I've been in a really weird place these past couple weeks. With finals around the corner and transferring to a new university in my near future I've been under a fair amount of stress. I've been using this as an excuse as to why I haven't been making the best decisions.
Two weeks ago is when the problems first started, I was at work when I got a text from a girl I dated way back in high school. She asked how I was doing and if I wanted to hang out later that week. This wouldn't be as awkward as it was except for the fact that I haven't spoken to her in over two years and throughout our conversation she hinted that she wanted to get back together with me. I don't know why I said yes to her and agreed to go to the city museum with her later that weekend (The museum here is not a regular museum but more of an amusement park/gym area) but I'm chalking it up to subconsciously not wanting to be alone this holiday season.
So yeah we go to the museum have a good time and in the car she tells me about how bad her current relationship is going and how she keeps having dreams about me (creepy but slightly flattering). However despite whatever feelings she has she doesn't want to leave her boyfriend, who's a douche bag. Long story short, she ends up using me to get her boyfriend to act like an actual person in jealousy of me and tries to lead me on while having me play driver and dog sitter. I understand this sounds slightly stupid but like I said I don't know what I was thinking but I left the situation feeling rather betrayed having been led on like that. So she and I got in a fight two days ago and haven't talked since.
I guess the thing that is bothering me about the whole situation is whether to view it as a good or bad thing. I mean the more I look at it I realize that yeah I was pissed at her for what she did but in turn I led her on just as much with the lie that I was the person she thinks I am (A perfectly straight, normal individual who doesn't see this whole situation like a game) so am I glad she's out of my life....I don't know I guess time will tell.

However along with this blast from the past I've realized the times I was happiest in my past relationships was with my ex James. We weren't the right people for each other but I miss the relationship we had and some of the cute things he would do. I want to find another relationship like that eventually but finding James was kind of random luck, as gay guys are harder to find out near where I live and the ones you find via the internet are usually more interested in sex whereas I'm more interested in the relationship leading up to the sex. So like I've stated I'm really fucking confused at the moment.....I don't know where to go from here

I don't know, lately I've been missing my ex. However the more I think about it, I'm not necessarily missing her but the concept of her. When I was with her I had that confidence of knowing "Hey I have a girlfriend, and she digs me. She definately is in love with me so I can be loved, awesome." I had stuff to do filling my time, someone to be with and didn't have to worry about trying to find someone because well I already had.
When it comes down to it I guess I'm just lonely and the reality of my situation has set in. Before we broke up I told myself "I'll end up finding that someone, that someone I can love and will love me back." However now I have to start back from square one and try again at the dating game. Being in a relationship is easy, starting a relationship (for me) is difficult. Oh well I'm sure it will work out eventually, I just have to keep putting myself out there.

Hi, I'm back now I guess. Whether it be for one reason or another I'll be writing on oasis again at least for a little while.

For the last 2 1/2 months I've been dating a girl I met at a concert and for awhile things were going pretty good. I had completely supressed my attractions and things were moving along normally in my relationship we were doing the things couples were supposed to do, we held hands, kissed, and eventually had sex.
I never mentioned to her that I was Bisexual and had dated a guy prior to her, it just didn't seem like a great idea and if she found out it may have wrecked things between us, so I kept quiet.
There were alot of problems in our relationship, namely that she lived about an hour away and had me come over ALOT, and as you all know, with gas the way it is now this really ate into my funds and I was living paycheck to paycheck. We also had incredibly different lifestyles, she was this party girl who didn't really have any plan for her future and was living in the moment while I'm the kind of guy who likes to live life like a chess game, planning 5 moves ahead. Really when it came down to it I just wasn't sexually attracted to her, not that I'm not attracted to some women it's just that she wasn't the most hygenic person and well that disturbed me on SO many levels. I think the thing that killed our relationship though was the fact that she moved WAY too fast for me, she would talk about moving in together and vaguely about marriage and it just scared me completely.
In the end I had to break it off with her, I figured here I am confused enough as it is and she was just adding to it in negative ways. She was deeply in love with me and we hadn't been dating very long at all (She even went as far as to claim to be pregnant to try to keep me, which she later admitted was a lie) and I figured if she was this in love with me now imagine what it'll be like in a couple months. If I'm not feeling anything for her now I best break it off because if i did it later it'd destroy her.
Well I broke up with her yesterday and she's a mess. Telling me she can't stop crying, how she had such plans and how no one will ever love her....I just feel like utter crap. I mean it's because of me this girl is a mess and there's nothing I can do to help her. We've done the whole "We'll be friends still" talk but she's just heartbroken. The last thing I wanted was to hurt her but i ended up doing that anyway. I just feel like such a jerk, bringing her into my messed up version of reality and not telling her everything that was going on. I'm starting to think that maybe I'll never be satisfied with anyone, maybe there isn't "that" person out there for me because I can't just be happy with either sex. Fuck my life

Yeah I'm gonna be leaving oasis here for awhile, I don't know I just kinda feel like my life has recently been turned on it's ear and I need to figure some things out. I've got alot going on now between work, school, etc. (I've decided to start a novel, something my teachers have been saying to do and I've wanted to do for awhile)

For those who care, you have my email or messenger.

Ok so yeah it's been awhile since I've posted here on oasis and it's mainly just because things have been going very weird for me. It's kind of like once I thought I had everything figured out it turned on me. Long story short, James and I started doing sexual things, it didn't really do anything for me, I started to question whether or not I'm actually gay, came to the realization that I'm just bi and james wasn't the right person for me, so we broke up. Ok so on to the good stuff...

Alright so yesterday I went to an MCR concert with James (We're still good friends) my brother and his friend murphy. We go to the concert hall like 2 and a half hours early to make sure we could get into the pit. While we were waiting we started conversing with the people around us and I met this girl named jasmine and her friend paige. Well we got to talking and it turned out we had a TON in common and we really hit it off. So the concert started we go in and got into the pit (it was fucking packed) and we sat through the first two acts in anticipation for MCR (one of the bands was Billy Talent which was also incredible) so in between bands, due to mass jumping around and the fact that there were like 500 people packed into a small pit we started getting really dehydrated so I went and got us some water, well jasmine started getting really into me, hugging me, head on my should, etc. It was pretty cool and I could definately see myself ending up at least good friends with her if not something more.

But here's where it gets interesting...
So there we were MCR starting up the crowd going fucking wild. They played through some new some old and all around it was an amazing concert until the last song. They started up "Famous last words" and I started feeling REALLY dehydrated, like to the point where I was going to pass out. So I sit down and try to get a breather. Jasmine looks at me and asks if I'm alright and just as I'm about to respond I puked all over the ground. NOT a good way to make an impression.

So there I am rushing to the bathroom all embarressed when I feel a hand on my back, it's jasmine helping me to the bathroom (I didn't need help but the gesture was appreciated) and after I cleaned myself up she was waiting outside for me. She told me everything was cool and not to be embarressed or anything because she was literally close to doing the same thing (3 hours in a crowded pit, people were passing out all over).
So we went out to eat with my friends and her friend and at the end of the night she gave me her phone number and told me to give her a call, which I plan on doing, I just feel akward because no matter what I doubt I'll live down the fact that I almost puked on her the first time we met, isn't that kind of reminiscent of south park?

James is back finally! I waited like two weeks while he was off in France, just going crazy cause my busiest work load happened to coincide with my spring break T_T. We ended on sort of an off note because I met him and his best friend rose up at the mall (coincidently) while I was playing Tekken in the arcade with a couple of my friends. I got the whole, Jon this is rose, rose this is jon, nice to meet you...blah blah blah small talk. But she seemed really nice and while James was busy playing pump it up (He's ranked 9th in the nation, no lie) Rose and I went outside for some air and to talk. I mentioned to her that I wasn't sure about how James was feeling about our relationship because he seemed kind of distant and she told me he had been hurt in his previous relationship and was just kind of reluctant due to that. She did say that he talked about me to her and that he liked me alot so that kind of cleared up the doubt in my mind.

So like I was saying today he came back all jetlagged and whatnot. But he sure had alot of stories to tell and he said he took a fair amount of pictures so I'm having him come over to my house (The first time, which is weird seeing as we've been dating for like 5 weeks) to look over stuff from his trip and watch I am legend. So we ate lunch with my friends like any normal monday but today he did something completely new. After everyone dispersed and we walked to my class and said our goodbyes he kissed me in public. Now just so you're on the same train of thought as me here, he's NEVER kissed me in public before. I was worried maybe he was ashamed or something. I mean it wasn't making out or anything but just a goodbye kiss, which meant alot to me because it kind of says he's sure enough about our relationship to kiss me in front of the random passerby of our college.

Yeah today was a good day :)

Something terrible happened this past week, I lost my journal....

Now this may not sound like a big deal or anything but let me put it this way, I've been keeping a journal for about the last ten years (not the same one, a series of notebooks) and the book that was lost consisted of about the past year and a half. So effectively I lost the last year and a half which included very crucial moments for me (My coming out, first date, first boyfriend, first gay kiss, etc). Now I'm not worried someone will find it and try to out me or anything (I'm out on campus) it's just like I've lost a part of myself. I mean I made that red mead five star my own. It was adorned in band stickers, cool quotes, ideas for cool band names I'd come up with, and other things that I felt important enough to include on it. So needless to say I searched for it tirelessly over a week. Well I found out that I left it in my music appreciation class under my desk. My teacher told me she had seen it but figured I'd be back for it so she decided to leave it where it was in case I came back...I didn't. I didn't realize it was gone until later that night and by then the college was closed and my notebook lost forever.

Now these thoughts pushed into a depressed slump over the past couple of days until I realized something, I've posted the majority of my journal entries as online journal entries too! Now I know that sounds slightly sad but when I was a freshmen a majority of my classes were boring so I would write during class, then later just come on oasis and post what I'd written as a journal post. So today I copy and pasted my journal entries into a word document and printed them out for my journal.

Oasis saved part of my journal! Yeah!

So it's been a week of firsts for me, well more like 2 weeks but who cares?

I've been dating James for coming on two weeks, we've been to the movies, out to lunch, and today he treated me to breakfast at a local restaurant. I've got to say these have been the best two weeks of my life, my first relationship with a guy and it's just going amazing.

Well today after we had breakfast we hung around Barnes n Noble for awhile talking about graphic novels, humorous books, movies, etc. Afterwards we headed back to my car and I had him listen to a song I thought was right up his alley. During the song my mind drifted towards what I really wanted to be doing, locking lips with him. However, I was really nervous about this, what if he pulled away? I mean I'd never done anything like this and he had mentioned that he'd gotten out of a long relationship, what if I just wasn't up to par?

He seemed to sense something was the matter and he asked me what was on my mind. I told him and he responded with a smirk on his face saying that he was wanting the same thing he just wasn't sure I wanted it. We both leaned in and I had my first kiss with a guy (20 years in the making) which quickly led to making out, etc...

Any questions of my sexuality went up in smoke with that, I mean I've found something here that I've never had before. It's like I'm finally on equal ground with someone. When he looks me in the eyes and puts his arm around my shoulder slightly playing with my hair, I just melt in my seat.

We're going to go see Ludo in concert next weekend which is just going to be an amazing evening :)

After much anxiety and worrying over the result, I went and asked James on a date today and he said yes!

I've been a nervous wreck lately over my crush on James, wondering how to ask him, if he's single, am I positive he's gay or is my gaydar broken? (A friend told me he was, so I was almost positive), etc. Well today in class I got all my answers.

"So the school districts got me working late tonight doing a training, so yeah my valentine's day is kinda shot. What about you? Got any crazy valentine's plans?"

Translation: Is he going to mention a boyfriend?

He told me that he had a couple night classes that he had to go to and we talked about how Valentines day was a corporate holiday, an obligation if you're with someone or a day of self loathing if you're not. We had a pretty good laugh over this.

So class starts and we end up watching a film on the castrati (Think I spelled that right) of the baroque period. For those of you who don't know, the castrati were boys who were castrated before puberty so that they could keep their high voices which were desirable for opera, the practice was later outlawed. The movie gets alot of laughs because the actor has to have a female singer dubbed over his voice with an end product that looked like a bad ventriloquist act.

Then class ended and I went on my "Walk and talk" with james, chatting about some cds I had burned him last week. This is when that "This is your last chance" light goes off in my head.

"Hey I was wondering, If you're free later this weekend, you want to hang out or something? I mean I want to see that Cloverfield movie but I'm not all that psyched to be the creepy guy that goes and watches a movie alone. Would you like to go see it with me?"

He smiled as if he knew what I was getting at.

"Yeah definately, I can't let you go see a teen movie alone. They'd eat you alive!"

He gave me his cell number and we decided to go see it on saturday.

I'm so incredibly happy right now, I mean he said yes! Not only that but he was excited about going with me, which I don't really get that often. I'm trying to stop this smile but I don't think it's going anywhere.

Ok so for the past couple months I've had a crush on this guy who my friend Nick introduced me to (before I came out to him). However, I never acted on this because at the time if I had it would have meant being forced out of the closet to Nick and that wasn't something I was ready for at the time. Well time goes by and my schools semester starts and who do I see on campus one day but the guy from earlier, whose name is James by the way. I flashed him a flirty sort of smile as I passed and headed off to class obsessing over it but thinking that nothing would ever come of it because well I'd be lucky to see him randomly on campus and it's not like we had any classes together.

So the next day I head off to a class I knew I was going to hate, Music Appreciation. Normally I love music but the class focuses on the origins of modern music and theres really only so many times I can listen to Gregorian chants and still be amused. So I just came into the class and sat in the back wishing it over. I was just about to contemplate killing myself with a protractor (not really) when who walks in but James! OMG I almost died, the class just had a positive twist. However I was too chicken shit at the time and just stayed in my seat in the back admiring him from afar...yeah I'm a loser, I know.

BUT the next class period I had it all planned out. I strategically placed myself right next to where he sat the previous class. I was going to talk to him even if it killed me. Now during class I didn't get much of a chance seeing as this is a lecture course and I sit in the front but this did give me a chance to notice how smart he is, I mean we were listening to all these old latin songs and he was just answering questions left and right about them while I was just dumbfounded.

So after class I turn to him and say "This is a kind of weird question but do you by chance know Nick Welz?" He looked at me and a smile went across his face. "I knew you looked familiar, I saw you at the arcade a couple months ago" he said. I was ecstatic. We talked a little and I was having a good time but I had to leave for my next class so I said goodbye knowing that I had finally opened communication with him.

So I head off to the office to drop of a background check form for my education class and go to pull it out of my binder...but my binders gone. I freak out, because all my important stuff was in there and now it's gone. So I rush back to the building and who do I see outside, frankly if you can't guess by now you're missing the point of this entry. He tells me that he found my binder and he gave it to my teacher. He says he would have chased after me but I was long gone. Yeah James is awesome.

I REALLY hope he's single right now, I mean I know he's gay and open about it but this is my first time wanting to ask a guy out. Is the dialogue any different or am I just fretting over nothing?

Ok so this is a double edged sword sort of deal but here it goes...So after a couple weeks of trying to get scholarships I had one land on my doorstep. I'm an eagle scout in the Boy scouts and they offered me a half tuition scholarship to one of the colleges in my state that has a great teaching program. Well the problem comes in well with the fact that I'm now trying to be open and the Boy scouts has a policy that you can be kicked out for being one of a couple things (Athiest, Anarchististic, or Openly gay) so to put it bluntly being gay = no scholarship. Now I can lie about it and take their money but the problem with that is that I'd be lying about who I am, which I don't care for, and if it was found out during my semester they could just cut my funding, though that seems unlikely they'd go to that effort. Maybe I should just keep looking for scholarships elsewhere, but this is such a great opportunity....ugh

Any ideas for what I can do?

Lately I've been hooked to that show Queer as Folk because blockbuster has made it so readily available. Now I'm about halfway into season two and I got to wonder "Is monogamy completely dead?". No one in the show stays loyal to their significant other at all. It just kinda portrays homosexual life as a series of "tricks". I assume that this is just a stereotype of sorts because you can't uniformly classify everyone but I got to wonder if there's any validity in it. I mean I'm one of those people that believes that someone out there for me (kind of lame I know).

I'm about to enter the "dating scene" and I'm wondering what I should expect. I mean I'm out to try to find a boyfriend and not a random fuck, is that realistic? I know it's probably a case by case type of thing but I'm just looking for imput from someone who's been there.

I went to the bank this morning to buy my parents christmas gift, my siblings and I are giving them a night out and got some money on one of those Visa giftcard (something you have to buy at the bank and in person). Well I got there and was waiting in line like everyone does, waiting for the one teller to take care of me when I noticed something... I got passed up like 4 times. Every time the teller would start to process my transaction she'd notice someone by the window and go to take care of them first. It really started to piss me off, I mean I had already waited a good 10 minutes just to get to the front of the line and now I was having to wait another 15 because some old lady wants to question her bank statement through the drive thru window.

I mean what is it that gives the drive thru users the "cut to the front of the line" privilege? Is it an automatic thing that just because these people come to the drive thru that there time is worth more than mine? I mean I had been there much longer than them and i had my cash out and everything ready to get it done and over with but I kept getting overlooked.

I know this is a small matter but eh its just something that was bugging me

This week is the start of finals at my college and once again the stress starts, but this time I'm going to do it without going back to smoking. The last thing I need is to start up that again and end up getting hooked, so we'll see how well I fare without my "sin sticks".

I decided since I didn't have an afternoon class today that I'd go and sign up for the SAGE group at my school. When I got to college center it was a different story. I knew I was in the right place (There was a plaque on the wall with something about SAGE scribbled on it) but I was filled with fear. The room was filled with people I didn't know, joking around with each other. As I searched for who to talk to I felt like a deer in the headlights as if all eyes were on me, the weirdo who had just stumbled in. Eventually I just pulled out my cell phone, like I was waiting for someone who wasn't there, and left the room. I'm such a coward...

On my way to my car I saw my friend Nick who I hadn't gotten a chance to talk to in awhile. Nick and I have been friends since middle school and have stuck by each other through most everything, including the death of Nick's mom and our good friend Stephen. We got to talking and decided to hang out for lunch. We went out and got some chinese and headed back to his place. As we ate our meal in his room I felt the urge to just come out to him. He's been my friend for almost ten years, I kind of owe it to him in a way. He noticed I was zoning out thinking and asked me if anything was the matter. Now or never..."Nick, I think I'm gay, or at the very least bisexual", I told him "I'm sorry I never told you sooner but I just didn't want to mess up our friendship, you know..."

"What? Mess our friendship up how?" he asked, "Do you like have a crush on me or something?"

"No" I answered (Half true, I used to have a BIG crush on him) "I just didn't want you to feel ackward around me"

He told me he'd always be my friend and to him I was still just the same Jon, his best friend. I'm so glad he took it so well, I guess it just gets easier the more you talk to people.

It's been a countdown of sorts this week. I was on the internet looking for information on schools SAGE (Straights and gays for equality) group and couldn't find any. Almost all the other clubs had links to their own site with info on them but SAGE didn't. Well I eventually googled it and found some info (on a st. louis site about events in STL) about a meeting later during the week with a date and time. The meeting was supposed to be about finding churches and religious institutions near you that are accepting, which was appealing to me seeing as my family is catholic and I squirm in my seat when the priest goes on a rant on homosexuals. So tonight was the night for the meeting and I was both psyched and terrified about it because while it gives me a chance to meet new people it's also a mass outing at the same time and I wasn't sure I was ready for that. I decided to go though and figured I'd get there a little early to get a chance to talk to people...well no one showed up. I waited for an hour and no one showed. It was kind of disheartening.

Well I decided to pick up the new Dane Cook cd on the way home so I guess the trip wasn't a total waste. Does anyone have any advice on finding groups like this one, because this area isn't really my forte. I mean I've heard of sites that list groups for gays by your state or area but have yet to actually see any.