'd like to think that even if I did have a harder life (like if I had to work two jobs to make ends meet), that I'd still be thinking about these same things. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if one of the new problems I'd have is trying to find enough free time to think about the problems that really concern me.

...but you know what?

This is a really pointless blog (because I have the time to write a pointless blog, no doubt). In reality, maybe all I'm doing is doing something else so I don't have to write my novel (which is not doing well, btw). I know I'm not going to reach the 50,000 word count, but I'm still trying to write something everyday just to sort of fulfill the spirit of the event.

The novel is taking a darker turn (as evidenced by the chapter titled, "Domestic"...see blog 118) and as such, it's getting even harder to write because I'm not sure if I want to go there. On top of that, it still reads far more like a collection of short stories than a novel. I know I said I wasn't going to worry about that, but...but I do.

Okay, enough dicking around. Back to the "novel."

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

118. at last

Okay, NaNo update. I've pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I'm not going to be a successful participant this year. That doesn't mean I've given up, what it means is that I'm going to keep going with this mongrel that I've started but now I no longer have that ape on the back of my head telling me that I'm never going to make it to 50,000, that what I'm writing isn't a novel by any definition, that he wants another banana.

I know the point of the NaNo is to write as if to get to that 50,000 word count and that goal is supposed to motivate me to push beyond conventional critical barriers. I know, but in a backwards way, not thinking about the goal has freed me to enjoy writing again which encourages me to write more which is the only way I'm going to have any hope of finishing this thing. In other words, I'm still hoping to get there, I'm just not thinking about it all the time.

Anyway, I wanted to write and say that I've finally written a part of this novel thing that I'm happy with. The chapter is called "Domestic" and it's the first time since I started Anonycity that I felt like I was chasing down the story instead of dragging it out of my ass (see blog 117). It's not a pretty subject and I'm not sure where I'm going with it yet...but I like it and I need to gloat a bit because I'm tired of all the complaining I've been doing.

So head over to anonycity.blogspot.com and check out "Domestic" because I think it's pretty good. And damn, it feels nice to be able to say that.

And if you don't like it then read this.

Tee hee...

Friday, November 11, 2005

117. the NaNoWriMo is stupid (caution, potty mouth).

I'm groggy, depressed, frustrated, lonely, despondent. And I blame it all on this stupid NaNoWriMo nonsense. Most of the moody crap comes from not getting enough sleep. Now it's not like I'm up at all hours of the night writing, it's all the time I spend doing something else so that I don't have to write, all the while believing that the other thing I'm doing is being done so that I can write.

Here's what I mean. The other day I get to thinking, "gee, I'm going to be doing a lot of writing for this thing so I should really work on my computer workspace in my room." See, before this, the desk where I kept my iBook was cluttered, messy, chaos. So I get the bright idea to re-do the desktop. I go as far as buying a new keyboard so that I can elevate my iBook so that I'm more ergonomically correct. I clear out an entire shelf so that I can put my laptop up at eye level.

All the while I'm doing thins, in the back of my mind I'm thinking that I did perfectly well writing all kinds of blogs with the old setup. Why should this novel thing be any different? And the fact of the matter is, it's not different at all, and there was no reason for the desktop makeover except to keep myself from having to face the horror of my novel - I don't mean that I'm writing a horror novel, it's that I'm horrified at the thought of adding more to the steaming shit-pile of work that's supposed to be my novel at the end of the month.

See, here's the thing. I hate what I'm writing. More accurately, I really fucking hate what I'm writing. When I'm writing this stupid novel thing, all I can think of is what a fraud I am and how lame everything I'm coming up with is and how far behind I am. The NaNo has not been kind to my self-esteem because not only am I not hitting my word-count targets (not even getting close), I'm also hating just about everything I'm writing.

To be fair, when I go back and read what I've done, it's not as bad as I thought it was when I was writing it, but it's still far from any of the story things that I've posted here, and that's humbling and frustrating and it makes me feel like I don't know what the fuck I'm doing...which makes sense because I truly don't know what the fuck I'm doing.

See, when I've posted stories here, it's because I had some spark of inspiration that I wanted to chase down - and the best writing feels like that for me, like a chase. It's like there's this story dangling in front of me like a carrot and I chase after it by writing about where it leads me. And the faster I write, the faster the words come, and I just keep on writing until I either fall off my chair in exhaustion or I get the carrot.

The novel thing I'm writing? I'm trying to manufacture inspiration because I can't wait for it. And so even if I have no clue as to what I'm going to write about, I sit at the keyboard and throw down the first thing that comes. And then I go from there. Unfortunately, instead of chasing an elusive carrot, I feel like I'm dragging an elephant. Words don't come easy and so I pretty much just throw words on the page like some mad chimpanzee trying to crank out Shakespeare.

I can see why writers (and other artists) take to drink and drugs. It's not easy to quiet that nagging critical voice that tells you every word you write is lame, every sentence illiterate, every paragraph is shit and the overall work is something that should have stayed in the back of your useless, pathetic, talentless brain.

It's not good for my self-esteem. It's not good for my health. It's not good for my love life (your what?). But I'm pressing on. I may not make it to 50,000 but I'm also not going to give up on the effort until time runs out.

There's a part of me that believes that a crazy stunt like this has to have something to teach me. Successful writers always talk about the need to write something everyday. They say that writing is a discipline and that routine is the only thing that helps them get work done. And so I write. Even if I'm falling far short of my target word counts, I write. Even if a fucking illiterate third grader could come up with better material, I write. Even if the girl of my dreams is calling me on my cell phone longing to talk about culture and art and ideas and the problems of the Christian subculture over a lovely Italian dinner - even then, I write...fuck that, I'd dump the novel in the trash and grab dinner if that happened.

Maybe breakthrough will happen. Maybe at the end of it all, the discipline will mold me into something more like a writer than I was before the attempt. Maybe I'll catch pneumonia because the lack of sleep has weakened my immune system. Maybe vampire butterflies will crawl out of my arse.

And speaking of sleep...

Tuesday, November 08, 2005

116. screw the rules (caution, small kine potty mouth)

Okay, the NaNo is kicking my ass and so it's time to take the gloves off, throw the referee out of the ring, and go from civilized match to no-holes-bared street brawl.

See, here's the thing. When confronted with the word, "novel," I think of something grand, noble, sophisticated. I also think of something whole, a large body of words about one thing. With these thoughts in mind, I set about the NaNo with high hopes and lofty aspirations. "Delusions of grandeur" would not be an inappropriate or inaccurate accusation.

From the beginning I had this idea to write little short story things like I've posted here (blog 43, 57, 61, 64, 67, 71, and 95), only these stories would all interconnect and they would make up pieces of a larger structure, a meta-narrative. I also had this crazy (aka stupid) idea about writing without names, creating a world where characters were known only by their pronouns. It was supposed to symbolize the anonymous world we live in, it was supposed to make the characters more accessible, more relatable. Instead, it made them...well, anonymous, impersonal, and hard to latch onto.

Well no more. I don't give a shit anymore about the lofty term, "novel." I'm ditching the connected-short-stories idea and just writing these damn stories - if they connect, they'll have to do that on their own, I'm not helping them along. I'm also ditching the only-pronouns rule and using names where/when I want. Also, I'm not above using my characters as soap-boxes to rant about topics that I'm mad about (see the last entry in my novel's blog titled, "Church"), even if that's all they ever do.

In short, I'm writing as if reaching 50,000 words by the end of November is the only thing that matters, as if ending up with the first draft of a "novel" is optional, as if nothing matters but reaching that arbitrary word count.

I'm getting desperate here, and maybe that's part of the point of joining the NaNo. Worst case scenario (actually, second-worst case...worst case scenario is me not reaching 50,000 words): I successfully complete NaNoWriMo and the stories don't connect at all and for all intents and purposes, I've written a short story collection, not a novel. Well, so the hell what? On November 30th, I'll write a new first chapter that reads, "a guy sat down to write a bunch of stories, and they went like this." and then I'll write a new last chapter that reads, "and then the guy stopped writing." And that will tie everything else together and that will make it a novel about a guy writing a bunch of stories.

And if I make it that far, I'm probably going to be suffering from lack of sleep which will make me a twitchy, pissy individual so you probably don't want to be the one accusing me of not really writing a novel. I've fired a shot gun before and I can do it again (of course, most of the clay pigeons I was firing at made a clean getaway, but I'm deadly accurate at close range...say, two feet).

"Hey, um, Randall? This is a nice blog and all, but shouldn't you be writing your novel?"

BLAM!!!

"Never mind."

Monday, November 07, 2005

115. drowning in words

Someone throw me a lifeline, I'm drowning in a sea of unwritten words!

According to the typical NaNoWriMo schedule, I should have been somewhere around 10,000 words on Sunday. Well, it's Sunday and I'm at the 4500 mark.

I feel like I'm captain of a sinking ship and I just can't bail water fast enough. I know the reason is I'm looking at every bucket-full of water to see if it's free of impurities instead of just throwing it all overboard, quality be damned (that's what editing is for).

It's not easy turning off the internal critic and just writing like a banshee, but if I'm to have any hope of getting anywhere near 50,000 words, I'm going to have to tie that bastard critic to the mast like his sailors did to Odysseus when sailing past the Sirens. (what's up with all the boating imagery?)

Blah, writing is dumb.

(My (not so) novel attempt.)

Thursday, November 03, 2005

114. good news for my NaNoWriMo attempt!

I finally reached my daily quota of words...

for Tuesday...

today (that would be Thursday).

113. life goes on

And so it goes -
over and over again
we lash out at the obstacles
between us
and what we desire.

We bruise
and we burn
and the walls mock us,
taunt us, ultimately
disregard us.

But life goes on,
and on,
and on. . .
and so on.

Wednesday, November 02, 2005

112. it's begun

Okay, so the National Novel Writing Month has begun.

My daily word quota? 1700 words. Today's count? Barely cracked the 850 mark.

The night before, I only had about three hours of sleep so that's my excuse.

Anyway, if you want to see the dreck I've been producing, you can see it at http://anonycity.blogspot.com/

...I am so screwed.

Tuesday, November 01, 2005

111. on Halloween...

I'm not a fan of Halloween. I mean I think it's an interesting holiday. I don't do the Christian boycot thing because...well, I won't go there.

I know Halloween is some people's favorite time of year. Most of these people say they like the holiday because they can dress up as something they've always wanted to be or they can put aside their everyday personality and be someone/something completely different.

None of those reasons appeal to me. Even back when I was a kid.

See, here's the deal. I have a hard enough time figuring out who I am when I'm just trying to be myself. Trying to think of someone else to be sounds like far too much work.

...although there is one thing I'd like to be for Halloween if I could figure out how to pull it off: a boyfriend.