Dearest Tyrashow.com,

By the time you read this, I'll be gone. Committed. The perfect ending to my Single & Fierce blog.

Exactly what I thought would happen when I set my goals, happened. Not necessarily what I wanted to happen, but what I thought would happen. Temptation reared its ugly head. Two days after I wrote my last blog, a friend and I went out to a bar. But I just drank water, until we went to another bar where his bartender friend gave us two free shots. Cheers to failure. I had gone a week without alcohol, but this was by no means the bottom of the downward spiral. That was all I drank that night, until five days later.

I was one week into my celibacy experiment. I told my friend, Everett, that I was taking a vow of celibacy and he said sarcastically, "Oh, that's a great idea," knowing about my huge commitment, "pretty soon you'll have nine weeks of forced celibacy. Do it while you can."

Then, Sally, my friend who thought we could be friends without sex, invited me out. We went to her sister's regular spot where the manager constantly loaded free plays on the jukebox for us. We sat and talked for hours while we tried to out-cool each other with our jukebox requests. I drank water while Sally drank whiskey and coke. Hours later, Sally surprised me with a Michelob Ultra, and the bartender made a comment about me watching my "girlish figure," so I beat him up. Okay, I just sat there and took the girlish figure comment while I drank my beer that women drink.

Sally said my vow made her feel more comfortable about taking me back to her place. I felt confident in my will power. I guess I had no basis to, if I couldn't resist alcohol, how would I resist my bigger vice? But hey, pretty soon I'll have nine weeks of forced celibacy, right? We went to her place where I broke "my big commitment." But as I predicted, we got that out of the way and now there's nothing distracting us from building that meaningful friendship. We have hung out since, and she's been a good friend through this transitional period in my life.

So, I broke two out of four, but I've stuck to my crappy diet, and I'm still jogging four miles a day. That's good, right? I guess not--hence, my need for the "huge commitment," where I will be forced to commit to celibacy and being sober. No, I am not joining a monastery. And, even though I strayed from the path, I've lost about 15 pounds in three weeks, and I've reached my goal weight to achieve the "huge commitment."

So, as you're reading this I am on a military chartered shuttle from Corpus Christi to San Antonio to re-attend M.E.P.S. (Military Entrance Processing Station). This is where all military branches send potential recruits to take tests and get a complete physical. I went up two weeks ago and passed every part, except that I was eight pounds over the target weight for my height and age. I dropped that in a week, now I'm just trying to get some extra pounds off to be safe.

On Friday, May 30th, I will be enlisting in the U.S. Army. One week later, I will, hopefully, be shipping out to boot camp--nine weeks of working out and shooting, with only dudes. Why, you ask? Because, it's time to grow up--and while some people can do that on their own, I'm putting myself in the hands of the U.S. Army, who will gladly force me to do it.

From the beginning of my Single & Fierce days, I have made the occasional mention of my ex "my longest and best relationship" who was "perfect for me, but the timing wasn't." About four months ago, we had that hypothetical talk all broken up couples have about someday getting back together. I couldn't feed her lines about some idealistic future anymore, I would have to prove I was a different man. She told me how to make it right, and now I'm doing my best to comply. I am flawed, but now I'm cleaning up--for her, not necessarily in a literal sense, but so when the next "her" comes along, she won't just be perfect for me, I'll be perfect for her too.

Cheers to you all out there in single land. Thanks for letting me share all of my adventures with you, now it's time for me to move on to the next one.

Love,
Mike