Back by popular demand. My progress on the display. I must tell you, I will be glad when the show is over and I can take this down.
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I don't deceive myself into thinking I understand Ava completely. Straight answers are not a valuable resource. So I rely on what can be observed and gleaned through conversations. Money is her biggest driving force. Financial freedom is significant to her. Retiring early is one of her biggest goals.
Ava likes the sex and traveling with me. She likes the fact being with me comes with no emotional or implied constraints, but everything Ava does is out of self-interest. Keeping that in mind, lately, whenever I clean up the spare bathroom, I notice she has left more of her belongings behind.
Partially, that is just her personality, Ava would deny she is nesting, but it is uncharacteristic of someone who thinks things will end sometime soon. This week she left behind a hair dryer and more products. She has more soaps, lotions, and hygiene supplies in that bathroom than I have in my own bathroom.
This is her subconscious way of marking her territory and laying claim to me. I don't mind. I'd be more concerned if she was taking things away.
Oddly, I realize there would be no benefit to having her move in. Instinctively, I know it would not make anything better and would come with more headaches. I like Ava. I like spending time with her and enjoy being around her, but it is a case of too much of a good thing.
I have been making some good progress on my Lego display. This weekend I will get out and do some biking.
Yesterday, I woke early, despite being up late into the night with Ava. I let her sleep long while I went to the loft to work. The night cold the house without me having to turn on the air conditioner, but the construction crew across from me were making a racket pouring basements.
When I went back into the bedroom to close the doorwall to dampen some of the sounds, I noticed Ava was awake, checking her phone. "You're not sleeping!"
I slid back into bed and rolled her over. Ava didn't protest as I started kissing my way down her torso. Things proceeded as usual from there. After, we decide to go for a walk on the path around the nearby municipal building. We took a copy of my book and placed it in the free library along the trail.
The morning sky is overcast. It makes for a pleasant walk. The path is a short trail along the perimeter of our township municipal building. It is not crowded and has some lovely scenery. Ava takes some nature videos while we walk.
"You don't seem like yourself," I tell Ava.
Ava mentions being depressed and finding it hard to get out of bed in the morning. She says she is plagued by irrational thoughts of feeling that she doesn't deserve things like success and happiness. It reminded me of one of the last in-person conversations Billie and I had when Billie said she would never be happy.
Thinking about it now, I feel those things are creations of our expectations. Today I am happy. Two years ago, I would have been unhappy in the same place in life. The only thing that has changed is my own perspective.
The Lego project is proceeding on schedule. I took a break the last two days to clean the house and organize my workspace. Max wants to sell his car and get a different one. Part of me agrees, but I don't have the stomach to start looking for a decent replacement. I am letting him do the leg work and will see what he finds. I just paid $5000 for his next semester of college. I am not looking forward to spending more on another car. I would instead take Ava to Hawaii.
Ava came over last night wearing high-waisted black jean shorts and a pastel pink bralette. She looked pretty. I slipped my hand into the waistband of her shorts and pulled her in for a kiss. I showed Ava some of my progress on the display before we settled down on the couch to chat.
The more the evening progressed, the more I noticed Ava seemed preoccupied. She has a job interview today. That is part of the reason, but Ava is also not where she wants to be in life. She is dreading her thirtieth birthday coming up in November.
She stated she had nothing big planned to mark the occasion.
"I had the perfect trip planned," I tell her. "You went and spoiled it."
Ava is a mash-up of contradictions. For instance, she wants to buy her boyfriend something for their three-month anniversary but still refuses to call his house home or do her laundry there. Ava says she needs to be with someone with a high libido but then indicated she stopped initiating sex with the boyfriend because he refused to have sex with her during her period. She still claims our arrangement is the one good thing she has going.
Ava is lying on her belly in the center of the bed. She is naked except for the teal-colored tee shirt of mine she always borrows when she stays the night.
"Do you think I should be with someone who accepts me for who I am or someone who challenges me.?" She asks.
I roll over onto her. Sitting on her thighs, I begin to massage her back while I try to formulate an answer.
"I don't think it is that simple. You should be with someone that accepts you. You don't want to be with someone trying to change you. You should have that lifeline of acceptance to fall back on, but you should also have someone you can grow with."
I think she was saying that this current guy takes care of her and puts up with her quirks, but he doesn't challenge her or help her accomplish her goals.
And then there is the biggest contradiction of all: she still comes to see me. I no longer bring it up anymore. It all makes sense the more I get to know her. I am unsure if she is self-sabotaging her relationship or if it is just her overall inability to commit. If I had to guess, I would say it is a combination of the two that keeps her justifying her actions.
Seeing me makes her happy, and she doesn't want to lose that. I don't think she would see breaking up with this boyfriend as a loss of the same significance. Which reaffirms my belief in not getting into a serious relationship.
Now, this is a wizard's tower. I finally received all the pieces needed to put the final version together. I even incorporated a witch's hut in the back corner. This is going to become a Lego until the show. IT seems like I don't have time for much else.
I accomplished more this weekend than I set out on my project and still made it out for a bike ride on Saturday. My biggest problem is a lack of specific colors and poor planning. I never planned for the display to be this big. I am struggling to expand it to fill the two tables respectably and keep artistic interest.
I have a concept for a tall wizards tower for the back corner. I am pleased with the appearance. I am waiting for some parts to arrive to put it together this week. The final result should be taller than the tower in the front. Right now, it is in sections.
This will be the top, but the actual Tower will be almost twice the height.
My building table, which is 8' x 4', is not big enough to give me space to build. I guess that is a good thing considering I need to fill 8' x 5', but there is a lot of empty area in the back, as you can see.
I think my best solution, and the one I have been thinking about is to have the edges more organic and jagged. There is still plenty to do and only 67 days left. I am feeling the pressure.
But tell me, did the wind sweep you off your feet?
Did you finally get the chance to dance along the light of dayWell, much like the Psychic predicted, work has been busy. I knew Summer would be busy, but to top it off, I have been covering for two people on vacation. When I get home, I am either exhausted or working on the Leg project.
Last night, I stayed up past midnight. I completed the road along the front, adjusted the mountain behind the cottages so that it hinges open to see the dragon inside, and started working on concepts for the second large tower. I have decided it will be a wizard's tower, but I am still working out the details for windows and a door. I am playing with the concept of having a spiral stair running along the outside. I like the way the stair look, but my concept tower is built in the wrong colors, and I have to wait for the pieces I ordered last night to arrive.
Over the weekend, Tinkerbell, Tech, and I went to the Airshow at Selfridge Air Force base. It was a lovely day but extremely hot for walking around miles of asphalt. The base is only three miles from my house, and the event is free, so it was well worth the time.
I have pictures of all the above but no time to upload them.
Tinkerbell and Tech want me to go kayaking with them on the Rifle River in August. So far, I have declined. Tink is not happy with my choice. She should understand why. The last time I was there kayaking was the day Billie and I broke up. I found out she cheated on me the night before, held back the whole day for the trip's sake, and then confronted her that evening.
Going back there would just stir up bad memories. Besides, the Rifle River is a party scene. Most people don't kayak. They use inner tubes and allow the current to take them downstream while they drink and party. I didn't like that last time.
Well, I have been accepted to display at this year's Brickworld in Detroit. The event is actually held in Novi, a city in the Detroit Suburbs where Tinkerbell and Tech live. The show is on September 24th and 25th. I am very excited, but I have a lot of work to do. I will probably end up rebuilding certain areas while increasing the overall size of the model and adding some height to the back portion.
I have added a counter on the side to remind me I have to get moving if I am going to finish in time. So many things to consider, including transporting the model across town. This is all new for me.
"I should write a book," I tell Ava. A female-centric fantasy novel like Fifty Shades of Grey. Ava wholeheartedly agrees. She feels like she is already living the fantasy.
After giving it some thought. I've come to doubt that I could not reach my target audience because I am a man. I think women and men write differently. My book would land somewhere in the middle and fall on deaf ears.
I feel like I would be better off writing about what I know. Somewhere between passing on knowledge and experience. The self-help out there for men seems to fall into two categories. On one side they say focus on money, muscles, and game. On the other, there is the MGTOW (men going their own way) who give up on dating. I feel there are many guys out there like me-- stuck in the middle. Neither of these is a viable solution for average guys in their forties and fifties in today's dating market.
I have no answers, but I do have experience, the desire to write, and some incite I think is valuable. Even if it turns into another cautionary tale.
The new book would start out with this quote:
A man wants what a woman has—sex. He can steal it (rape), persuade
her to give it away (seduction), rent it (prostitution), (or) lease it over the
long term (marriage). —Andrea Dworkin.
I wanted to expound on this further, but it is turning into a busy week.
Ava came over and spent the night Thursday. She arrived at 9:30 pm, took a shower, and crawled into bed with me. We started having sex in the bedroom, but I pulled her down to the living room at one point, and we continued on the couch. We spooned together downstairs for a while before returning to the bedroom.
We talked late into the night. Ava would like to get away with me again, though her schedule keeps getting more complicated. I have to keep reminding her of this fact. She has compromised a lot of things for her current relationship. She says the good outweighs the bad. This is probably true, although the more she becomes financially stable and independent, the less she will need what is appealing, and the bad will become more glaring over time.
I wouldn't be able to explain this to her, but I think she sees that instinctively. Currently, she is trying to have the best of both worlds. Being fully committed is hard when you have options, and Ava is not short on options. She talks as if she wouldn't be too phased if she got caught and her relationship ended. I believe that to be true.
At some point, her desire for long-term security will outweigh her desire for thrills and adventure, but I don't see that happening soon.
I am reading a new book, The Ape that Understood the Universe. I am only a third of the way through, but it is very good. One of my first takeaways from the book is natural selection has engineered humans, like every other species on the planet, to procreate the genes we carry. Not the species but the genes. I think modern humans outlive our usefulness in that.
I also believe in the future, if our species survives and continues to advance, we will become more asexual and reproduce through genetically engineered replication. The evolution of humans will become more rapid. It has taken millions of years to get here, but our technology is outpacing evolution.
We are currently out of sink with our biological imperative. We will either outgrow the biological imperative or be thrown back by some cataclysmic event. I am just speculating. I don't think I will be around to see either outcome.
This week will be slow at work. Most of my customers and coworkers are on vacation. I decided not to take time off. Hopefully, I will have a worthwhile destination to use my vacation time on later this year. One can only hope. Otherwise, I like using it at the end of the year.
I reached out to Brickworld last month. They hold Lego shows all over the US. The upcoming Detroit show is in September. You can display by invitation only. I wanted to know the criteria and whether my creation would be accepted.
I received an email back today. Local exhibitors need to be able to cover two eight-foot tables. People traveling to the show from further away need to cover four eight-foot tables. My current model covers one eight-foot table, but I can continue to expand it. There isn't a lot of time between now and September, though.
I will submit images of what I have completed, and we will see what happens. I have seen other displays on par with my own at previous shows. I think I have a decent chance of being accepted. Usually, Lego clubs get together and build larger displays. It takes a lot of Lego to cover two to four eight-foot tables. Still, now I know the requirements. At the very least, I can submit again next year.
It was a full weekend. Friday, I managed to get someone out to fix the air conditioner. $300 later, it was up and running. We also picked up Max's car from the shop. That was another $3300. An expensive start to a long weekend. After getting all that out of the way, I took the twins' presents and out for ice cream for their birthday.
Saturday, Max was supposed to come over early and help me swap the Chinese knock-off steel bumper on the Gladiator for the original factory bumper. The steel number is starting to rust around the blot holes and needs to be repainted. I am unsure if I will end up repainting or scrapping it and getting something else.
By noon Saturday, I had the bumper switch, the Jeep washed, the top and the doors off, all before Max woke. I was ready for a nap after that. Later in the evening, Sam and I went to dinner in the Jeep. After eating, we went to several stores in search of pasta noodles. Alexis planned to make macaroni salad for a Fourth of July party and needed four boxes. I guess macaroni salad is popular on the holiday. The selves were bare.
Sunday, I headed across town to go biking with Tinkerbell and Tech. It was our first ride of the year. Tinkerbell wanted to get some miles in. I suggested being flexible on our route and starting at Kensington Park. That would allow us options for extending or shorting our ride, but Tink didn't like that idea.
We started from their home in Novi and rode into South Lyons for lunch. On our return trip, we took the cut leading to Kensington Park. We rode to Kensington but ended up riding through Island Lake instead. Island Lake is a state park that borders Kensington Park. I think it is less crowded and more scenic than Kensington.
The temperature was in the mid-eights. We rode a total of forty-six miles and were out all day. It was exhausting. I said this before, anything over thirty miles gives you a diminished return. It is better to ride for one hour every day than five hours in one day.
Sam, Alexis, and I went to a Four of July party the next day. One of their childhood friends is a famous former major league baseball player. His wife has a large family that still lives in the area, so they have never moved. They live in a subdivision a few miles away from Alexis.
In the large subdivision, a group of twenty homes surround a small man-made lake. The houses are huge million-dollar homes packed close together on tiny lots. They have the party every year. I have only attended once before. I usually know ten people, including the host, but I am not big on crowds, and this party is pretty big.
They serve grilled fillets and chicken instead of hamburgers and hot dogs. I would call it affiance at its finest, but the hosts are the nicest down-to-earth people. The houses on the lake chip in for a professional fireworks display. Last night the fireworks went on for thirty minutes. The finale was a combination of white bangs and a golden shower of sparks that filled the sky and rained down dangerously on us.
