has been forever.

It's been a long time. So long that I don't think anyone reads this blog anymore, so I should be completely safe in posting my thoughts, names unchanged, as always. Also I felt it was time to add something from that last post, otherwise it will seem as if I've had my feelings hurt for over a year. 

Today Malcolm and I went out for my birthday. I was hoping it would be a friendly occasion. I've been slowly sitting out the tempestuous phase of my singlehood, and now it seems to be nearly concluded. I don't get terribly lonely at night. I don't crave attention from men (though I enjoy it when it comes) and I'm not fixated on getting into another relationship. I've managed to switch my focus from what I need to do to get into another relationship, to what I need to do to complete myself. And I've been so busy lately that the whole thing has become a moot point. In fact, sitting across from Malcolm today, I found myself posing the question, "Why? Why should we get back together?" 

I've always found Jarrett's lack of interest in getting into a relationship rather unsettling, but it seems I'm coming around to his way of thinking. The only thing that makes me nervous is the knowledge that there will never be a rational motivation for getting into a relationship. Feeling independent of the need to relate to someone romantically is all very well and good, but I don't want to rid myself of it forever, and I don't know how to preserve an on-switch - much less how to install a mechanism for turning it on. 

Over dinner (which was excellent) the conversation turned to our past relationship. This was not ideal, but I thought it might be best to get this stuff off our chests. Having been in Malcolm's position (but with far fewer opportunities to express my feelings) I remember the burden of unspoken things... regrets, resolves, emotions. I wanted to give him a chance to say those things, just one chance, and hell, why not indulge myself. So we talked about things we regretted in our relationship, lessons we had learned from it, etc. Unfortunately, this led to Malcolm making an argument that we should get back together. I tried to express that I was not interested in this option, but I didn't want to be cold about it, and Malcolm chose not to be dissuaded. I chose to be honest with him, and admitted that I have lingering feelings for him, but I made it clear I didn't see that as sufficient reason to get back together. We have leftover emotions. So what? Those are related to the past. They are not an argument for the future. Assuming we're starting fresh, why should we get together? Who would profit from it? What purpose would it serve? And we are not starting fresh, we would be building on the foundation of a demolished relationship. What then? 

It was hard to say these things to Malcolm's face. I know he's changed. I'm not completely unmoved by his assertion that things would be different this time. Since the chances involved would mean he would treat me extremely well, something I have a great weakness for, it wasn't easy. But my standards have changed - again. There was a time when I wanted to be worshipped. Now I would rather be esteemed, as by an equal. This changes everything. It's not conducive with dating men I don't respect or feel challenged by. I respect Malcolm, but I don't see myself feeling challenged by him. I would get bored, or complacent. 

It is not fun having this attitude. Part of me was addicted to the rush of falling in love; the feeling of getting carried away, the taking of risks, the adrenalin, the pheromones. Now I'm turning down my favourite drug and frankly it is making me cranky, even though I am completely aware that this is the better choice. 

We left the restaurant and got gelato (and it too was excellent) and walked back to Glendon from Bayview and Eglinton. The second-to-last play in the Fridge Festival (the first set, before the intermission, was mediocre at best) was about an English major who falls in love with an Econ major, who starts writing poetry because of her and becomes famous. Later he experiences deep regret over mistakes he made in the way he treated her. There was much more to the story, but I picked out those bits because they reminded me of Malcolm and I and it was rather uncomfortable. 

After the Fridge Festival, Malcolm took me on a walk to show me the slow way up from the Glendon gym so i wouldn't always have to take the stairs after my workouts. I allowed him to do this despite the fact that I know the route quite well because I suspected he was trying to protract our time together and if he had some purpose or destination in mind, I thought I might as well go along with it. Nothing monumental happened, except that he brought up the subject of our getting back together again and I changed the subject several times. He had switched tactics from trying to change my mind to trying to get me to take time and think it over. The play we had seen seemed to him to be the perfect argument in favour of us getting back together. I did not feel the same way. 

Malcolm walked me up to my room to get his bag, which he had stowed there, and we said goodbye. He opened his arms for a hug, so we hugged, and as I pulled away he took my hands and made his last plea. I had been hoping this would not happen. I don't respond well to physical contact, by which I mean I respond extremely well to physical contact so I usually avoid it in situations as charged as this one. Malcolm's argument was simply that he was not happy without me, and I had already confessed (a week ago, when I was desperately lonely) that I wasn't happy either. So we should get together and be happy. It was at this point that my inner equilibrium got knocked off. Malcolm had successfully created a moment charged with emotion and tension. He pulled me in for another hug, kissed my cheek, and left. I made no attempt to disguise my discomfort and awkwardness. All of this was thoroughly interspersed with significant pauses and meaningful looks. If he had done the classic waiting-to-see-if-she-calls-me-back move, he would have heard the door close and then a distinct thump as I hit my head against it from the other side. It only needed a wrong move or two, less resolution, more sexual tension, to go seriously awry. 

Tonight, a man who has been in love with me for more than two years proposed to try the whole thing again, this time with more sensitivity, more maturity, better communication, far better treatment, fewer narcotics. I said no. I am awesome. 

my dream.

I hadn't been eating in awhile so that probably explains it.

Last evening our last prayer group was with the high school serving ones and that probably explains it too. 

But this is what I dreamed.

It was one of those time-lapse dreams and a lot of time passed and a few different places got merged into one. But I was in a high school we were using for Ignite (at least it felt like Ignite) and it was also my university campus. And I met this really nice guy somehow and over a long period of time that got squished into a few minutes, we kept bumping into each other, and then talking a bit, shyly, and as we got to know each other better I learned he was really outdoorsy and we walked around in a forest while he identified different flora and fauna for me. And there was something with a horse; I think I learned horseback riding. Anyways, there was one moment where we were hugging in the high school hallway and who came walking by but Nathan himself.

I was astonished to see him in my dream. I've never dreamed about him, not that I remember, not even when there was reason to; and I haven't had him on my mind for a long, long time. But there he was.

He came up from behind this guy, so I saw his reaction. He stopped, took a second look, and came over to intervene. I think he was taller than usual; he just stood there with his most condescending Nathan face, like we had just asked him the difference between acoustic and electric, and he said to the guy, "No, no, no. I think I know what's going on here, and I get it and everything, but trust me - you don't want this one. She's really unhappy right now." 

and I was like what the heck? I wasn't mad. Just astonished. Even asleep, I knew it was really weird for Nathan to interfere like that. He wasn't in love with me, he wasn't jealous, he didn't want to take me away from this guy. He was trying to give him some good advice; he was trying to tell him to stay away because I was bad news.

So I said, "What?...no, I am happy."

and he said, "No you're not." And then he added, "have you talked to your sister Mary recently?"

and what he seemed to be saying was that he had spoken to Mary and she told him something which led him to believe I wasn't happy. 

and then he walked away and the guy walked away and I was alone in the hallway, incredibly confused.

and I was so confused that I woke myself up.

weird dream. 

questions:

Why am I trying to tell myself that I'm unhappy?

should I call Mary?

Why wasn't I with Malcolm?

EN 3240

# 31.

I am a puzzle being pulled apart, I am a sandcastle slowly sloughing away
I am lost in a world several sizes too big and when I reach out,
I can’t feel the walls, I can’t feel the walls,
Where are the walls, where are the walls, where am I?
I have lived in an iron lung but I loved it but I left it
I have made it this far pushing up, pushing through, avid-eyed and resolute
And now you are the proffered apple of my peril.

My world is textbook definitions, my world is medical presciptions, it is linear, it is monochromatic, or was;
It is familiar interdictions, it is neat organizations, it is sorting everything into black and white
I am a sage and a mother, always right; I am a scholar, quoting my books
And you are a sullen teenager, mocking my rules,
Loathing my complacency,
Running gleefully roughshod through my pretty world
like a child
with a needle
in a roomful of balloons.

I have arachnophobia, I have a fear of the foreign, of the alien and unknown, of eight superfluous eyes,
of rigid, jointed legs, of a mechanical fashion of moving – not pretty, but efficient,
like a tank or a robot; of evil, surreptitious machinations,
of the facelessness, the soullessness, the silence of spider’s eyes and spider’s legs
but I love spiderweb, the way it wavers in the wind, its lovely, fragile charm,
the way it pulls me in closer, like fire,
until I start back, looking for the spider.
And in my new world several sizes too big there are spiderwebs everywhere and I love it
Except that they all have spiders somewhere and I see them if I look.
And all of this is nothing to you,
there is nothing unfamiliar to you, nothing novel to you,
nothing to react to,
all of this is so long ago that you can’t remember how it feels.

I am reactionary, I am reflexes induced with rubber hammers,
I am what I was taught to be
And you have thrown off the shackles of prior knowledge,
Of lectures from people who know how you feel,
Of the battle between want and desire and need and feel and fear and require and dread,
Between should and must, between could and cannot.
You have escaped and now wait for me to shamble my way through,
And I am hanging back because this way to knowledge leads,
But I have left complacency behind and I rather miss it

And I am swearing up and down that God has told me that of this tree I shall not eat,
Nor even touch,
And you are asking me if he really said that,
You are encouraging me in heavenly ambitions, in a most liberating heresy;
You are showing me a world of little gods, all knowing right from wrong for themselves,
Naming them as values to be known or unknown,
Glaringly revealed or subtly obscured or ignored or reinvented or uniformly rejected or just never thought about,
Just never thought about.
And oh, your world is beautiful because you believe it
And mine is full of rubble and distant rumblings of dynamited foundations,
My world is self-destructing, it is unsustainable,
There is dust everywhere and broken furniture.

Your world is just one and mine is still two and I will never forgive you for knowing
When I am still asking.

My Life is Falling Apart.

or rather, my life is in a constant state of flux and it's starting to wear me down.

Malcolm and all things malcolm-related are coming together nicely.

School is coming together in one sense - I dropped a course I couldn't attend regularly, and made arrangements to make it up during the winter semester and the summer, discovering in the process that I'm really well set up for my degree requirements, which was nice.
On the other hand, I need to start attending a certain tutorial I've been missing. But my absence so far can't have done any lasting damage, since I've attended every lecture and done all the readings.

Spiritually-wise, I was late for my youth group today and they had to start worship without me. I don't like letting people down, but it was a unique situation that shouldn't happen again, and it worked out fine in the end.

WORK IS FALLING DOWN AROUND ME. I shouldn't have canceled this last shift, and now they're threatening to write me up. It's my fault, of course, I shouldn't have been so flippant about my job. The problem is they judge me week to week - they remember that I canceled last week, but they don't remember the shifts that I do come in for. I was a stellar employee during the summer; it's only recently that my downward spiral began, but they act as if I'm been terrible from day 1. Maybe that's logical, I don't know. But there's so much going on right now that I just can't keep it all balanced. Something is always spinning out of control. I need to lose something, I think, to keep everything else together. But nothing is dispensible.

I have a shift on Sunday. I'm going to take the opportunity to talk to my manager and try to sort things out. I'll probably end up working every other weekend, or something. I don't really need to take my hours down more, once a week is actually sufficient for me. But I can't cancel any shifts for a long time, so I need to give myself as much leeway as possible.

It should be ok. Eventually.

i figured it out

almost. The problem, I think, is that this relationship makes me a worse person. I'm irrational, unbalanced and I can't stop fighting with him. I'm not getting the support I need in my Christian life. I find myself changing because of him - and I can't decide which is better, to become ultra-defensive or to lose my backbone entirely. I usually end up doing the first because I don't like the thought of the second, but it's becoming more appealing. I could just turn quiet and meek. It'd mean less fights.

I've proposed a summer hiatus. A 'break', if you will. And he has nothing but contempt for the idea of breaks; he says they don't solve anything. But I need a break. I'm spiralling into the kind of person I don't want to be and I want to stop and get a handle on it. I want to be able to be with him but i don't know if I can do it without doing damage to myself at the same time. And this isn't fair to him, either.

update.

So I was reading other people's bloggers and felt bad because everyone else updates more than me. So here goes.

I'm really floundering relationship-wise, and I shouldn't be. This guy is loving, sensitive and thoughtful. And completely committed. I'm the problem here, which is a novel position for me to be in. And I really am happy 80% of the time, but that grade was never quite good enough for us in high school ( am I right) and it's not quite good enough now. The problem is that he's so sensible and logical that he's almost always right. About everything. Any position he chooses to take on a certain issue becomes the right position. So where does that leave me? If I choose to disagree, then I'm going to be proven wrong and sooner or later i'll have to apologise, if we were fighting, or admit that he's right, if we were just talking. But if I agree with him right away, then I lose all my freedom. Either way it's eating away at me. So I start to see attacks where there are none, and take offense at things he says that he didn't mean that way, and I end up picking fights with him. The cycle is getting faster and faster. Last time there were only a few minutes between the beginning of our conversation to the beginning of another fight.

And every time we start fighting I just feel despair, because we're starting down this vicious circle again and I don't know how to stop it. And for a few minutes I'll start to wonder if this is going to be the fight that ends everything, and sometimes the thought scares me and sometimes it seems as if it'd be for the best. But then, tiredly, we start trying to sort out who-said-what and how we got into the fight and why, and in the end we always understand where the other person was coming from. And we've saved ourselves, again, but only from breaking up. Not from fighting. And the next fight could be only seconds away. It's exhausting.

Neither of us is happy; we're too nervous, wondering when the next fight is going to start. We're hanging on, but not by much, and it's not for the sake of our relationship. It's more just because we're both stubborn and we hate the idea of giving up. This is his first relationship, and it's the first of mine that has lasted this long. We've tied up a lot of ourselves in this, and the thought of ending it seems too extreme.

In a place like this, when I'm confused and unhappy, I'm not very safe. I'm moody and impulsive, and completely capable of getting myself into regrettable situations. It's like this relationship is a house of cards, and I've got a twitch in my fingers.

Workwise, I'm not getting enough hours and it's driving me CRAZY. I guess that's another factor in everything else - stress.

Glendon is keeping me happy, though. I was content for nearly two weeks to obsess over schedules and course lists, tweaking my workload, making calls to ask if I could take an extra course, sending emails, submitting portfolios, adding and dropping and adding and dropping. I got completely lost in the whole thing and it was great. And then I got my residence offer, and that kept me occupied for another few days trying to figure out if I should stay in Hilliard or move to Wood, and the pros and cons of that. Everything with school is going according to plan, and it's the only part of my life that's coming together like that. But everything is taken care of now, and nothing remains except to send in my residence forms. So I've got to find another consolation. But that could be dangerous.

giving up

And I love you, but this is never what I want.
And are we just getting struck with reality?
Or should we be fighting for better?
And is it better to hold on with teeth and claws
and is it better to suck up all of the wrongs
or should we give it all up now,
just cut our losses, just get out
and does it matter anymore

And you love me, but I'm not lovable these days.
And is it your job to get it out of me?
Or should you be looking for better?
And is it better to love me into staying
and is it better to keep me with praying
or should you just throw in the towel,
get out while you still know how?
It doesn't matter anymore
if you love me.