Chapter 1: The decision

I made the decision about a week after my 28th birthday. This birthday had been like the last five, meaning pretty bleak. There was no family to party with - or at least share some cake. It's not that I had no family, just that we couldn't stand each other and I had no contact with them for years. I also had no real friends, just some acquaintances mainly from work but nobody I would have wanted to share that day with me.

Don't get me wrong, I'm pretty much a loner and usually prefer it that way. It's just that I sometimes wish I had some person who I could trust, someone I could share parts of my life and thoughts with. As there was nobody like that, my birthday consisted of buying a small cake in a nearby bakery, eating it all (even though I felt lightly queasy afterwards) and going back to work.

You might wonder why I didn't just go out and find myself a girlfriend. Unfortunately, it wasn't that easy. I'm sure I could have found some nice girl to be my girlfriend. While I didn't consider myself good looking and actually was a bit overweight, I wasn't ugly as hell. I had a pretty good income as a self-employed computer technician. I lived in a good-sized house that could easily house a family. Yes, had I gone out and started looking, I'm sure I could have found me a girlfriend. It's just that I didn't want just any girl, I wanted something very specific and so far I wasn't able to find one that fit my bill. I probably wouldn't ever as my wishes were pretty much unrealistic.