i finally have a few free moments to put up an entry here. its shocking how long its been since the last update. i am still alive, any reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated. my thanks to those who have inquired. your concern does help, even if i am too tardy in acknowledging it. school is over for the summer, and that is a big relief. and my relationship with the fair ephelba is on more promising ground. yes, we are still together, and still getting married. we even picked a date: june 21. it is a fine date; the first day of summer, the longest day of the year, and just over a year since we first 'met.' it was by email, through the some personals ads. i had no idea. who would, really.

ephelba and i have been through so much. one thing we didn't realize was that ephelba had become more depressed over the winter. ephelba already copes with her depression well with medication that is really effective. but in late december and january, she needed more. and we didn't know that. we could have avoided a lot of anguish if we had. i know that i will never miss a clue like that ever again. we didn't get this addressed until april. way to long a time. too long for me to have to live with someone who was asleep, except when it was absolutely necessary not to be. someone who had no sex drive, and no ability to become aroused, and little extra energy to do anything anyway. it was an incomprehensible, disturbing and hurtful time to go through. i don't recall it without pain.

it made my (old) diary title a sad mockery. even though ephelba did try. she would have sex with me even though she didn't feel in the mood. but knowing that she wasn't into it, and her inevitable lack of enthusiasm made the whole thing little more than a physical relief, more than a little uncomfortable and weird . i doubt that my words can convey how despairing ephelba's behavior was to me. the changes in our relationship were a huge sad loss for me. we had figured that the problem was ephelba's chronic fatigue syndrome, and we were already doing everything possible to treat that. except for the really nutty or really expensive things. its just that even when you know, or think you know, why your lover no longer wants to make love, or even kiss, the thought that this person no longer loves you is not far behind. nagging. even though its not true. even though she tells me she loves me. even though she is there for me, and listens to me, and cries, telling me that she doesn't want to hurt me. this helped, but not for long. i wanted to be wanted, and that just wasn't going to happen.

i would get mad. i broke stuff, kicked a door and bruised my right big toe. thought the nail might come off, bit it didn't. now i use sturdier shoes when kicking crap. (birkenstocks are not meant for that kind of abuse.) ephelba would get scared and avoid me. i would feel like a jerk. later we would make up, but the underlying tension, the nagging thought was never relieved. i remember one night, asking ephelba if she still wanted to marry me. i told her that it was ok if she didn't. that people change, that it might have seemed like a good idea at the time, but it was ok if she was having second thoughts.

ephelba got irritated at this. she said she was tired of telling me that she loved me and wanted to marry me, and wondered why i didn't believe her. i told her that i just wanted her to be sure, that i didn't want to be in a bad marriage again. ( this would be my second marriage, and i really want things to go well. ) then ephelba started crying, and asked me not to leave her. i told her i never would. she had thought all my questions were all about some major second thoughts i was having. we talked for a long time. until about 5 am. school was hell the next day. ephelba went to see her doc the next week and got some more meds, one that has a side effect of increasing the libido (i.e. wellbutrin). and she got a job, too. this also helps. we are slowly recovering. the medication helps ephelba's depression, but not her chronic fatigue. she is as tired as ever, it sucks as much as ever, and i still don't know what else to do.

so enough drama already. does anyone else play video games, on the game cube? i've been playing 'the legend of zelda: ocarina of time' and it is a great game. it was a special release, a reissue of an older game for the nintendo 64 system. we got it because we reserved a copy of the newest zelda game, windwaker. it was like christmas, going to get the windwaker, and they hand us ocarina of time, too. i play this game until my eyes burn. i am just over halfway through with the game, and i'm a little sad knowing that the end is nearer. i plan to savor this last part slowly, deliberately, consciously, drawing it out, even. so why is it legend of zelda, when the game is all link out there busting his hump to save hyrule from evil? that is just so wrong. but after ocarina of time, i plan to tackle metroid prime, another seriously cool game. and then eternal darkness, a game about which i know very little. and then, of course, wind waker

the best thing i've done lately is to start a terrarium of carnivorous plants. they are pretty cool, these guys. i've got five plants: a butterwort, it catches gnats and the like with really small sticky wads on its leaves; a sundew, it can catch larger bugs- its sticky wads are at the ends of short hairs; two venus fly traps, everyone knows this one; and a purple pitcher plant, this one captures insects with an intoxicating fluid and a slippery tubes the bugs fall down into. these are all bog plants, and have taken to eating bugs to supplement the poor soil they find themselves in. i don't even have to feed them. i just put them out on the back porch, and they catch what they need. and in the winter, they will go dormant and not need food. i have fed the venus fly traps, its just too much fun. even cooler, on one of the traps, is the wing of some unfortunate sweat bee that is sticking out from the jaws of (its) death. almost got away. is there a lesson here?