There's a bit of magic in everything, and some loss to even things out.
--Lou Reed

Finally, I thought, finally she's arrived. I looked her in the eyes and let go her wrist, murmuring something about modes of alienation and the future. I don't know why I was holding her wrist in the first place, and the way I let it go... I felt uncomfortable so I kept talking; talking about whatever came into my head, because to stop talking, to exist with her in a vacuum without words would definitely illuminate something more powerful than I was willing to comprehend at that hour of the morning. And I knew somewhere in the back of my head that she wanted desperately for me to stop talking, but I wouldn't. I called her bluff, knowing she would never say something as forward as "shut up and makeout with me," as some who'd come before her had. I suppose that's really the most violent I've ever been. The most passively and non-physically violent, anyway. Didn't think I was capable of it, but there it was. And the truth is I have no idea why I didn't stop talking. I get this prickly feeling, in the middle of the day, usually, that I'm sublating myself, denying myself whatever chance I have of understanding who I am, because understanding something like that is always painful. I don't think it has to be, but when it gets that essential, when you're dealing with the innermost core of your personhood, or whatever, it can hurt like a bitch to realize you're living in bad faith. So it seems that understanding is painfully necessary, but not necessarily painful, or something. And so I consistently choose not to think about it, because while understanding yourself might be painfully necessary, and not necessarily painful, you can get along without doing so for at least a little while. Something I've happened upon recently is the epiphany that the unexamined life, while being somewhat less noble than spending your days in some cottage next to a pond, is relatively less conducive to gastritis than confronting your own impotence in the face of the oppressive 'other' that Sartre always liked to talk about. I think the dress she was wearing was navy, but it might've been black. I'm always horrible at that distinction. When I finally ran out of steam, she led me back to my room. The French call an orgasm le petit morte, the little death. I think I've unconsciously tied sex to death my entire life. Leaving that morning without a word was a hard thing to do, but I get the impression now, looking back, that it was easier than staying would have been. But I can't know that. At least not for certain.