most Salon readers live in the world of The Truman Show. People who are genuinely suicidal just go and kill themselves mostly. You guys talk about it too much. Suicide is just one of the options you run through and dismiss, thinking about it in a wistful way when your "writing" isn't going well. Still, I don't want to minimize your pain. It's not easy being American. You have no excuses, so you have to make them up, like the one that says you can't get a job because you're not blonde and blue eyed. Yes you're all persecuted by racists and sexists and homophobes and your parents, those villains who think derogatory thoughts about you all the time, and work in car dealerships where they serve whoever's whitest and malest and straightest first, and who nod to you in the street just because you're not completely white and they unconsciously feel superior to you, and who throw car keys at you sometimes if you're standing outside a hotel. And then you go overseas and the people in the countries your grandparents came from and whom you've been identifying with to avoid responsibility for electing Bush twice treat you like an American. It's tough, there's no doubt.

I got most of my sex education back in the early eighties from Judy Blume books. If they're any kind of gauge of the cultural climate, getting your period at a young age was a big ego boost, such that the character Nancy in Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret pretended to get hers early.

Maybe this guy's motives are confused. Maybe he's asking a 'stupid' question. It's hard to ask that kind of question in this world because it inevitably elicits sneering from mean-spirited people. Liberals are as bad in this respect as conservatives, which goes to show that virtue and political affiliation don't correlate. Liberals and conservatives are equally (un)likely to be motivated by love, even if, as I think, 'liberalism' represents a slightly more evolved worldview taken in itself.

Another good text on the contemplative life that I didn't see mentioned here is "The Cloud of Unknowing". The author, a fourteenth century monk, chose to remain anonymous. He remarks that "unto this day all actives do complain of contemplatives" and he advises them "meddle ye not with contemplatives for ye know not what aileth them." At the same time he acknowledges that people can be drawn to the contemplative life for the wrong reasons, and that you need advice in order to clarify your motives. I think Cary Tennis is a good first place to turn. The Cloud-writer also says that the active and contemplative lives can be combined. My own opinion is that either way you're going to be involved in a difficult relationship with an other who is in some sense part of you. There's no easier softer way.

Scratch the surface of any American, whether they call themselves liberal or conservative, and there's a dyed in the wool puritan right underneath: humourless, moralising, supercilious, judgemental. I'm moving to China. I'm sure they've got problems too, but a change is as good as rest, so they say.

You're going to get A LOT of hatemail.

already know everything Cary said in his response, but boy does it help to hear it from someone besides yourself.

I can't tell if you're a man or woman, but my advice is to ignore all the outraged women who are calling you a monster here. That's their stuff and nothing to do with you. You decided to 'cheat' and maybe fucked up your perfect life. I'm sure you didn't intend this outcome, but demons are no joke. They make us do things we don't want to do, and yet we're responsible for their actions nonetheless. Some people get to blame everything on patriarchy or racism and they don't like it that you have demons. You're encroaching on their prerogatives as victims. I think It might be worth your while doing what Cary suggests and using this as an opportunity to get to know your demons. The other people involved will survive. Just don't make it worse by trying to make it better. It is what it is. Happens everyday: pain, confusion, loss, guilt, choruses of outrage or disapproval from people just like you. The only way out is through. Best of luck with it

This guy is Irish. He doesn't necessarily work the same way as the kind of guy Cary imagines. I think he's telling you his head is messed up and he doesn't know what he feels because he feels guilty about telling you he doesn't want to pursue a serious relationship. His mother's love may not have been unconditional in every way. More likely his relationship with her is complicated by the fact that he always felt responsible for her feelings, and he doesn't want to feel responsible for yours too. You gave up a lot for him, and he feels the burden of that sacrifice, and he thinks you won't be okay if he tells you the truth: that he wants to be independent. I'd say the nicest thing you can do for him is go to grad school in America and let him attend to his mother on his own.