Timeline So Far

November 2

December 10

December 20

March 25

May 3

May 13

June 30

July 2

July 8

July 23

Clockwork

What does it take to have a stable, reliable, predictable, semi-romantic arrangement in my life?

Am I asking for the moon here?

This was us

“

I once knew a man who came on very strong at the beginning of relationships, but couldn’t seem to help closing his heart as soon as a woman had opened hers. I have heard that kind of behavior referred to as an “addiction to the attraction phase” in relationships. This man did not maliciously go around hurting women. He sincerely wanted to be in a genuine, committed relationship. What he lacked were the spiritual skills that would enable him to settle down in one place long enough to build anything solid with an equal partner. As soon as he saw human faults and weaknesses in a woman, he would run. The narcissistic personality is looking for perfection, which is a way to make sure that love NEVER has a chance to blossom. The initial high can be so heady, so tantalizing, that the real work of growth which needs to follow the initial attraction phase can seem too dull, too hard to commit to. As soon as the other person is seen to be a real human being, the ego is repelled and wants to find somewhere else to play.

At the end of a relationship with someone like this, we feel as though we’ve taken cocaine. We had a fast and exciting ride, and it felt at the time like something meaningful was happening. Then we crashed and realized that nothing meaningful had happened at all. It was all made up. Now all we have is a headache, and we can see that this kind of thing isn’t good, isn’t healthy, and we don’t want to do it again.

But there’s a reason why we’re attracted to relationships such as this. We were drawn to the illusion of meaning. Sometimes someone who has nothing to offer in a real relationship can come on like they’re offering the world. They are so dissociated from their OWN feelings that they have become highly skilled performers, unconsciously playing whatever part our fantasies prescribe. But the responsibility for our pain still remains OUR own. If we hadn’t been looking for a cheap thrill, we wouldn’t have been vulnerable to the lie.

How could we have been so stupid? That’s the question we always ask ourselves at the end of these experiences. But once we’d had enough of them, we admit to ourselves that we weren’t really stupid AT ALL. We suspected this was a drug. The problem was, we wanted it. We saw exactly what the game was with this person, usually within the first fifteen minutes, yet we were so attracted to the high, we were willing to PRETEND we didn’t see it, for just a night, or a week, or however long it lasted. The fact that someone said to us, “You are so fabulous. You’re such a wonderful woman. This is such a great date. How lucky a guy is to get to date you,” when he’s only known you for an hour, is a blinking red light to any thinking woman. The problem is, the depth of our wounds can be so great—we can be SO hungry to hear those words, because deep down we suspect that they’re untrue—that hearing them can cause us to put aside all rational consideration. When we’re starved, we’re desperate.

”

—	Marianne Williamson

(No) Comparison

I find that there’s never a lack of things to talk about with Asher. Either he’s on a 15-minute tangent about articles he’d read that week or I’m on a half-hour ramble about some pop culture minutiae that only he would understand. Whether we’re on chat, phone, or in person, the conversation doesn’t stop. Unless he interrupts me with a kiss, in which case, we’ll just continue the dialogue while tearing each other’s clothes off anyway. Afterward, he lifts himself off me, gently tips over to a side of the bed, and becomes the big spoon to my little spoon. It’s what he always does. My body used to tense up at that. 

The vibe between us flows easily. I’m surprised by how comfortable I feel around him. The last six months of constant interaction with Chance wrung my nerves out, shattered any sense of security or awareness of our situation to the point where I would second-guess myself on second-guessing myself. With Asher, I’m not confused or uncertain. I know where we stand. His person—and everything that comes with that—is a known entity devoid of mystery or speculation. I could weep for the sheer relief he brings with him. 

In bed, he’s attentive in ways that Chance never was. I see him quietly file away every gasp and breathy whisper that slips from my mouth as his long, clever fingers rub little half-circles between my legs. He remembers what I enjoy, how I liked to be touched, and doesn’t switch to his preferences until I give permission. To be sure, the hours spent in his room aren’t the desperate, frenzied couplings I had with Chance, but maybe I’m tired of that. Maybe this is what I need right now, for now. Not love, not nothing either. 

Companionship.

I'm going to trust my judgement. I have to trust my judgement.

A Year to the Day

This was the week I started talking to him last year.

All through May, I was really happy. I was surprised by how happy I was, actually, at meeting someone who wanted to know me more and wanted to scale the walls I've raised over the years. I was so happy that I didn't even recognize the emotion for what it was until he vanished for two months. And when he came back, hat in hand, apology email in my inbox, I waited two weeks before resuming communication. The sexual undercurrent soon returned as well. Again, I fell into that happy, swooning period in August where I knew something had to give.

Labor Day Weekend was exactly what I wished for. The subsequent weeks were not. Looking back, I should have permanently cut my losses over our phone call in the beginning of October. I gave him an ultimatum that I reneged on after barely another month of silence, his absence a thrumming presence in my head while mine must have hardly registered in his. By then, he had already moved on from whatever he may have felt in the initial time of knowing me, but I was only just sinking into my obsessive, hopeless mire. Everyone called it but me.

The slip-slide into sin occurred in the first two weeks of November, which I pretended to be shocked by when I knew perfectly well that he would be willing to keep me around as an easy, reliable sex friend and nothing else. I held on to our friends-with-benefits arrangement through December and January (all the while juggling multiple personal/familial crises) because I couldn't bear to have him leave (again). That's but the foremost reason. The rest of my excuses are too numerous and shameful to name just yet. I could only watch myself make false promises to stop doing what I was doing. 

I wasn't strong enough to break things off. He took the decision from my hands by accepting a job offer in another state and moved at the end of February, but not before meeting me one last time (or so I pretended.) We spent an evening in a hotel room--which sounds better than what the room looked like--and were each other's firsts. I committed his every groan and lip-bite to memory, filed away the filthy things he murmured, savored the kisses he dropped on my cheeks, forehead, and hair the way one would savor a tender whip-lash on their back. I cried when the hours ran out; he did not.

That ought to have been our goodbye. I had the chance to fade out gracefully, but persisted in texting, IMing, emailing--longing for somebody who had long stopped wanting me. The meeting I instigated a week ago was my wake-up call.

-----

A lot about ending this hurts. The emptiness. The loss of something familiar. The knowledge that I tried to build a connection with someone that went beyond sex, and failed in a spectacular fashion. The fear that I'll take a very long time to replicate what and how I felt with him. The regret of realizing what could have been if I'd only said or done a thing differently at such and such point in time. The hard lump I have to swallow when reminiscing about last may and acknowledging that for a little while, I was very happy in a way that I haven't been with anyone else thus far. 

Somewhere in the middle of those slow, wretched months, I was in love, and he did not feel the same. 

That's why I am moving on and taking time to love myself before making any further moves.

Judging by how often I find myself in compromising positions with men in my car, I should probably sterilize the interior.

I found out he was back in town the day of, which is say yesterday afternoon. What did I think would happen after grabbing a seemingly innocent drink?

I had my fun though--and so did he. Pretty sure I was going to crash while I was driving back to the car deck, but he swatted me away every time I tried to pull his hand out of my pants.

I made him pay for that later.

I miss him. Goddamn him. I miss him.

Every time I think about sitting down to write about him my chest gets too tight, and I put off the slow process of drawing out the poison for another day.

Self-Portrait

When I see myself in the mirror every morning, a few breakouts are sprinkled along my hairline and between my eyebrows. The shadowy circles under my eyes have been carved on from poor sleeping habits and anxiety. My feet shift restlessly, rough, calloused heels rubbing against each other. As I change shirts, I can’t help but study my armpits, the skin there darker than the rest of me, nearly the same shade as the sensitive flesh of my innermost thighs. Sometimes, my hands wander and gingerly prod the additional breakouts erratically scattered across my back. Sometimes I scratch the places where they’ve scabbed. Then the underwear slides past my knees, and I have another area to scrutinize.

My mons pubis is discolored and scarred from years of plucking, pulling, and other painful hair-removal methods. I hated the way it looked when I had just begun puberty. All through high school, I systematically groomed myself, breaking the skin often because I was careless so it’d bleed, scab, scar, and score yet another mark on the tender triangle of flesh between my legs. I don’t exactly volunteer this information right before I sleep with someone, but I usually try to dim the lights by the time the both of us are naked. 

None of my partners have ever breathed a single comment about any of the things just mentioned though. I have moments of doubt, in the split second their eyes flick down to drink in the sight of me, that they’ll see what I see, spot what I spot, hate what I used to hate but now merely agonize over. They never say a word. They open their arms, draw me close, kiss the curve of my neck, and my insecurities fade into the background again. 

Maybe they never notice them. Maybe they do, and don’t care. Maybe they see them and like them for what they are: every scar, every mark, every scab, every discolored dot of flesh—a collection of tiny (im)perfections that coalesce into someone flawed. Like me. Maybe none of it matters once the clothes come off because there are telltale faults on the landscape of their bodies, and when I see them, I realize how quickly they’re forgotten in the wake of exploring other secret corners. 

The older I get, the less important my body issues become. Eventually none of this will mean anything at all.