AdNonSense

A while ago, I made the decision. I was going to monetize this blog. I figured, hey, since I have been griping about my frustrations and tiny heartaches, bleeding my heart as it were, I might as well get something for my troubles. So I filled out the online registration form and submitted it. Forty-eight hours, they tell me before ads will appear on my page.

A few hours later, I received an email from Google AdSense, they’ve rejected my application on the basis of unsuitable content. I stared at those two inconspicuous, albeit, loaded words—unsuitable content. What do they mean about unsuitable? Clicking on the link, these are what Google considers unsuitable:

1. Pornography, adult or mature content
2. Violent content
3. Content related to racial intolerance or advocacy against any individual, group or organisation
4. Excessive profanity
5. Hacking/cracking content
6. Gambling or casino-related content
7. Illicit drugs and drug paraphernalia content
8. Sales of beer or hard alcohol
9. Sales of tobacco or tobacco-related products
10. Sales of prescription drugs
11. Sales of weapons or ammunition (e.g. firearms, firearm components, fighting knives, stun guns)
12. Sales of products that are replicas or imitations of designer goods
13. Sales or distribution of coursework or student essays
14. Content regarding programs which compensate users for clicking ads or offers, performing searches, surfing websites or reading emails
15. Any other content that is illegal, promotes illegal activity or infringes on the legal rights of others

I’m certain this blog does not in any way advocate or practice items number 2, 3, 5-15. As for items 1 and 4, well they are contestable. Yes, I have used an occasional cuss word here and there, in fact, I’ve used swear words for a total of three times, four times if you count that instance when I substituted an asterisk for the “U” in f*cker. But I hardly consider three times (or four) as excessive.

With regards to the first item, see, I don’t think my entries qualify as pornographic at all. An entry on kissing, does not, make a site pornographic. They are intended for a mature audience, because, obviously people of a certain maturity would only be able to appreciate and understand the things a grown up person such as I am is going through.

In fact, if I am to be allowed to blow my own horn, I think these entries make for good writing and entertainment. Not to mention a fine example of a neurotic mind. My family and friends concur.

So it bothers and annoys me that Google AdSense should reject my application, and on what basis? And with not much of an explanation that could truly suffice at that. As far as my content goes, they are assured of originality.

Sure, they talk about sensitive matters, i.e. human relationships, and can be indelicate at times, but hardly anything that warrants a thumbs down from AdSense. Are we suddenly living in the Dark Ages where a mere slip of propriety can be considered no less than scandalous? This simply begs the question: is Google AdSense the new morality police?

The truth, the whole truth and anything but the truth

I take the word, friendship, deathly serious. Even in romantic partnerships, I believe that it is quite imperative that you maintain a certain friendship with the one you’re with. Because when all else falls away, including love, you at least have that one thing you can hold on to. And though, I have never been entirely successful in being friends with the people I’ve been with, I could honestly say that I’ve made sincere efforts to do so, no matter if I failed at it.

His case was no different. In what was my previous attempt to break things off between us, he offered the proverbial olive branch, and asked if we could be at least friends. I said yes, and although, things had not turned out to be simply friendly between us, the offer was made, and I had accepted.

So it hurts to actually realize that it was an empty offer. Maybe in my naïveté, I thought things would be far simpler if we were friends. And because I had counted that maybe since he wouldn’t have to try winning me and luring me in anymore, it would be easier for him to be honest and open with me.

But I guess, honesty, like a lot of things exist in varying degrees. And yes, inasmuch as he tried to be honest about a few things in his life, he wasn’t being completely so. C asked me if I actually expected him to be honest, given the circumstances we’re in. I said no, I didn’t expect him to tell me everything. After all, everyone is entitled to a few secrets, but not that. Definitely, not that. It’s almost unforgivable. I reasoned, “it wasn’t the secret and the lie that makes me so angry, it’s the fact that he had to keep it from me that really makes it hard for me to wrap my head around it.”

I figured, if we were to be friends, don’t I deserve to know even the basic facts about him? Because if I can’t trust him to be honest with even the most basic of facts, how can I even trust him to be honest about the bigger stuff?

I wanted to confront him, and demand an explanation. I wanted to know the reason and the motivation. “But you already know why,” C said. “If he had been upfront about the whole business, would you have even given him a chance?” she asked. “I wouldn’t know,” I said, “Because I never had a chance to make that kind of choice.” All I know is that the truth would have been far better than this.

Life is not at all black and white, I know that, but it can get pretty muddy. And lines are not always drawn or etched in stone, they are sometimes drawn on the sand, and they get blurry. And these are things I constantly realize the longer I’m with him.

I’m nowhere near condoning what he has done, and as far as I am concerned, he is guilty unless proven innocent. I have yet to hear the full story, or his version at least. I just hope I get to hear it sooner than later. I don’t know for how long I can also pretend and maybe lie that I don’t know what I know.

In the far, twisted reaches of my mind, however, I try to find comfort in this thought: “Maybe I should actually feel flattered. He was willing to deny and lie what may be the most important thing in his life, just so he can be with me.” But of course, this could be just my narcissism talking. Or simply the lie I tell myself to make me feel better.

A Bit of Therapy

“This is therapeutic,” he said after pulling away from a long hard kiss. “Great. You think I’m therapy,” I said calmly but not without a hint of exasperation and dejection. But in my head, I was screaming, “I’m therapy?! I’m fucking therapy?!” This is hardly the thing I want to be described as, hardly the thing I would like to describe this thing we’re doing. Couldn’t he have just gone to the spa? Or a shrink?

I don’t get him. At all. I’ve been trying to figure him out, maybe as much as he’s been trying to figure me out. But at least, I’ve proven him (and myself) I’m actually strong enough and willing enough to actually take a chance on him. He, on the other hand, is being a pussy about the whole thing. And this is what actually drives me mad. He blows hot and cold, always shifting, never staying still. And he wonders why I’m defensive around him.

I know I should blow him off already, just as I vowed to do for the last couple of times. But I am an addict, and he is my drug. He’s bad for me but I can’t seem to get enough of him. Heck, I can’t seem to stay away. Every time I see him, I try to compose myself and tell myself that this time I won’t get affected by him, that this time, I can bravely face him and feel nothing. But every time, all my resolve melts away, and I literally feel weak in the knees. He fucking makes me swoon. How Victorian is that?

The only consolation I get though is that he, too, can’t stay away. No matter how much I push him away he finds a way to come back to me, making a real effort to connect, to reach out. “You’re irresistible,” he said as he stroked me that night. But I wonder if there’s really anything between us besides heat, if he feels anything real besides what he gives me.

S. tells me I should just take things as it is, to simply enjoy the moments I’m with him. But I can’t be content with that. I need to know. I need to understand the things he do, and more importantly the things he doesn’t do. For if everything we do is an act of self-definition, how do I then define him? How do I define myself against him?

“I’ll see you,” he says as he got off the car. “Yes, in August,” I replied back. He held the door open, silent. I wanted to be off-handed about it. I wanted it to hurt him. “I’ll see you when I get back…in a few weeks,” he trails off. I smiled. It was a small victory, to know he still wanted to see me. I won, this round at least. I just wonder, in this game we’re playing, does anyone really ever win?

For M: In Requiem

It’s been two years since you have gone, no hope of return. Maybe I will see you again, but not soon, I hope. There is much that I need to do and experience. With you I have laughed the loudest, and maybe cried one of my hardest.

Soon after you left, I imagined I was talking to your ghost, and said, “I could have loved you forever.” And you replied, “You already do.”

You will never be forgotten. And wherever you are, smile for me.

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone
W. H. Auden

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

Blind as Love

I am going blind, or at least I thought I was. For months now, my eyes have been giving me problems. I had initially attributed it to my contact lenses, and the fact that I haven’t been sleeping as well I wanted, and those two together, well, they are quite a recipe for some major eyestrain. But it was turning out to be some really horrible eyestrain. Not only were my eyes almost constantly red, and tearing up, but it began to have this really grainy feel, like someone had just poured and embedded sand onto my eyes. Add to that, my vision started getting cloudy as if a heavy fog had descended all around me. And it didn’t make any difference whether I was wearing any corrective lenses or not.

It had gotten embarrassingly bad last week while I was having lunch with mystery man (see previous entries), um…let’s just call him Hugh. And he asks, “what’s with the (dark) glasses?” I told him it was all red from eyestrain, and proceeded to take my glasses off. What I didn’t know, as I was to find out later on when I visited the ladies’ room, my eyes were R-E-D, big time. I looked like 1) a woman possessed; 2) high on drugs; or 3) the devil himself. But not only were they red, my eyes actually hurt.

A good friend, who, I have a sneaking suspicion, is a hypochondriac, offers me a diagnosis: “I think you have glaucoma.” I looked up the symptoms, and I do have some (or most) of the symptoms. So…that explains it…but wait, what do you mean, it can lead to permanent loss of sight? And there is nothing I can absolutely do from going blind?!

I panicked, I couldn’t breathe. The prospect of not seeing anything at all, much less myself (yes, I am a narcissist) was something I simply could not accept. It scared me the living daylights out of me.

But there is hope, since I have only self-diagnosed, maybe the doctor would tell me otherwise. And he did. It was…keratitis. In layman’s terms, my corneas were badly inflamed, and it was causing all my symptoms, including the cloudy vision. Apparently, I was the fourth person that week to seem him for the exact same condition. It seems to be the de rigueur as far as eye infections go, and my wearing of contact lenses had only helped to worsen it.

The doctor says it takes a while for this condition to go away, six to eight weeks at the minimum. I can’t wear my contacts, meaning I get to play hot librarian everyday (I wish!). And I get to slather about a mountain-load of gels and drops on my eyes…nice. But yeah, I guess this is much better than the alternative, so I’m just gonna have to suck it up.

The most frustrating part in all of these is that my condition didn’t have to reach this state if the first doctor I had gone to when my symptoms first presented itself actually diagnosed me right. But no, there wasn’t anything wrong with my eyes, he said, short of telling me that everything was just in my head. Stupid f*cker.

And I guess, this is my point. We are what we do, and vice versa. We could be doctors, writers, waiters, or what have you, and if we couldn’t live up to that function, and be really crappy about it, then it doesn’t really tell much about us, does it?