"Don't be sad on the internet. Don't be sad on the internet."

I am repeating this to myself. I can be sad here, in this blog, if I want to be, and I did post a breakup announcement to my "close friends" on fb (I really love that feature, btw, and I don't think enough people are aware of it or use it) yesterday, but I am trying to limit it to that. No poignant song postings, no vaguetweets or vaguebooking or any of it.

I don't want to be sad on the internet this time. And I've blocked Joey on every social media we previously shared. It has kept my anxiety at a minimum. And the sadness too, I think. There has been a little bit of crying today. A little bit of kneeling on the floor, scolding the vial of ashes from bbqs in Minneapolis, topped by stones from a creek in Wisconsin, topped by tiny shells found on the bank of the Ohio the first week after I arrived in Louisville. A vial to represent my journey, that I sat on the floor and chastised, only to realize I was not helping myself.

All of this now is about helping myself. Find friends, find a good group of people, find my place.

I get angrier and angrier at Joey. He only gave me two months. Two months in the worst period of my life wherein I was still charming and funny and warm and made him dinner and loved him despite all of the shit happening to me.

Fucking hell.

Not Girlfriend Time

Welp. Apparently, it's over. He wants to be "friends." I'm not going to prattle on about it. Not too much.

I think I might be okay. I feel a little bit of sadness creeping in today, but it has nothing to do with missing him, or feeling lost or any other thing related directly to us breaking up. It's mostly that I'm broke and my social circle here is currently very limited. I don't have a lot of outlet. I am and will make friends, I will find my place, but it's 6:36 on a Friday night, and I know I'm staying home. I know no one will be calling me to see if I want to go to a thing. I know no one will say, "Hey Sarah, I need to talk. Can I buy you a drink?"

I have plans tomorrow night. With my two new friends, Mia and Sharon. They are insta-likes. My people. My age. I think Sharon's a little older. Sarcasm, dark humor, graphic sexual conversations, warmth. My people. We're going to see a band I saw on Tuesday that's fantastic. Right now, I don't have enough money to pay the door fee. Wait. Maybe I do. I've got $4-something in my bank account and a few coins on my mantle. Together, I may be able to pull together $5. This is where my life's at. That means a 2-mile bike ride to the bank before noon so I can pull out that money.

Thpppt.

For Joey, this has all been intense. For me, it's been the first time I've done a relationship closer to the way I see others doing it. Smartly. I picked my battles more wisely. I kept many things to myself that annoyed or frustrated me that were not important. I "fought" when I had to with as much grace as I could. And I fell slowly in love with him, and deeper as time went on, instead of feeling everything all at once and needing to fulfill myself with intensity within the relationship. I learned to allow myself to be inside the relationship without over thinking it. But, it is a testament to my sometimes faulty ability to read people and a situation that somewhere in the last few weeks, he decided to break up with me, while I was falling deeper in love and thinking of him less and less as a temporary object, or something to be regarded tentatively. And maybe he sensed this, because it happened shortly after I began to fall deeper, that I could sense certain problems forming. A couple days before we broke up, we went out to dinner. I mentioned my ideal way of dying, at 85, in bed with my partner of 50-ish years, of carbon monoxide poisoning. It was all well and good until I laughed and said that he'd be 77, which seems a little young to die. I felt him get just the slightest bit colder. I think he was already near his decision at that point, at least subconsciously. Somewhere in the last month especially he started to make the pile of my faults that would tip the scales in favor of the decision he already made. I learned a long time ago not to do that. It's just a shitty, shitty thing to do to love. Instead, I let those things make a pile and make sure I keep very clear that there's another pile, too. One of love, past good deeds, the way the sun bounces off his eyelashes. And those things always bring me back to the right place. And eventually, things get better.

I won't be writing any songs about this one. I won't be waxing rhapsodic about it being the best relationship I ever had with the best sex and the best connection in all ways. That isn't what this was. This was a kind love. This was patient and warm and safe and I loved it very, very much. It didn't have peaks and valleys of emotion, it stayed steady. I got mad and frustrated and upset with him, but it was never that mad, that upset, that frustrated. For the most part, it was just good.

He disagrees.

Well, okay then.

I need time to not be Girlfriend. I told him this. My offer was we take this month off. I'll be out of town for two weeks for Thanksgiving anyway. I can get my head together about this place I live in, get some money made, etc. I'd leaned too hard on him for emotional and financial support in the tumult that's been my first two months here.

And you know what? Things feel better without him. That isn't to say I don't still want to be with him. That isn't to say I want this love to diffuse itself so it can coalesce some other day for another. I just need a fucking break.

Barf. Child.

It's about 80% hangover making me feel nauseated, but there's a good chunk of wtf doing it to me as well.

I've been thinking about having children.

Who am I fucking kidding. I'm 35. I'm not going to have a child. I'm 35 and have a life about as together as the average 27 year old.

It's just not going to happen.

I started watching one of those Wigs shows on YouTube, where actresses of some note get the opportunity to delve into a "character," a "wig," if you will, and the shows are all about some serious issue women deal with. All well and good. The first I watched, Blue, with Julia Stiles, threw me last year as it was about a mom who has to prostitute herself in addition to having a day job, in order to make ends meet with her young son. A lot of the same issues I've dealt with, in my work, and in my life, were raised in that show.

The shows consist of clips that are about 7-12 minutes long. Little show blurbs to watch on your coffee breaks at work, and the like, I'd guess, was the pitch idea on that one.

Susanna, the one I've started, stars Anna Paquin and Maggie Grace. It's honestly not that compelling and it's more upsetting than anything in a way that makes my gorge rise a bit.

Anna's character is a new mother suffering an obsessive compulsive post-partum depression meltdown. Maggie's character is her stable, mature younger sister with a "real" job.

I've always wondered if I'd be a good mother. I've sought assurances in friends on that front. I used to have a terrible temper. Physically violent sometimes. It's still in me, it's just that I've learned ways to diffuse it within myself in seconds instead of letting it out. It's amazing what just stopping for a second and looking at the situation while in the situation can do. And understanding consequences is a lot of that. "If I throw my phone across the room at my boyfriend, it will hit him hard enough to hurt him, might break my phone depending on whether it hits him, might ricochet and hit something else breaking my phone AND the other thing, and then the fight will escalate, boyfriend might leave me, then I'll be out a phone and a boyfriend and have to replace thing that got broken."

But with a small, vulnerable thing that can't defend itself that's been crying for hours? I don't know how my brain would work with that. I am terrific with other people's children because you can always give them back to their parents when things get stressful. You can go to your quiet home and blare Ryan Adams and sing at the top of your lungs and not have a baby to wake up. You can always get away from the small, vulnerable thing.

And there's the dependence. Sometimes, with four cats, as much as I love them, I think, "Dear god, you are making my life so much harder." You can't just pack up and leave any place with four cats. It's hard to find apartments that will take you. People call you "Crazy Cat Lady" and they think they're hilarious. I can't even go on vacation or a trip for a few days without lining up someone to check in on the cats, change litter, replenish food and water. And that dependence is very, very minor compared to a baby. A baby that becomes a toddler that becomes a child that becomes an adolescent that becomes a teenager.

If I told Joey any of this, he would think I am only thinking this because he is freaked out and doesn't want kids right now and might never want them. While it's true I am thinking this out loud because of the conversation we've been having, it's always been there. Always.

And I know all of these fears are normal. But I'm 35. I really just want to be in a happy, stable relationship. I don't think about the future with Joey. I just love him.

I just wish he could do the same with me, be willing to consider compromises down the line, and acknowledge in a meaningful way that I have moved my whole life to make this work, and that I am willing to get rid of my cats down the line, or even sooner, to have an environment he can be with me in.

Okay. Writing this out makes me feel less like barfing.

Ripping through a dozen angry bears...

I done fed myself too much caffeine today. This causes a large amount of general anxiety, coupled with obsessive thinking and effectively, a bit of depression.

I did it to myself, things were just peachy until mid-way through the third cup of coffee, here at home, while I idly watched the 21 Jump Street revamp (pretty funny, though I expect I missed a few things, having never watched the series, and appreciated the Depp Deluise cameos, both of which are still very sexy man folks), did some internet business, and tried to drum up some work. None was particularly effective, so my idleness became quite a sedentary state, as I blinked blandly at the pile of dishes that need washing and generally became twitchy and over-anxious while giving into obsessive, not in the least bit fruitful thinking.

Namely, that Chris's birthday is in two days and I wish it made sense to do something for him, because fuck I'm awesome at birthday shit for boyfriend-types, that I don't ever open the front door to my place without hoping he's standing on the curb, fresh out of a taxi, all Troy Dyer in Reality Bites-like, or that the Sandra Bullock as Mary Magdalene black velvet painting he said he'd still paint for me when we broke up (I didn't ask, he said outright he'd do it, that he wanted to, even if its arrival was upsetting for me, which it couldn't ever not be if we're not together, but I still want it, very much. Tom Cruise as Jesus Christ needs his obvious [to me] companion) would be there on the porch, delivered by the USPS.

Or, better yet, that he'd be standing on the porch with the painting in hand, a shy, maybe a little scared, grin on his face.

And I'd welcome him in, happily, and we'd cry as we are wont to do, being emotional retards, and we'd have some serious talks, or maybe we wouldn't at all, maybe we'd just break down and kiss and love each other, and that would be it, an admission of us both being ridiculous, difficult, impossible people, but an understanding that we are worth working out. Because I still believe that we are.

But every time I open the door, there's nothing there, save some grocery fliers, or mail for my shitty former roommate from the state about her child support, or packages, abundant packages, for the people upstairs, who are nubile, pretty artists in their early 20s, from all over the world.

So I'm trying to balance out the over-caffeination with a little whiskey. I'm still twitchy, and writing this has made me weep a little, but the whiskey is effective and I'm feeling my mood elevate a little. Such a delicate balance, these drugs! Too little caffeine, and I feel cobwebbed and sad and achy. Too much and I'm hyper-neurotic and can get pretty depressed. Too much alcohol leads to a whole host of issues. And too little of it, well, I am a social butterfly, I need my social lubrication.

And, as soon as I've washed some more dishes (two sinkfuls in the last hour, about two more to go), and put myself together a bit, I'll head out on my bike. Maybe aimlessly, maybe with friends and a destination in mind. The night is young.

It's been almost decided that I am headed to Chicago by bus and then Louisville by car on Monday. I bought a very cheap bus ticket today, so if the plan falls through, I am only out $34. My friend's brother is hosting a Morrissey night in Louisville, he is opening his house to me and my friend from Chicago, whether or not his sister is able to make it with us. I look forward to the Morrissey, to seeing him again, and to testing whether I can be responsible with my heart, my body, and my general place in life by not acting on our flirtations. I have never been the most emotionally stable person, I've more or less been in a "bad place" for as long as I can remember, with only infrequent peaks in emotional stability, or feelings of being on solid ground. Travel always helps, and is actually fairly imperative. But that doesn't mean I need to act on a crush. I want better for myself, and for the people who are to interact with me now and in the future.

And the simple fact is, I'd rip through a dozen angry bears to get to/save/be near Chris again.

Grandma

I lost one of my life's best friends the other day, my grandmother. She was 85 years old, and when she died, I was told her eyes got very wide and she looked afraid, like she wanted to fight it. Though there is no autopsy being performed, the cause of death is likely an aneurysm in her stomach that dislodged itself from coughing and shot up into her heart, causing almost immediate death.

She was 80 very tiny pounds when she died. She was as small as a pea, her body nothing more than bones and skin. She had once had beautiful C-cup breasts. Not a bit of that remained on her chest, she was as flat as a child. She had once had a beautiful smile. No longer able to wear her dentures, she was toothless and unable to speak (and the bones under her gums were wearing through, painfully). She breathed heavily, chuffing through her mouth with little moans and noises like she was trying very, very hard to say something, but couldn't do it. That idea upsets me more than anything, that she was too weak to speak and had things to say, but couldn't.

I had been there, at her side, holding her hands, smiling into her still-beautiful face, with eyes that were losing their ability to see in those last hours, clouding over and unable to focus. Her left eye would hold your gaze, her right eye often rolled up into her head. I can't be sure she could even see me. But I kept smiling, giving her as much love as I possibly good with my touch. Because my love for her couldn't possibly wane in the face of her death, her very visible, increasingly clear death. But there was a moment where I shut off, and needed to care for myself. I had had two hours of sleep, and seeing her literally die wasn't going to enrich my life. I was going to have to drive five hours home later, and I needed to get some more rest. So I held her tight, I kissed her cheek, and her forehead, and I told her I love you, and I went back to the hotel room I was sharing with my sister and brother in law.

Not ten minutes after I arrived there, my sister called to tell me she'd died. I hung up the phone and smiled again. "Good girl," I said aloud, and went to sleep. She'd been in so much pain. The last words I heard her speak much earlier that evening (it was now just before dawn) were "What else can I do?" She said this several times. I told her she had nothing left to do, that she was loved, and if it was time to go, she should do that. Then she asked for my mother, and my mom and I sat together with her, trying to convince her to eat something, because she had medication sitting in her empty stomach, and that was the bulk of why her belly hurt so. But she refused. She'd been having diarrhea, so I imagine she thought she'd only add fuel to the fire on that front, if she ate. Not that she'd been able to eat much at all.

She was my last living grandparent, the person I'd always been closest to in my family, and just a really good friend my whole life. She championed my singing and my writing from the very second I began singing and writing. Frustrated that I had stories to tell and couldn't yet write (but could read), I would dictate to her at the age of four. The first was called Robbie The Hummingbird, an origin myth story about how hummingbirds got their colors. I would often put together entire concerts, make fliers, and charge admission at the door to "shows" in the first bedroom in my grandparents' house. I remember one was Bruce Springsteen covers where I made up music on the pump organ and sang his lyrics along to them, disregarding their original melodies. Admission was a nickel. The only person in the family who was guaranteed to be there was my grandma. Everyone else typically continued to watch sporting events in the living room.

We hadn't been very close in the last few years. There had been a major rift in the family with my mom and my uncle that grandma lived with that I had nothing to do with, but as a result, guilt by association, we lost touch. In addition, as she'd gotten older, she'd become gossipy and kind of a brat sometimes, plus while she still had her own house, she was doing things like letting the dish sponge get moldy and using it without realizing it... I am not designed to handle these kinds of things. Everyone else in my family has a medical background, it doesn't faze them, but I can't handle the infirm. Not in a caretaking sort of way.

But I don't regret the time we lost. Like a friend you haven't seen in many years that you find you can just pick up where you left off, my grandma and I were like that.

It fucking hurts though. If Chris and I hadn't broken up, I wouldn't have the closeness I have with my immediate family that's come the past couple of months. But, if we were still together, I'd have someone to go through this with. Friends and family aren't the same as a partner, and all of this makes me miss him so much. And maybe he'd be an asshole right now. Maybe he wouldn't be able to be supportive. Maybe he wouldn't figure out a way to be with me through this. Maybe he'd just shut down. Maybe it's all for the best and happening exactly as it should.

But I can't ever know. My heart aches and I miss my grandmother and I miss Chris. It's been almost three months now. It feels like an eon. I can hardly remember what he's like.

My grandmother was cremated. I wish I'd have known this. I went into accepting that her death was coming with the understanding that I'd see her in her casket. I feel a little robbed of this, but I am at least going to get a little keepsake urn with a bit of her ashes in it. That's better, I suppose. She'll always be with me, but now I can have something tangible.

Okay then. I've got a dozen things to do. My home is as much of a disaster as I ever would allow it to be. I should do something about that before it actually makes me ill.

Thoughts on An Uncomfortable Dream

Time will tell if anything does bloom again with Chris. I never had happy dreams about Andy after we broke up, because, even as I held on to the love for months afterward, I already knew he didn’t love me as much as I did him. I already knew there was too much about him that wasn’t compatible with me, that the level of insecurity he made me feel for not being smart enough, well-read enough, interested in the right music enough, was never going to make me feel comfortable and safe. Those were things I never felt with Chris. I worry he felt that from me, though. There were several instances where Chris had little outbursts of insecurity, citing me being “cooler” than him, already knowing all the right books to read, all the interesting music. And honestly, I don’t know where he got that, except to say it was already there. I don’t think it was coming from me. I don’t think I was fostering that insecurity, and if I was, I sincerely don’t know how. He introduced me to music I now love, to books I now own, to ideas and topics of interest and movies. He was my equal partner on all fronts, in my mind. So much so, it was exciting in just the simplicity of it. A partner, on the same level as me. 

But, he wasn’t all sunshine and kittens. Far from it sometimes, but I love him in spite of this, because that’s what love is. Chris has a persistently dark persona, in spite of the love and kindness he wants to project. Corner him, he’ll lash out with cruelty without a thought. Fight him and he’ll insult you. Do something he doesn’t like, and he won’t be constructive in the way he tells you. He called my hair frizzy several times (hey, sorry bud, years of bleaching and dyeing have given me some damaged hair, and it being long for the first time in over a decade, I’m having to relearn how to manage it. Plus, the whole time we were dating, I was using an “organic” conditioner that didn’t do shit for me other than dry my hair out and make it feel weird. I’ve since moved on to something cheaper, and vastly more effective, but thanks for making me feel defensive about it). He essentially told me I give bad blow jobs (but condescendingly told me I “make up for it in other areas” after I told him that was a shitty thing to say), and insinuated others had been lying to me when I told him that was malarkey as every dude I’ve been with in the dozen years before him writhes with ecstasy and remarks loudly and often that mine are the best they’ve ever experienced (and, notably, a couple of exes have literally asked me to give tutorials to their exes, who are mutual friends; weird, but actually, not as weird as it might sound, since ladies do really want to give great head). The fact is, he likes the kind of blow job other men don’t, in my experience. No variation. Just up and down on the shaft, consistent, with increasing speed, preferably no coming up for air or giving the jaw a break (claiming that because he goes down on you for such an extended period [and with a skill level I would say is precisely on par with my blow jobs, if he actually liked the kind of blow jobs I give], you should happily return the favor, not understanding that licking a pussy is a different beast, where you can easily take a moment to swallow and close your mouth for a moment, than having a solid object between your teeth for minutes at a time). Essentially, a porn blow job. Which is what all girls start doing (and usually hate doing, for good reason), but quickly learn is not what makes a man happy. Variation, incorporating the hand, licking, teasing, taking the balls in the mouth, kissing the inner thighs, wending the tongue around the head, sucking, and yes, at the end, consistency, briefly, to the finish. But instead of accepting my assertion that he was the anomaly, he told me other men must be lying to me. Right. 

I mean, that’s fucked up. Really fucked up. He has a cockiness, an arrogance about his sexual abilities and his art-making that are borderline nauseating. Pair that with the previously mentioned insecurities, and it’s often difficult to know how to navigate him, because if you compliment something he knows he’s good at, he’ll just smugly say, “I know,” but tell him he’s awesome at something he’s insecure about, and he’ll make you feel like you’re lying to him.

While this is a big thing, it’s also something that can be rewired with the right conversations and patience. He either doesn’t get, or isn’t interested in, the fact that this behavior is incredibly off-putting. And now, even though I don’t think any man has lied to me about my blow-job giving abilities, I feel insecure because I realize it’s now possible I could run into another man like him. I am basically afraid to get physically intimate with anyone at all, for several reasons. 

And so I won’t. Because right now is very firmly about rewiring several things about myself, and understanding why I do them. Therapy, friends, drastically reduced drinking, and avoidance of the more obnoxious, “party lyfe” sector of those I know.

Tonight, I’m having a ladies night. The new Ryan Gosling flick, A Place Beyond The Pines. Then dinner. Then maybe something else. I’ll only have a couple of drinks. I’ll laugh and hug and cheek kiss my ladies.

Even that, in and of itself, is a marked change from a few months ago. I am not constantly on the prowl these days. I don’t look around for the cutest dude in the room. And if I do sniff out the cutest dude in the room, it doesn’t really matter. In Louisville, I spend quality time with my friend’s brother (seriously, friends, stop telling me to date your brothers), who is patently adorable, big of nose, hairy, music-obsessed and smart and kind and interesting (also, a baby of 26, natch, which likely has a lot to do with my physical disinterest. In a recent conversation with a friend, we posited that we’ve gotten to an age where younger men must SMELL different, because there’s an honest aversion to them, no matter how attractive they are). I value his opinion of me, and wish to get to know him better, but I didn’t have anything more than the acknowledgement of his attractiveness as a response. I didn’t flirt, touch him unnecessarily, though I feel sure it would have been well-received. I just enjoyed getting to know a new person, as we sat on the couch together, showing one another YouTube videos (introducing him to my favorite Pulp song, Death II, which he’d never heard, despite being a huge Pulp fan, and following it up with live Pulp footage that convinced me Pulp wouldn’t exist without early Scott Walker, and then showing him the videos for Jackie and Montague Terrace in Blue, which thrilled him because the music is great and he recognized I was right about Pulp) ‘til 4:30 in the morning, and smiling to myself as every couple of minutes, he inched just a little closer to me on the couch. Instead of letting anything happen, I bid him goodnight, and went to bed.

In short, I’ve got work to do. And I’m doing it. As for the dream, Andy is not a part of my life, I don’t wish for him to be, and if we ever meet again, I hope it’ll be nice, and that we’ll hug, and we’ll continue our day, appreciating that we still have affection for one another, but that is all. I once told Andy, in the dregs of our breakup, that I hoped we’d find one another at a sunny 4-way stop at some point in our lives, and we’d nod at one another with respect, and see what happened afterward. I still want exactly that, knowing that to “see what happens” is only to see if we can be friends.

I never had happy reconciliation dreams of Andy after he and I broke up. This is the fifth or more I’ve had about Chris. Some people treat this love as if it’s no different than others I’ve had, now. They tell me I’ll move on, that something else is on the horizon. And maybe it is. During some intense girl talk recently, though, a friend that met Chris said she sniffed out that they have very similar, “artist” temperaments, and, comparing him and me to a relationship she had last year that terrified her and caused her to push back in fear with distance and not a little anger, treating him like he was acting “crazy” and too intense, ending it and subsequently sleeping around for the rest of the summer... Now she’s in a “stable” relationship that isn’t ultimately all that interesting to her, and in the last couple of months, she’s been considering that previous relationship that scared her, realizing how much of a connection she has to him, and that there probably is yet something there to be explored, when they’re both single again. She says maybe I should keep Chris in the back of my head. Move on, as much as I can, but keep the love, if I can. Because, if he’s like her as she suspects, he just needs a great deal of distance from everything that frightens him about me. Namely, that I love him as I do.

That was always the plan. Until it’s not. The world will find something else for me if that’s what’s to be, as it always does.

An Uncomfortable Dream

Saw Danny Boyle’s new film Trance last night. I want to talk about it because it pissed me off, but I suspect anyone reading this likely also wants to see the movie, and literally anything I might have to say about it will spoil some aspect of it. It is a movie that can’t be talked about with anyone who hasn’t seen it. 

In any case, the movie infiltrated my dreams, but mostly through set pieces, in a grand meld of the three main characters’ homes. And also, I suppose, through Vincent Cassel’s seductive vigor. I swear, you can get a nose full of his pheromones from the movie screen. He is, despite being many things I don’t normally find attractive (small mouth, aggressively masculine face, narrow head), probably the most potent symbol of masculine eroticism that I can think of. 

So my dream was set in a large, spacious, heavily tiled, modern home, like the homes in the film. Dark, but inviting. Lots of slate, glass tile, subtle lighting.

It was Andy. We were lying in bed together, fully clothed. He’d slimmed down a bit, lost the borderline too much doughiness of his midsection and accompanying fat deposits in the chest region (that were never actually too much, especially when he’d lay on his side and get furry cleavage. I always found that to be quite a lot of fun to stick my finger in, and we’d laugh) in favor of more toned musculature. I was enjoying feeling his form through simple jersey, he was solid, and warm. We had just reconnected, I was unsure of what I wanted, scared that becoming physical would be too much for me, but he suggested we take a shower together. I went downstairs with him, to the enormous, fully slate tiled bathroom, with two stairs you had to walk up to get into the glass-enclosed shower, which had, tellingly, multiple shower heads. He stripped down, and I admired his ass, but felt too shy to disrobe myself. Feeling frightened, I made an excuse, and nervously talked to him as he showered. I thought about his large, straight, prettily-perfect cock that always got so hard I’d joke that one could crack a tooth on it, just as he made some reference to it, trying to entice me to join him.

And then, by some dream trick, he wasn’t there any more, and I was alone in the room, steam from the shower still lingering. I called out for him, but there was no answer. I opened the still-closed shower door, but he wasn’t there. His clothes were gone, he was gone.

I sat there a while, my heart racing, feeling abandoned. I left the room, and went upstairs. He wasn’t in the bedroom we’d been in before. But the house was quite big, and there were many other rooms to investigate. All of which made me nervous, because I knew there were other women in the house. Perhaps he’d given up already, and didn’t want to give me time to figure out what I wanted. Maybe he’d moved on to another woman. 

All of the women in the house were immediately beautiful, in the right light, and this house was designed to always present that light. Women who worked as strippers, as escorts, as erotic masseuses. That wasn’t his type of woman, I knew, Andy prefers intellectual, academic, music-obsessed, earthily plain-pretty girls that you’d never notice in a crowd. A physically unfettered woman, who wakes in the morning the same as when she went to sleep. While I am quite intelligent, I am not academic, and while I am music-obsessed, it was never the right music, and while I am pretty, my prettiness is altogether too unusual to be his type. 

Conversely, the women in this house were over-sexed sea hags, who wake in the morning groaning like kracken, yawing sharply until coffee, cigarette, and thickly applied makeup were had, but one never knows what might draw a person to another, so I entered each semi-darkened room, afraid.

The women were fucking one another, viciously, animal grunts and growls, processed over-styled hair and too much perfume putting out puffs of product that made me want to sneeze, and by the third room, I’d found only one man in bed with them, a man I didn’t know. They all tried to get me to join them, even after they complained that I’d interrupted them.

Defeated, tired, I went down to a room I knew to be sex-free, a basement rec room, with florescent lighting and tan carpeting, where people were putting together puzzles, playing board games, drinking beer and laughing. It felt like a last resort, and even as I knew it was more likely I’d find Andy in the rec room, I needed to abate my fear by confirming he wasn’t with any of those women.

The room had about a half-dozen men in it and only one girl, who wasn’t one of the terrible women, and all parties were lazing about doing the aforementioned game-playing. There was a big, tan brick fireplace all the way at the back of the room, the kind one finds in crappy suburban homes built in the 90s. My eye was drawn to it, as I stood in the middle of the staircase down into the basement. No one looked at me, and I scanned the room, again looking to the fireplace, which wasn’t lit.

And that’s when I saw him. Not Andy. Chris. Laying on his side, on the floor, just in front of the fireplace, wearing a polyester patterned shirt that was white, with blue and red print, clearly from the 70s. He was idly flipping through a magazine, which, if I’m not mistaken, was an issue of Highlights. Yes, the kids magazine. There were other books strewn about him, and they too seemed child-oriented, as in things from the late 70s, early 80s. Our childhood years. 

I cautiously walked toward him, and when he saw me coming close, a wry smile formed at the corner of his mouth, clearly in spite of himself. “Hi,” I said. He stood up, and remained a few feet from me. I motioned for us to walk outside.

We stood on the grass, which was not yet green, as spring had not yet come, next to a river that was barely more than a creek, but rushing with water. He looked at me, down at me, standing tall, but not imposingly so, and said he thought it was too soon that we were meeting, that we weren’t ready. But he still had that wry smile. Despite himself, he was happy to see me. Just uncomfortable, and confused. My heart was racing, but not with fear, just excitement. Andy wasn’t right. This was right. I recognized that the second I saw Chris. I wanted to kiss him, to touch his skin, but I resisted trying, because I knew he wasn’t ready. “We live in the same house,” I said, “I couldn’t avoid you.”

He acknowledged the fairness of this statement. “But I was looking for Andy, I thought we might be reconnecting, but it didn’t feel right. He lives here too.” Chris’s features darkened, just slightly, with a twinge of jealousy that couldn’t be helped. He made motion to his shoulder, indicating the length of Andy’s hair. “Long, dark, wavy hair?”

“Yeah,” I said, “with kind of a darkness around the eyes, a little sunken, Slavic looking.”

Chris nodded. “That guy.”

“But it’s not right. He’s not what I want.”

And we continued to stand there, awkwardly, uncomfortably, but understanding it was better than anything else.

Headed Home...

I have been in Chicago and Louisville for the past week. Chicago has three dear friends that love me very much, and though I don't really care for the city, being with them has been immensely healing. Last night, when I got back to Chicago from Louisville, the couple I'm staying with told me that to them, I'm family. The statement came about because when I was here early last week, a package arrived for them while I was gone. Amber asked why I didn't open it, sincerely. "You're family!"

This is the only house that isn't my actual family where there's a picture of me on the fridge, far as I know. I'm sitting on the bed in their guest room right now, the sheets stripped and drying just outside the door. I should have left nearly three hours ago. I'm just going to hit awful traffic now. But my gut is all in knots and I keep tearing up. I'm afraid to go home. I don't know what I'm doing with my life. I don't know what the next few months hold for me, and I'm afraid.

I've been away for a week and it is the happiest, most content I've been for months. Since before Chris and I broke up. I had a week of adult conversations, interactions, situations. I went out, to shows, to bars, to restaurants, and no one was obnoxious, no one acted a fool, no one said any stupid shit to me, and it was eye-opening. I've thought for a bit now that maybe I'm really done with the party life. Like most things I do actually mean eventually, I think I've been saying this for about three years now. I want reasonable, adult people in my life. We can still go to shows, go to bars, go out and drink, but getting shit faced doesn't feel like me anymore. Fucking dudes who have appropriately thick bodies and the right amount of chest hair but are assholes doesn't feel like what I should be doing anymore. You'd think that would have occurred to me some time ago, and it did, about half-way, nearly a year ago, but, fuck.

I think I'm done. I want to focus on me, on healing all the things I'm holding onto that make me difficult to be close to (with the understanding that I am always going to be an intense, difficult person. I know that's who I am, and I don't want to be someone else. I do want some smoother edges, though). My other friend here in Chicago told me I'm much calmer than last we met two years ago. That means a lot to me.

Every year for the past three years I've gone on a trip this time of year that's put huge things into perspective and moved me forward a great deal. Memphis in 2011 pushed me toward forming my band. New Orleans 2012 made me realize just how many toxic people I was keeping in my life. I hope looking back around this time next year, it'll feel like something just as big was created from my travels.

Emotionally exhausted

Today is a heavy heart day. Today, six years ago, a woman who was loved by everyone who ever met her overdosed on heroin. She wasn't found for four days. On top of heartbreak, missing Chris, the stress of not enough money and being at a crossroads with what to do for money in the future, my grandmother dying (she was moved to Sioux City for more tests, the likelihood is she'll never leave the hospital), and a host of other small issues, I'm kind of at my limit here, emotionally.

My friend Johnny is going to come over in a bit and we're going to take my dog for a walk, go see Searching for Sugar Man, and then have a drink. His treat. I need all of that. I'm sad and too in my head today.

I can't remember a time where I felt this emotionally spent and wasn't a wreck. I'm proud of myself, of the technical grace I am taking on these problems with, but there's so much comfort in just letting yourself fall apart. This is so much harder. Curiously, I am almost completely without anxiety.

I am leaving for Chicago on Monday to visit friends, and then I'll be traveling with one of those friends down to Louisville. I hope to have some jewelry made for a potential money-making venture, and I'll see if I can't get my stuff implemented in a couple of shops while I'm gone. I also want to see Louisville because it seems it might be a good place to live in the winter. Or hell, a friend is trying to get me to move to LA. He made a very valid point, that to be a successful artist or any stripe, there are only a few cities in the US that make this truly feasible. NYC, Austin, Nashville and LA. I'd never live in NYC, Austin is far too isolated from anything else that's not-Texas, and Nashville, while in my favorite state in the union, is not a city I have found any attachment to. I've never really been to LA (a layover in the Greyhound station on the way to San Diego doesn't really count) and maybe I would like it.

In any case, I am so excited to leave the city for a week. Right now I haven't got a dime to fund the trip, but fingers crossed, I'll have about $800 coming in this weekend. Otherwise, I'll see my parents on Sunday, and will ask to borrow some money, much as I'd rather not do that. Canceling the trip is not an option, for my emotional well-being. Every spring, I've taken a trip that's reset my brains, for the last three years. Memphis April 2011, New Orleans March 2012, now Louisville.

Uff.

Hole Spackle

My grandma has been very ill. Not quite immediate deathbed ill, but she may not recover, long term, and could be looking at a move to a nursing home if she does pull out of it. Best case scenario is it takes a month or more for her to recover from the pneumonia she's got after aspirating into her lungs last week. Aspirating into her lungs because, even though she'd been in the hospital for three days, weak from wracking coughs and needing several blood transfusions, but had pulled out of it and had been released, she decided to clean her assisted living apartment for FOUR HOURS and then treat herself to a freaking BURRITO afterward. So she went to bed, completely exhausted, and then woke in the middle of the night coughing, went to the bathroom, fell down, aspirated, and couldn't get back up. She was found in the morning lying in her body's refuse, weak and very cold. I mean, fuck yeah, I've got a ballsy, brassy, sarcastic, stubborn as all hell, 96 pound grandmother who gets out of the hospital and decides she's gonna clean and then treat herself to a flippin' burrito, but FUCK YOU grandma for not taking some fucking time to chill the fuck out and watch some tv instead of cleaning and eating a burrito when you've got serious acid reflux and shouldn't be eating that shit ever again.

So, as a result of this, most of my family made the trip to Iowa this weekend to see her, as it's possible this may be the last time we can see her. She's determined to get better, but she's also a stubborn asshole who wasn't eating the food the hospital gave her because it's tepid, unseasoned and gross. Of course you don't wanna eat it, grandma, but you have to. No one wants to eat pureed baked chicken, but you can't even put your dentures in because your bones are wearing through your gums, so just suck it the fuck up and eat for chrissakes so you can get the eff outta there. We basically sat around her bed and bullied her into eating.

Even more unfortunate than dealing with a dying grandmother (my last living grandparent), this weekend I also had to deal with seeing the uncle who did something untoward to me when I was very small, and definitely did many completely inappropriate things to and around me my entire childhood and early adulthood, until finally, I refused to be around him anymore after my cousin's wedding in 2006. That was the last time he was allowed to hug me and touch my ass. That was the last time he was able to sit across a room and take dozens of photos of me, only me, over and over again. With a year of therapy and a lot of work, I haven't had a nightmare about him in over two years.

On the way to Iowa, I found out he'd be down there.

Now, anyone who knows me knows I don't really freeze up. I may get emotional, I may break down, I may get anxious and over-communicate, but for me to become very still and shut down is incredibly rare. And that's what happened when I had to be around him, for years. He'd come near me to hug me, but I wouldn't be able to say a word, I wouldn't be able to move away, I'd just become very still, my throat would go dry, and tears would well up in my eyes and I'd just wait for it to be over. This is pretty common in the sexually abused, I know, and I resent it in myself. I want to fight, to scream, to throw things, but I can't. I want to yell at him, but I just shut down. Maybe this is why I was so angry for so many years, because I couldn't let it out on him.

So, the second I heard he'd be there, I got very still. Tears welled up. My throat went dry. Sitting in the back seat of my parents' car. My mother assured me she wouldn't let him near me. That I'd be safe. But that kind of safety isn't possible when he's there. In fact, the only time I'll ever be truly safe is after he's dead. But, he's an incredibly unhealthy, alcoholic cockroach of a man. He'll never die. At the least, he'll be around another twenty years.

We arrived at my uncle's house in Iowa, and bad uncle wasn't there yet. He was at the hospital, seeing my grandma. I was so worried about seeing him, it was hard to enjoy seeing the family I'd missed. My other uncle piped up immediately to the uncle whose home it was, "What are we going to do to about sleeping arrangements to keep ___ away from Sarah?" I may have audibly sucked in my breath. It was the FIRST time anyone had ever said, in front of anyone else in my family, that there was a problem. Granted, it was also the first time bad uncle and I had been in the same space in over six years. I became very still. My throat went dry. My eyes welled up with tears, and spilled down my cheeks. My mom, dad, two uncles and two aunts discussed what could be done. My mother suggested getting a hotel. Everyone looked at me, asked what I wanted. I spoke in a meek voice that didn't feel like me. "A hotel would make me more comfortable," and tears ran down my face. My aunt came over to me and put her arms around me. It was decided we'd stay in a hotel.

I stood on my guard for over an hour. Afraid to sit down, lest I'd be trapped if he came in suddenly, afraid to wander too far away from my mom and dad. I kept watching the windows, and when he came up the sidewalk, I braced myself for the worst, that he'd go around and hug everyone, and he'd find his way to me, and no one would be able to stop him, and he'd touch me, he'd hug me, he'd touch my ass, and all I'd be able to do was stand there, very still, my throat dry, tears welling up in my eyes.

But he actually stayed far away. From everyone. He said his hellos, hugged a couple of people, but mostly he wandered away and stayed away. Didn't even make eye contact with me. The second he was out of sight and my aunt thought he might be coming around a corner nearer to me, she stiffened and made eye contact, clearly ready to leap in between us if it came to that. I assured her he'd gone away, and we shared a laugh about her vigilance.

And it went this way all weekend, and he even accidentally bumped into me at one point, but by then, even though it was a constantly stressful thing to be around him, I wasn't really affected by it. He was as surprised as I was. And so, I got through it, minute by minute, deep breaths, calming thoughts, and staying very near my mother or my aunt at all times.

The scariest thing about my grandma dying has been the thought that at her funeral, and the family time surrounding that, that I would have to spend more time focused on keeping him away from me than grieving, especially since everyone else would be grieving, and it would be easy for everyone else to not be on their guard for me. But that's just not the way it went this weekend, and I think, when the funeral comes, it won't be easy, I'll still be stressed being near him, but I know I'll have my family to support me.

This is so enormously huge. I have always felt loved by my family, but "love" in my family is always tough, never soft, never tender, and my parents have never been supportive of any aspect of my lifestyle, from my art, writing and music, to my drinking and inability to stay in a relationship for too long. Suddenly, just in the last couple of months, since Chris and I broke up, I feel supported. I feel a love that is soft and tender. I feel like my choices are respected, even if they're not understood.

I feel like a giant fucking hole in me has been filled and I just could not have imagined how incredible it feels.

It did all make me miss Chris enormously, though. He's the first man I've dated who took a very aggressive, masculine stance toward the abuse from my uncle, saying he'd love to kill him for me, to get rid of him, and make the world safer for me. Typically, the response is tenderness and love and apologies for my having gone through it, but wanting to actively do something to make things better for me isn't the response as a general rule. Not in my boyfriends, at least. And Chris was so perfectly wonderful about saying just the right thing to ease my upsets, to soothe me and make me laugh, and make me feel completely loved and safe. I mean, in the last month, he rarely did that, but in the beginning, it was something I'd never known. I wanted so much to contact him, but I resisted it. I keep telling myself, if he and I are to ever have any kind of relationship, even friendship, it's him that needs to come to me. I can't chase him, I can't poke him and convince him that I should be in his life.

In the meantime, that's a hole that'll slowly get smaller and heal on its own. Even though I'm still resisting it, because I worry time is going to let it get so small and so repaired, there's not even room for him to get back in.

Sweet Dreams

I haven't dreamed about Chris in a while. A couple of weeks, at least. Last night, my brain blessed me with three. I say blessed because each one was really, really nice. After I woke, I laid in bed for another half an hour in a liminal state, relishing warm sensations that happily stayed with me in waking and didn't dissolve into sadness that it was a reality that cannot and very likely will not ever again be attained.

The first was an easy 50/50 combination of an ad in a magazine that I saw yesterday, a couple, sitting on the edge of a sailboat or other sailing vessel, her in a stark white bikini, him sitting behind her, holding her tightly against him, plus one of my favorite Chris memories, which was the last time I was at his place in early January. I was reorganizing my suitcase, sitting on the floor in his bedroom, when a wave of sad came over me and I poutily said something to him (he was in the living room) about how I just felt like crying. He stopped whatever he was doing and basically came rushing in to wrap his long limbs around me (we are the man and woman version of the same body; long arms, long legs, short torso) from behind, sitting on the floor with me, and he just squeezed me, his arms wrapped around my stomach and chest, and I wept a little, and then started laughing, and then kissed him, and thanked him. I remember even in that moment, I thanked him for being him, that that was the kind of thing he would do, and that I loved him for it. Had he not been so sweet to do so, it's likely the sadness would have lingered for an hour or two. He was always good at diffusing those feelings.

So in the dream, I was wearing white cotton panties and a white bra, nothing else, and he squeezed me like that from behind. It was a reunion moment, and as he wistfully laughed into my ear and my body tingled at his touch, he said, "I missed about 70% of you." I thought that seemed a fair enough amount to miss.

The next dream found us in college, and I received a phone call from the Dr. Seuss Foundation (yes, my brain made up a foundation that carries out the continuing publication of children's stories in a similar vein as Seuss) asking me if I had any completed work or ideas that would fit into their publishing schematic, as they'd seen some of my other work (?) and thought I'd be good in their company. I hung up the phone (a landline, like I seriously was in college), and came slinking into the dorm room (which I apparently lived in alone, as there was a single queen sized bed in there, with a man in it). I leapt on top of the half-sleeping man (the sheets, the comforter, were all notably white, as my bra and panties had been white, and the room was full of sunshine), and told him what had happened through the comforter that was draped over his face. I mentioned the book I'd always wanted to write, based on the first story I ever wrote at the age of four, called Robbie the Hummingbird (true story, and Chris and I had talked about working on this together), and I snuzzled into his ear, through his long hair (it wasn't exactly *Chris* in the dream, he was somewhere between Chris and Andy), and said, "But I'll need an artist to do the book with me. And where, would I find someone like that? I don't know any artists!" and we both giggled and pulled back the covers and started kissing. I remember thinking that something was off, that I didn't know this man in my bed, that his features weren't quite right, that he didn't seem connected to me, nor I to him. And then the hair shortened, the nose became smaller, and it was Chris. We attacked one another with love freshly renewed, and my lord, it was the sweetest, most sensual kissing and touching (but not exactly sexual). It was the sort of making out where you somehow feel clean afterward and almost feel you might never need to bathe again.

The third dream, a lady I've met recently who must vaguely remind me of one of Chris's exes (the only one I actually have met, who is a friend of Lindsay's), was courting Chris. I found a notebook with her musings on this (again, notable whiteness in the paper), and I was a bit hurt. This dream is fuzzy at that point. I know I confronted her, and she apologized and said she didn't know how much I cared for Chris. There wasn't much resolution other than that.

Still, I woke up refreshed, and that liminal half hour was like a milk bath. Would that there was a goddamned thing I could do to facilitate any of that feeling between us again...

The Letter I Wrote Today

In conjunction with not hearing from Lindsay for more than three weeks now, I've received a couple messages from a woman I used to consider a pretty close friend. She has, over the past two and a half years, tried several times to learn why I had stopped speaking to her. The thing is, by the time I officially ceased all communication with her, I'd been pulling away for months, and I feel like the reasons I was doing that should have been all too obvious to her. The message she wrote me today inspired me to respond, since it seemed clear that at the very least, she was in denial about any reasons I had to stop having her in my life.

Because the lack of communication from Lindsay is happening at the same time as this woman trying to pull me back in, I've been examining whether there are similarities I should be making note of. I'm not seeing anything notable. The breakup with Chris, despite being painful, has been very adult, all things considered. No one is writing mean, drunken text messages or leaving 4 a.m. voicemails, and there hasn't really been anything posted online intentionally aimed at maiming the other party (Chris's "I did whippits and made out with people at a party and it was the best time I've ever had!!!" post notwithstanding, and I'm trying to hold onto the slim hope that he was really being a dumb boy and didn't consider that I'd see it, but it seems fairly impossible that he wasn't trying to get me to 'go away' in a passive aggressive manner. Just the same, the incident gave me a good reason to delete and block him on fb, as that kind of shit just isn't something I want to see. And, for fuck's sake, dude. You're turning 36 soon. You were too old to write a poem to your girlfriend on your two month-aversary, but you're cool with doing whippits? 

In any case, looking back, there were several passive aggressive instances that I didn't pay much mind to, now I'm seeing that that is, unfortunately, an aspect of his personality when he feels cornered or can't articulate himself in a positive, adult manner [sorry for the lengthy aside]), so I'm hard pressed to feel like that's the whole of it. Someone suggested that it's possible he asked her to not speak to me, which would be... weird.

Anyway. This is the response I gave her, and I'm pretty happy with the diplomacy of it, considering that I really don't like her and have no intention of having her in my life. This is about the level of shit it takes for me to oust someone from my life.

Xxxxxx,

I haven't spoken to you in about three and a half years for several reasons. It started when I was dating D. You wanted us to get together, and then you pretty constantly shit-talked him when we did. It wasn't very respectful to your friendship with him, and it made me very uncomfortable that you'd want that for me. Then, as B and I became better friends, I was really not impressed with the way you treated him. I know that things are different inside of a relationship, and he could have been blowing things out of proportion, but from the outside, it seemed like you were using him and abusing his love so that you would have a safe place to hang your hat. This only became more obvious as you continued to be involved with other people (J, namely) and string them along as well. Then, when B acted on your "open" relationship for the first time, you flipped out. Yes, he did it in your bed, and I understand that was a violation, but it really seemed like you were telling him he couldn't do what you'd been doing the whole while.

So by this point, I had already backed off from you, and was more or less avoiding communicating with you. The last (several) straws were the summer of 2009 when you became involved with S, L, and finally P.

That made four people you'd dated/had sex with who were people I had recently been involved with, in the course of just over a year. P in particular was deeply upsetting to me, as everyone in my sphere was perfectly aware of how deeply I felt for him. I found it enormously distasteful, and it hurt quite a bit. I felt betrayed by both of you; that was the third time I'd caught P in a lie about sleeping with someone I was friends with. [Editorial note lest it sound like I was obsessed with P; he and I had an on again, off again but never committed "thing" for three  and a half years, which finally ended in 2011, though we have now overcome all that mess and are good friends now]

While I think you are a woman with a great many interesting things to say, and I know you're a lot of fun to be around, these are things I won't over look. I think they speak altogether too much about your character, and that is why I do not consider you a friend, and why you shouldn't continue to spend time trying to get back in my good graces.

Take Care,
-Sarah.

Heart Tests

Some might call this torture, but it's a simple way for me to remind myself that I can, and do, move on.

I'll listen to a mix cd/playlist an ex made me, usually the one prior to the one that's hurting now. Or that I made for them. Or I'll listen to an ex's band. In this case, Andy's music, and the (really fucking awesome) mix cds he made for me. (Seriously, the guy was amazing at making a mix cd. Best I've ever gotten by a long shot, and the sort of mixes that you throw them on in mixed company and everyone loves them. Plus, the "love" mix he made me once, entitled "I'm Still Your Fag" after the Broken Social Scene song of the same name included on the disc, is quite possibly the best love mix ever made in the history of love mixes. So good I've made copies of it for other people who then mine it for their own mix cd making uses.) (And, notably, I don't listen to anything Thor related for this exercise; he didn't have a band, and he never made me a mix, and the mix I made him is something I play at work almost daily. The guy upset me so deeply in the moment and now it's just all okay.)

And sometimes, it still hurts, even on top of the current heart hurt. But most of the time, I feel nothing but enjoyment of the music.

Feeling Impotent

A sure sign my brains are rotting:

Bad dream about bad touch uncle. Haven't had one in years. And it wasn't that bad, but he was there, at a family gathering, and the air was hot and damp with summer, the lighting was bad, everything was shadowy and uncertain, and I could see him, sitting there in a recliner. It may have been the 80s, I felt young. He was wearing a ringer shirt; red around the collar and sleeves.

I wondered why he was there, and why no one was doing anything about it.

So I slunk around, afraid to be seen by him, afraid to engage with anyone because I didn't want to upset anybody.

I don't remember if the dream would have been before or after I woke at 5 a.m., panicking a bit and fretting over the fact that I've not heard a word from Chris's sister, my friend of nearly nine years, despite a couple of emails and two texts, in the three weeks since I wrote the first email.

But it seems to work either way. In general, I'm feeling pretty impotent. She avoids conflict (though I'm not even sure what the conflict would be here, so that compounds my impotence), and I've done as much as I should without being pushy.

I'm a doer and a planner. I like to take an active role. There's nothing to be done, and nothing to plan for but two vacations that seem altogether too far off. A month away. I'm too sad to do things at home so I just sit on the couch. I've lost momentum, I am mostly coping with loss, doping myself with Friday Night Lights and Downton Abbey and numbing movies because there isn't the energy in my limbs to do anything else.

I should clean out my juicer. Take out the garbage. But today is not a day where those things will get done. It's taken about all I've got to convince myself to sit down for a bit and start a painting, which I'm all ready for, the tools are in front of me...

So, paint.

In Love

I fall in love easily, but I also stay in love for a long time, typically well after the relationship is over. If I make a decision like that about someone, it's because it's true and it stays true. It took me over six years to move on from my first love, Jared, who I'd only been with for a month and a half (with periodic make out sessions every couple of years after). The end of love came abruptly, a thought, out of nowhere, when I woke up one morning in Paris in 2001.

"His kisses are too soft."

And that was it. If I don't enjoy kissing you, it doesn't make much sense to be in love with you.

That realization won't ever come toward Chris. His kisses were exactly what twenty years of kissing has taught me is perfection. And we had a perfect rhythm from the first instant.

My high school "Psychology" teacher (in quotes because she was mostly there as volleyball coach) once said, "You can't be in love with more than one person at a time." For the longest time, I regurgitated that pabulum as if it were gospel. It's been years since I thought that were true, and yesterday, as I sat at the intersection of Hennepin and Franklin after my therapy session, thinking about love and my longing for a "true," lasting love, I considered, again, that statement.

Love, being a chemical reaction to a battery of things, pheromone, timing, proximity, and hundreds of other things that you just know you "like" or "love" about someone, it makes not one iota of flipping sense that you can only be "in love" with one person at a time.

I say this because there are people I know I will always be in love with, on some level. It's not sexual, though it is romantic, in a way, and comes from a place of bonding that just can't be broken. 

My therapist asked me why I love Chris, when he's done several things that are a bit fucked up and could be grounds for moving on. After thinking about it, I made this statement:

"When Chris is trying, when he's in it, he's everything I want, he's the one for me. But he isn't trying, he doesn't want to try, he's 'done,' so he's not the one for me."

It's just a matter of reconciling the disconnect between the two versions of Chris. He is ugly and immature in his darkness, anger and distance. But when he is focused and in it, he is, as I've always told him, a magickal fucking unicorn.

Time will tell how my feelings play out, and whether he and I will ever reconnect on any level, but at this moment, I just need to take everything day by day and not let my fears or hurt dictate my behavior. Right now, at least, it's not time to let go of being in love.

This Poem Kills Platitudes

My friend Juni's father wrote this poem. He has died, and she wasn't even aware that he'd written poetry.

The words here, the simplicity of how they're written, the rawness of it, the aching vulnerability, I've just got tears streaming down my face.

This is what love is. This is how you love. Belief or acceptance of anything else won't get you very far.

And fuck Chris for not wanting to try.

***

I have a need for you to be what I make you.
It's very difficult for me
to let you come to me
on your own,
as only what you are

and

I have a need to be what you want to make me.
It's very difficult for me
to come to you
on my own, 
as only what I am.

I am afraid

Maybe,
if I give you my fear
the way will open
for us to come together,
as only what we are.

I would like to try. ~Liam Grimm

Hurts Donut

Some days are worse than others, and this has been the worst in two weeks. I hurt everywhere, my heart, my guts, even a dull ache that extends into my knees for some reason, that seems to be attached to emotion rather than a physical ailment.

Every few minutes I have to talk myself out of communicating with him in some way. Every few minutes I have to give myself a pep talk that I need to be patient. Some shift for the better is on the horizon, it can't get worse now, I just need to be calm, and patient, and think good thoughts and distract myself and...

not think about how much I love this person who doesn't want to be with me.

Andy Reflections

Earlier this week, I looked at old emails from Andy, after he'd broken up with me about two months into our relationship. The circumstances were different, he was conflicted between me and his ex of five years who wanted him back. He loved me, admitted it freely, and was florid about how he knew he was ruining a beautiful thing with he and I. But, he also stated, in very plain terms, that he was done with us. That he didn't want a relationship. Not with me, not with anyone, that he wanted time to figure himself out and become more stable.

This sent me into a tailspin, but, after I'd reached an operatic head (far, far more melodramatic and anxiety fueled than anything with Chris has been in this post-breakup scenario), and he asked me to stop talking to him, I did that, and I calmed down, found a parcel of peace on my own, and tried to make amends with the fact that it seemed he and I were not going to work out.

About three weeks later, we were back together. I look back on those emails, and on the blog posts I wrote here while this was happening, and there are more parallels than differences. I was just as convinced then as I am now that things won't work out in favor of a reunion with Chris. Perhaps even moreso, as there wasn't 1,729 miles between Andy and I. There was only a quick drive down 35W from NE Minneapolis to get to my home, where we talked, reconciled, made love, and he took me to Tuesdays with Toneski at the 501.

In the reconciliation, things were never easy with Andy. He was always uncertain about me, about us, about whether he wanted to be in a relationship at all. So the next nine and a half months with him were  consistently in turmoil. It was a lot of him trying to break up with me, me letting him go a little, him coming over to play Scrabble, us making love, reforging our bonds, and repeating the process over and over. It was a constant game of "Go Away, Come Here." It was never stable, it was rarely in a state of contentment. I was always trying to shoehorn functionality into something that wasn't ever going to find its stride.

Ironically, our most stable period was the two months right before we broke up. We were as happy as we'd been in the first couple months of our relationship, but our sex life was flagging. I know myself well enough to know that when I lose interest sexually, there is something very wrong in the relationship that I just haven't figured out yet. It took me about three weeks to realize what I had probably known, somewhere, all along. Andy never loved me as much as I loved him, and he never would. This would never end up being marriage, kids. He was about to apply to colleges to start a graduate program in poetry(!), and I knew I didn't want to be with him for that journey, and he didn't want me there. This was an obstacle we couldn't work our way around.

So, on the one year anniversary of our first date, September 6th, 2010, we had a planned breakup. We went to a Twins game, held hands, snuggled, went to dinner at a nice restaurant, shared a bottle of wine, had sparkling conversation and love and intimacy, and then I drove him home, we went to his room, talked for a bit, kissed, cried, and I left.

Looking back on the whole of our relationship, I see something I don't think I'd fight for, now. Looking at Chris and I, it's different, because he and I were much happier, and much more functional in our three months than Andy and I ever were. Andy was a good boyfriend, and I was a good girlfriend to him, but as great as my love was for him, I don't look back on it with any wistfulness. Chris and I connected in a way I hadn't ever known, and continued to, even in the worst of it, when I knew he was going to end things.

Yet, is that something that can be repaired? I feel very ill at ease with shoehorning anything with him. I don't want to fight against any current on a consistent basis. I want a relationship that works because the person I'm with is as in it with me as I am with them. And, the fact is, he gave up on us. The fact is, no matter what issues he had with me, with us, that led him to believe it wasn't something he wanted to work for, the fact is, he's the sort of person that gives up instead of solving the problem. I am not that kind of person. I thought our love was worth it. I still do. He was my partner in crime, truly, and it felt amazing, and I won't settle for anything less than that.

1,729 miles will prevent any hope of that. He won't decide this is a good idea, even if he wakes up one day and is filled, again, with love for me. The distance will always be enough of a problem for him that he will believe it can't work. And if that's what he believes, then it can't work. I was not at my best trying to hustle money to see him, or to pay partially to get him here. That was $1,000 a month just to travel to Portland or get him here. I was at my best while with him, in his arms, looking at him, realizing what was important and how much I loved him, but the distance makes it so those moments become foggy fast. Even with only three weeks between visits.

I am ambivalent. I want the love to fade, so I can move on. I also want him to call me and tell me, "What the hell. Let's see if this can't fly. Mind if I move in with you?"

On marriage and kids

The talk about marriage and kids came early. Before any I love you was uttered. And, though he was drunk and doesn't remember it, he was the first to say I love you, too. Or, at least, that he was "in love" with me.

I was sober, lying in bed, he texted that he was sad, and was going to get progressively more drunk. I called him, and we talked for what ended up being three hours, but felt like mere minutes. We told stories, I talked about things like how I find dimes in conspicuous places, when it seems like I'm on a particular path toward something, and I attribute them to my deceased grandfather, Dale. He asked if I'd found a dime the day I met him.

I had. In the middle of the bathroom rug at his sister's place, where I'd been staying. I remember picking it up, as I always do, and relishing its thin metallic feel, smiling softly to myself, wondering what the day had in store.

At some point in that conversation, the phrase, "I wouldn't be in love with you unless..."was spoken. It took my breath for a minute, and I almost said I love you to him, as I'd wanted to over and over in every conversation we'd been having the prior two and a half weeks. But, I knew he was drunk, and I knew it wasn't time. I knew, in the morning, he probably wouldn't remember he'd said that.

In that same conversation, a propos of nothing, he stated, "We need to get started on having kids early. I don't want to be an old dad." I laughed, and it scared me a little. Even though I'm comfortable with moving "fast," I am also accustomed to people feeling fast for me and it scaring them, so they project that fear onto me and tell me over and over that I'm moving too fast, yet ignore the fact that they're putting out exactly the same language and feeling that I am. It's unfair, and as of yet, I can't figure out a way to handle it. He asked me, at one point, if I didn't think that he and I were "eerily similar." It came via text, and honestly, I balked at the notion. I thought about the things I'd noticed already, that he could grow angry quickly, that he was horribly stubborn... and then realized I could say the same of myself. After, I started to tally up the ways in which we were similar, and it was true. He was me, with a penis. I started to tell people that when they asked me what he was like.

Chris, seemed so cutely sure of himself and his feelings (and it was only in that one conversation that he was drunk), even though he admitted it also scared him. He'd say things like, "If you can guess how many cavities I have, I'll marry you." The answer was 0. I guessed wrong. I wasn't saying anything like that. I'd talk about marriage, about kids, in the abstract, that I wanted to have them, that I wouldn't discount having them with him, but he was interviewing me. He was probing me for information, for things that compiled his list of what he wants in a wife, in the mother of his kids.

We were sitting at a restaurant, about to go for a walk along the Mississippi when he was here before Thanksgiving. He smiled at me, in the sunset light streaming through the windows and asked if I'd want family dinner every night. I told him of course, that that was the way I'd grown up and that's what I'd want for my family once I had one. He nodded. "Good. That's really important to me."

And there were the other times, like the moment when we were talking about pregnancy and how I wouldn't abort if I got pregnant because I'm 34 and it seems silly to me that I wouldn't keep it, even though my life isn't ready for a kid. I know I'd be able to figure things out pretty fast. But, I said, if I did find out that there was a major birth defect, or some terrible illness, I wouldn't hesitate to abort. He grinned, and high fived me. It was one of the many things that could have been a touchy subject, but was not. We were just on the same page.

He told me, too, when he was here, on a night where we went out dancing and I found that he was the first person I was involved with that I could actually dance with and I was elated, and he was elated, and he was adorably listing, in my ear, over the loud new wave and 80s hits, all the reasons he loves me, and he said something about marriage, and I laughed at him and asked him how long he needed to "know" about me, and without missing a beat, he said, "Six months."

I don't know where that kind of talk got lost. I don't where it was, or what happened that made him just give up on us. Because, as far as I can tell, as far as I remember, we never stopped being compatible. Even when we were fighting, we worked things out efficiently, and were able to look at one another with sincere love, affection, and respect. Something dark and significant happened in his head that took his heart from me, bit by bit, and he just let it happen. And I am just at a loss to understand it.

I've been in relationships where I thought about marriage and kids. I've talked about those relationships here. But none of those people thought the same of me. None of those people talked about our potential kids by name (I'd like to name a boy Ivan Jack), made jokes with me about having "witch twins" after passing street names Cremona and Bersota in Seattle, and none of them, certainly, drew a fucking picture of a girl he had a dream about that he decided was our daughter.

Scrabble-less

This gal can't play Scrabble anymore. It was such an intrinsic part of mine and Andy's relationship, it feels like a betrayal to engage in it with anyone else. He beat me every time of probably a hundred games in a year, excepting four. He was a shitty loser, blaming bad tiles or a failed strategy for his loss, which pretty much made my wins moot since it had nothing to do with my own skill and everything to do with his lack of it, obviously. But I went into every game with him knowing that's the way it would be, and I didn't play to win, I played to play with him. Because it was two, three, four hours of listening to records, sipping coffee or wine, with breaks for lingering love looks and smooch breaks.

He's got in his custody our Scrabble score book, which has the scoring of each one of our games since mid-October, 2009. Sometimes, while the other would be taking his turn, the other would start a drawing, and we'd take turns adding to it. The book is full of our insane doodles, some sweet, some creepy, some a commentary on the relationship at large. Last we discussed the book, post breakup, he said he'd been playing Scrabble with friends, but hadn't, and wouldn't, use the book with anyone else. I hope that remains true. In that book, and its designated use, and the fact that he's still got it in his possession, even though we currently cannot bear to be around one another, well, in that book is something akin to hope.

I miss Scrabble so much. And by Scrabble, I mean Andy.