When it comes to pleasurable situations I favor beginnings, and the period just before the beginning even more, that wonderful time when slack hope swells and hardens into concentrated anticipation, when infantile gratitude and giddy expectation engage in heated rivalry in my mind, competing for my attention like clamorously auditioning tap dancers. My senses throb from that moment when engagement becomes likely to just after engagement begins; after that the graph of pleasure dips precipitously. I like pouring a drink more than finishing a drink, with the first sip falling somewhere in between, to use one G-rated example. Even before I reach the midpoint or the height of pleasure, the sensory climax, I begin to imagine the end, the terminal whimper, and must fight off anticipatory nostalgia for something I'm still in the midst of enjoying. This reflects a failure on my part no doubt, evidence of an immature and undisciplined imagination. I think I'd be happier if I could work up a genuine appreciation for that last sip, to appreciate its bittersweet complexities for what they are, which is apparently something some grownups and most blues singers can do. Or maybe they just say they can and they're full of shit. Am I the pathetic embodiment of something fundamentally juvenile in society? Whenever possible I like to blame my shortcomings on other people or society as a whole.