Tag Archives: Gay

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Balance 8.22.08

I can’t believe that I wrote this entry five-years ago.  Until I reached the age that I am right now, I had no idea what people meant when they talked about how quickly time passes.  Five-years…  This one is a re-blog, but I want to look at it, because I feel as if I am finally getting my balance with where I’m headed in my life.

Balance.  Do we even know what the hell this word means?  I cannot believe the way in which everything is overdone: work, activity, even the way in which we approach relationships.  I’m kinda sick–I sneezed and my nose ran all day to day, but it was a decided improvement upon the incessant headache and sinus pressure that I’ve had for over two weeks.  When colds finally hit me, I feel a sense of release that is foreign.  I think it’s because I don’t actually let go too well.  Americans even take Yoga about 3 times a week to practice “letting go.”  Isn’t that utterly ludicrous?!?  How the hell do you practice that?  People talk about moderation, but I’m sure that I have not mastered it.

I am going to hike with my son tomorrow.  Desiring grocery shopping is not what I would call part of my evening, but it is necessary.  I may hook up with my friend and her son, but am cool if I don’t.  I am cool with most things these days.  I have to be…

I would like to have some physical intimacy…  Would I overdo that?  I think that my goal is to actually ensure that I am varying my activities and letting things unfold as they should.  I’m sure that I’ve said these statements before, but they are starting to make increasingly more sense to me.  I think that I understand that I need to be patient with myself to fully listen to others who I truly love.

PS.  I get it.  I understand what balance is too, as I have let go of extremity and fervor.  It’s little smatterings of the things that I used to enjoy more than I do now, and connecting to those who have an energy level that matches mine.  Enjoying whatever unfolds without expectation is helping me too.  No poison.  I’m not anyone’s therapist who knows me either.

I am not overdoing sexual intimacy, and in fact, I am not able to overdo connecting with my current girlfriend either based on what she has going on in her life as she focuses on strengthening and balancing her energy.  I’m not overdoing anything right now, but I must embrace that as I have come to center, that I can connect with people only when it makes sense.

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Another wake-up call

My girlfriend called me last night and we had a wonderful conversation that was seamless like usual.  I know for a fact that there isn’t anyone who takes me like I am, less her.  I have all of these expectations from everyone, but her.  She just wants me to be myself.  I just want to look at her, learn from her, laugh with her, and have family time.  I’ll take that anytime that I can get it too, and won’t despair when plans have to change because of her capacity or her sons.  Any second that I get with her is a gift.  I just want to be and not to bend the river.  It’s flowing and it’s beautiful.

I’m breaking up with a lot of friends.  My workout partner started doing things that I couldn’t follow and seemed bizarre and like she expected me to meet her needs.  I had to tell her that I needed space.  I’ve taken it, but I had to see her yesterday because I had locked myself out of the house in the morning and wanted my key back.  It was super awkward.  I just don’t want to be anyone’s everything anymore.  I don’t have it.

Another one of my friends says that she is “going through” a lot of shit at work.  I texted her to be grateful to have a job, as I know that many don’t.  I meant that.  Then she said when I called her that I was undermining her.  I was being honest.  I think what has happened is that everyone has these expectations of me either to do some toxic joining, or just listen to the same recycled conversation.  I got this text out of the blue and it was a “feel sorry for me and listen to me bitch” text.  No thanks. She helped me move many loads of dirt to my backyard in 2011.  I appreciated that and I cooked for her three times.  She had gotten that job then, and has always hated it.  She still hates it.  I do think that she should be glad that she is employed.  I finally told her that I would pray for her to find peace and a new job.  I will do that, but I can’t do the toxic and recycled convo anymore.  I just don’t have it in me.

I had gotten stood up at the end of last month by my bday twin.  She took over two weeks to explain that she left her planner at home, and she did it via text.  She wants to get together Sunday.  No thanks.  Who does that?  I texted her sorry that we missed each other, and she explains it now over two-weeks later?  I don’t need that.  Frankly, I’m a lot better off and more balanced when I’m either alone, with my son, joking casually with colleagues, or anytime that I spend with my girlfriend.

I’m going to read all the entries that I have written about her to her, and then ask if that level of detail is ok for me to write.  If it is, I’m putting this blog back up.  If it’s not, I’m going to support my work blog, dog blog, and my son’s old blog and that will be what I do.  I entitled this one “Return,” and think that perhaps my return has lead me into a more introverted self, which is more balanced, and one in which I seek out positive interactions.  I don’t want to do ranting or toxicity, and since the end of 2012, I have not had a toxic approach to love relationships.  I don’t want them in my friendships either.  I’m shifting and becoming the person who I want to be, and it’s one who wants to seek out good.  I don’t want to be mired down by anything that resembles poison.

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Done with that

I don’t think that I want to go to my parent’s house much anymore.  I will plan a Thanksgiving dinner the weekend that I have my son and host it at my house.  I picked up burgers and fries at a pub.  My stomach, which literally never hurts, feels like it has a grease rock in it.  I hauled ass out of their house as fast as I could.  I’m going to have to look for something different for November.  I’m thinking that our Y has a Day Camp, and that is going to be what he has to do.

Sometimes my son gets a little bit entitled.  He complains and gets bossy and refuses tasks.  After I brought him home this evening, he was completely delightful.  Honestly.  He and I talked while I loaded the dishwasher and then we put together one of those giant puzzles that only has a frame that is interlocking and makes the edges.  I talked to him the whole time that he was in the bath, and read him his nightly story.

I asked him if he knew that he was super pleasant, compliant, and sweet after a night or two away from me.  He looked at me with his incredible blue eyes and said, “I didn’t know that.”  I told him that we should concentrate on times like this, so we can have connected and good times.  He told me that he missed me.  I missed him for two nights too.

I still haven’t connected with my girlfriend.  There is a world of difference between one and four kids.  I respect it though, because she does it right.  So, we’ll talk when we can, but I get the impression that she needs some space, so I’ll just wait to hear from her.  I would never do anything to smother or fuck it up.  “Love is like a blanket.  It gets a little bit to warm sometimes.  I want to wrap somebody in it who can hold me in [her] arms.”

 

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Time to unwind

Work was just slightly weird today.  I had too many meetings, I think.  I was exhausted by the time that I left and then I had to come home, switch over laundry, help my dog stretch her legs, pack up tons of food and head to my parents house.

While I was cooking, I needed oil and vinegar.   That was it.  You’d have thought that I was ruining their lives.  My mother also stared at me while I cooked, and was wiping the counters around me.  That combined with the fact that my Dad was upset that I didn’t bring over take out put me over the edge.  That’s the way that I grew up.  They were always in my ass and it never ceased and nothing that I could do was right and they had to monitor and “show” me what I was doing wrong.  I’m going to have to figure out something else to do with my son on November 11th.  He can’t be around that, and frankly, if I hadn’t had a beer while I cooked and my Dad was saying that he couldn’t play with my son because too much was going on–meaning my dog smelled him a couple of times and he had to get the olive oil for me–I couldn’t have either.

It was a difficult 45-minutes of cooking, but the food was good.  My Dad commenced to eat nearly all the food as soon as I put it all out.  We had sockeye salmon with tarragon and balsamic vinegar, a nice salad, the best brussels sprouts in the world, and saffron basmati.  I asked him if he’d eaten today and he said he had oatmeal and four prunes.  When you’re Bipolar and your blood sugar drops, you are a real treat.  It’s amazing at 73 that he doesn’t manage his calories better.

I hugged my son and I left.  Poor guy.  I’m glad that tomorrow is his last day off from school.

I ran about 2.25-miles on the treadmill and felt soooo much better.  Then I walked my dog around the lake at night to do an outdoor night warm down.  I dropped off some materials at a colleague’s house and talked to my best friend from graduate school.  Her cancer may be back, and her best friend there has stage 4 colon cancer.  Now, those are real problems.  Mine with parents is just sad.  They feel better when they can tell me what I do wrong.  I’m just fine.

I do miss my girlfriend.  She has been out of contact due to family stress, and she has her little boys this evening.  It’s ok, but I really, really hope that I get to see her again.  I miss having her arms around me and looking into those perfect hazel eyes.  I’m turning in.  I hope that she contacts me tomorrow.  I want to connect with her and don’t know how she is doing really.

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Honest

She had to cancel on being in my bed with me tonight, but I completely understand.  I will miss her smell and softness when I retire in a little bit, but I get why she can’t be around people anymore tonight.  She needs to take care of herself so she can take care of her boys too.

Something that I left out of the Thursday entry that I had written last was that she got probably five phone calls while we cooked and got the boys organized.  One included a conversation with her father and it was an intense relaying of some of what she is going through right now.  It’s too much.  She respectfully left out details that would have been alarming to him as well.  I was shocked that we had dinner together and that she ever texts or emails or gets on my FB during the week at all.  It made me feel loved to see that.

I feel important.  I feel respected.  I feel like we could be building something with a permanence, and that part doesn’t scare me.  I’m scared about doing right by her.

She had a truly horrible day.  It can’t even be written about, because it’s unreal.

My last three have just included too much running around in favor of being productive.  I like to get things done, and haven’t been able to very well over the last three days.  I’ve kind of felt like I’m just spinning my wheels, but it’s just stress.  It’s not anything bad.  She teased me relentlessly about it and then helped me reframe it.  I think much of it is that I’ve been around lots of people too often and my son has been getting over being ill, so that means that he’s crabby.  Nothing has been bad, I’ve just felt kinda pulled around and not able to get work completed.

I held her as tight as I could while being reasonably sure that I was not hurting her back.  I felt her tears on my cheeks.  I was moved on a deeper level than I can remember too.  Again, I feel important and loved.

Finally, we both were unwinding and she wanted to watch some tv.  I asked if we could read.  She read all the cartoons in her favorite periodical, and laughed so many times that I had a large grin on my face.  There was one in particular that was very odd, and was my sense of humor exactly.  My sense of humor borders on bizarre and is definitely droll and strange.  When she showed me it, I was surprised how she knew something instinctively about me.

We didn’t get very physical.  I had to tell her that I’m at a point wherein I’m nervous about making love to her, and I told her that I think that part of that trepidation is an energetic thing that vibes from her.  She talked to me about being ready at some point and realizing how excited that she was to see me when she was driving home, but that did not include sex, and I said, “I really don’t think we should.  We are both sexual people, but the thing is that it shouldn’t be planned and should just be an organic development when we both are moved that way.  It’s going to be a big thing when it happens.”  I’m not ready either.

She told me some other things from her experiences too.  I think that I’m starting to really get where she is right now, and it’s funny that the timing is in our favor from both standpoints.  After awhile I just said completely easily, “Listen, ______ , I love you and I want you to know that.”  She said without skipping a beat, “I love you too.”  There was a pause and then she added, “It’s real too.”  I told her that it certainly is for me too, and I would not have said it had I not meant it completely.  She said, “I know.”

 

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Evolution

It was raining hard after work again, but my son and I made the trek to her and her little boys anyway.  It was sad that it took us 50-minutes to get to her, and it only took half that to get back.  I wished that had worked in the other direction.  Just people in cars in the rain, and really heavy end-of-the-week traffic resulted in a later start than either of us wanted.

It made my son cry when her little boys had to get picked up by their Dad.  He doesn’t understand anything but full custody, because he has never had to consider it much.  He sees one my friend’s daughter on my weekends every once in awhile, so he doesn’t think about what she does during the week.  His best friend’s mother has custody of him and his sister–they have a summer and Christmas visit Dad.

For the most part, he LOVED the visit as did I.  They laughed and played so well together.  I told her, “That is really encouraging.  And it’s rare.”  She seemed surprised.  I said, “They should really be vying for our attention.”  Then, I realized, although I didn’t say it, but it’s probably because she and I parent the same way.  Our boys get our undivided attention when we are not cooking or conversing with each other.

She has this cool thing that is a better version of High / Low wherein someone sitting at the dinner table asks someone, “What is your favorite part of the day?  What did you learn today?”  My son likes it, and I do too.  We had great conversations about what aspects of our days went well.

On the way back home, I told him, “You’re right.  I do love her.”  He said, “I do too.  I give you one month to tell her, because you need to say it.”  I told him that the time had to be right in terms of the timing.  He said, “Well, I’m going to say it to her first then.”

We were in her kitchen alone at the end of the night and she spun me around and pushed me up against her sink.  I had just given my son the three-minute warning.  Of course he couldn’t turn off the system he was playing, so we had to stop and that sucked, and then she messed with me a ton by saying kinky stuff to me in double entendre that my son of course could not follow.  Then she climbed up to the loft in her house and lain forward on her stomach peering up to where the tv area is.  I had a perfect, albeit not-so-perfect, view of her while she talked to my son and laughed.  We have a flirtatious and fun dynamic.  She is the sexiest and most intriguing woman I’ve ever been around.

Gone are my days of the crazy-making pacing and the worry that we won’t work.  I’ve done that a bunch.  I know that she and I do work, and we have lots of days to find out how that will shake out.  I don’t want to rush either, and I don’t want to overwhelm or push anything on her.  I really met her at the right time of my life after I had done lots of necessary changing and evolving.

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Who needs to fight?

I told her that I had my quota when she said that I would fight with her in the grocery store.  That’s honest too.  One, why the hell would you fight in the grocery store?  I love food, eating, walking, and she is someone who I love to talk to or simply just hang out with and do whatever.  I’m perverse at times, so I pointed out three different couples who were talking and sauntering about the grocery store.  Finally, as we neared the back of the store yesterday, there was a couple–two girls–who were visibly arguing and having lots of tension in the grocery store.  I wanted to pass them quickly, but she is pretty observant.  So, when I saw her see them, I made a plan.

We exited the aisle and I said, “Ok.  I do realize that was the only gay couple who we’ve seen today and they were fighting,” and then she does what she does.  Her head tilts back and she laughs hard.  It always makes a warm smile drift across my face and most of the time, I start laughing too, or I just hug her.  Then she pulled me to her, kissed me and said, “See?  People fight in the grocery store.”  I told her, “I don’t want to,” but as is the case with her, I had a huge smile across my face.

There is more.  We could have had conflict around my misunderstanding about evenings and dinners–it was something that just didn’t sit well with me earlier in the week–as she was busy all week and we couldn’t see each other easily or could we talk.  Instead, we went outside after 5 on Saturday when the boys were engaged in boy things, and she talked to me about what a team is, and what a new girlfriend is and how it’s always her desire for me to express my needs or just be honest with all of my feelings when I don’t want to do something or simply just can’t easily.  Also, as I guess she just is, she was nakedly vulnerable with me about her last two relationships and what she believes about independence.

So, as it turned out, I didn’t have to have, or even request a discussion.  We just organically talked about where we were with respect to our relationship, and what could be a compromise on seeing each other during the week when it works easily.  OK.  Wow.  I’m sure that some of you have read “discussions” that I had with my ex.  Or should I say my trying to bring things up, and then feeling like I was in a duck and cover drill?

Preparing for fallout (with my ex)

Preparing for fallout (with my ex)

I don’t think it’s realistic for me to try to avoid to make comparisons based on contrast.  She is so different than anyone who I’ve been with over the last four years.  She is easy and genuine, and an enviable adult when it comes to communication.  It think that it’s safe to say that I love this woman, and she has admitted that she thinks that she loves me too.  I can’t wait until there is one of those right moments and I can just say, “I love you.”  Because, I do, and I think that I have met my match.

We wound up making out in her bathroom about three times yesterday.  I was helping her with her hair.  We got really physical.  She is the most affectionate of anyone who I have been with, and that combined with how attracted I am to her makes it difficult not to go further than we should yet.  I love her eyes, mouth, and body.  It’s a wicked attraction, and I’ll admit that I have never been this comfortable with a woman either.  We can talk, we can sit, we can make meals together, or we can have conversations that are rooted in compromise.  I think all of these things make it safe to say that I’m going to be in love for the first time with someone with whom I could make something work.

My Horizon

My Horizon

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Saturday!

I was going to lay low, but I had to reach out.  I just wanted to tell her that I hoped that she was doing well, and that I wanted to hold her.  She said that she was doing as well as she could, but that she wished that I was there.  So, I said that I would have been, but I didn’t know if that was cool with her little boys there and my not having my son.  I think that I’m starting to get this stuff, and I just need to ask in the morning if I can bring dinner over at night.  Although, last night would not have worked.

My son was too sick to go to school, which is really rare for him.  He has been coughing like crazy though, and asked to go to the Dr.  I told him yesterday morning that the doctor can’t do anything about viruses, but I took care of him at home.  Then when his Dad finally got here to pick him up, I was able to drive to supervision.  We had 1.5-hours of supervision, and then I returned two phone calls from friends and went to the gym.  I could only run 1.5-miles because I have sinus issues right now and it got uncomfortable.  Then I bought a bottle of Sangiovese, and texted her while I had a glass.  Afterward I boiled some noodles and ate pesto and an apple.  I see her and her little boys this morning.  It feels like it’s been a month!

I love talking to her.  We have wonderful conversation chemistry.  I also like her ease when I’m with her, as it’s contagious and makes me have pause and lights up my senses.  She is pretty wonderful.  So, I can see her Saturday, Monday, and Thursday.  I want to see her next weekend and hope that she’ll spend the night with me again.  I can’t wait to get my arms around her for a hug this morning.

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Organic Flow

If what you’ve done is a good predictor of your future behavior, I say to that, evolve with it too.  I was getting a little in over my head with my artist.  Now, it’s time to slow myself down a bit.  Monday is not that bad to wait to get together.  She is not champing at the bit to make weekend plans to me, and I would gather that because she had a long and difficult week at work–about which I know no details–that she just wants to connect and nest with her little boys.  I tried her on the phone last night and she texted that she was sorry that she missed my call and that she was making dinner.  She ended it with, “I miss you!”

We have plans for next Monday and Thursday.  So, I’m not going to obsess.  I’m going to revise Chapter 3 and I really need to run.  I may run after work tonight.  This weekend I should consult with a gardener about my lack of lawn in my backyard, since it is all cleaned up back there, and I should write like crazy.  I always have people who want to see me.  I’m not going to watch football at my cousin’s house on Sunday though, because I may not be gay.  I don’t like watching professional sports.

My workout partner said, “You lost yourself for a bit in this.  You sound solid now and MUCH better.”  Lesbian relationships are different, and mine aren’t in the Date 2: Move in, and Date 3: Get the donor ready, but they still match that intensity.  I realized that what I know of her, I could read in her book that she is editing.  It’s not the stuff of her.  Hell, I don’t even know her custody arrangement.

I know that when we are together it’s much better.  It’s connected.  It’s easy.  We have chemistry making meals together in the kitchen.  Our boys get along.  I feel really good when my head is on her left shoulder and I lay on my side and she puts her legs bent over mine and rubs my left arm.  We have magical kissing.  That’s all a pretty good start, but it’s a start.  Now it just has to flow, because you can’t bend the river.  It goes where it shall.

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Run all you want

You can be mindful and always present with what you are doing in a relationship, but past is honestly prelude.  I have trouble with being rejected or thinking that I have been rejected.  And I will not be able to do things that resemble push and pull ever again.

I touched her hand in 2005, and I knew that I had to avoid her, but then, I was transferred.  She is a big flirt too, so we just wound up talking more and more and then I started organizing Happy Hours.  That affair developed as a progression, and we wound up sleeping together mid-October of 2007.  The first few times were just mind-blowing; although, they weren’t satisfying.  Then when she had a work karaoke party, I spent the night and it was very good.  I fell asleep next to her and slept well too.  I wanted to date her.  She was in a very different place, however, and was lukewarm on kids and never saw herself as a mother.  Now, looking back, she and I never would have worked, because we didn’t have the depth of conversation either.  I learned from her that I don’t like feeling rejected–I know that is just my perception, but I don’t like it.

She sent me an email in September of 2011 just a week after my birthday.  She had just turned 37 a month before too.  We had a connection, I think.  But, she got into her controlling patterns based on fears of me not needing her desperately–even if it was just her money–and that I would leave her.  I wouldn’t have done the latter if she hadn’t kept saying that she loved me, but love wasn’t enough.  I don’t do push and pull and I won’t.

I want to continue to laugh.  I want to snuggle and have connected conversation.  I want to have family nights and dinners.  I want to a couple of nights away a few times a year for tons of sex, dinners outside, and generally escaping for a short period.  There are things that I can’t run from, but I can certainly focus on where I’m going and what I seek.

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Possibilities

Anything is possible when you’re seeing a woman who sees the best in everyone, and she is willing.  She wants to explore, and that matches well up with what I have read and heard one of my gurus state, and that is “loving fully without guarantees.”  I like that it will develop more slowly, because there is nothing that is crazy-making about a steady and slower pace.  I know that I shouldn’t spend too much time on contrast, but she is so different than previous relationships.  I’m lucky.

  1. She drives to me even when she has had a 10-hour day and her back is sore and compressed.
  2. She is smart and loves to read and write all kinds of things, but each one of them is thought-provoking or somehow poignant.
  3. She is sweet, tender and gentle.
  4. She is funny, and laughs easily and fully.  (Her laughter never fails to make me laugh or smile widely.)
  5. She wants to be with me, and is willing to see what can work out

I know that it is not particularly healthy to contrast women who you’ve been with, but I just did a lot of that this weekend.  I rarely had my ex-gf down to my house, and in fact, she would complain about my house all of the time too, as I’m not anal or is mine a newer one.  I live in a 50s ranch with a finished basement and the neighborhood has established trees in the front yards, and my floors are hardwoods.  I actually love my house so I found that insulting.

She read self-help and new age.  She was critical and quick to anger.  We stopped laughing.  My workout partner and I read and shredded her cards that she gave to me fall through about February of 2012 on Saturday.  Even the first few were full of tired and trite phrases and terms of endearment.  She is really just all about marketing and taglines.  There also were a couple that said stuff like, “I appreciate the things that you’ve given me, and I’m sorry that I can’t lean on you while I’m going through tough times.”

There isn’t much that is similar between these women with the exception that they have been on their own since teenage, and have had a lot of strife throughout their lives.  One found a way to embrace joy, and the other found a way to craft a world wherein emotions are kept at bay and people are controlled.  I can tell you which one makes me feel like anything is possible.

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Surprises

So, I knew that we were having dinner together on Friday, but I didn’t know that she would be staying.  I took my son out of practice, as it was running over, and went to our house–she had already arrived.  She started making out with me in my garage.  Ok, then.  Then my son and I helped her get all of her bags in the house.  She said, “It’s completely presumptuous, but I am staying the night tonight.  I have to work a little and don’t want to drive home.”  I said, “I think that is a wonderful idea.”

No shaving, no landscaping, sleepy, and after dinner and putting my son to bed, we are both sitting on my couch.  She had to work a little, so I straightened up my kitchen and took my dog for a walk.   I couldn’t believe that were going to wake up together.  When she was done with work, she read some of it to me, and I liked that a lot.  We went to the kitchen to get drinks and she kissed me and after we pulled away she said, “I don’t think we should have sex tonight,” and because I have wanted the first time to be special and we don’t really know all of our dynamics yet, I said, “I am in complete agreement.”

She cuddles a lot all night–I’m not used to sleeping close like that all night.  When we first got into bed, she did start kissing me pretty intensely and then she had her hands on the fronts of my shoulders, so I felt like I had to say, “You can touch me.” When she did she gasped and said, “You have incredible tits.”  I laughed.  That settled why I was wondering why she wasn’t feeling me up.

It has been a really long time since she has been in a relationship with a woman, and the one that she did have which lasted a year sounds like one in which she would just be moved sexually by this woman and wind up in her bed with her.  She had a non-serious bf at the time, and the other girl did too, but eventually went exclusive with him, and that result broke my artist’s heart a little.  I guess, from what I can gather, she is just ready to be in relationship with a woman.

In this case, and I told her this, I just hope that being with a girl works for her.  It’s different.  It’s emotionally complex and involves a level of intensity that seems unique.  What she has gathered is that if we just go slow, that stuff will work itself out.  I think more than that, it’s essential for me to give her space for reflection, and also just follow her lead with anything physical.

I think that’s good.  I have slept with women way too soon almost every time.  I told her before we all left the house that what seems to be building is a solid friendship.  She said, “We are.”  I actually think that it’s healthy.  Now, I do honestly want to take off every stitch of her clothing and feel her skin on mine, and kiss every part of her that is not covered by a bathing suit until I can do more, but I won’t.  I don’t really want to either; although, I fantasize about it.  I want to wait until it’s not only special, but it’s right.

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Last time that I went slow

I had a gf in hs and another one in college.  Both of these girls were barely bi, which worked for me at the time because 1) I love women, and 2) I had not worked through any of my internalized homophobia.  I remember once after we had become sexually intimate that my gf from college said, “Did you ever consider that you are a lesbian?  If something happens twice and does feel this right for you, I think that you should consider it.”  That scared the shit out of me at the time.  I was probably 20.  I wouldn’t deal completely with it for 13-more years.

Women who are only slightly attracted to women are probably still around me, but I don’t think that I look butch enough for them.  My previous partner who I was with for two-years is soft butch.  She is also a raging alcoholic too, but for the purpose of this post I should mention that she had an entourage of girls who were barely bi, and one of whom she kept around until she moved to the East Coast.  Barely bi women stopped appealing to me as soon as I came out.  I don’t want to date someone who–for whatever reason she has–gets all tripped out touching a girl or doesn’t want to try different things with a girl.  I’m sure that if I looked more gay at first glance that girls who were curious would approach me, but they don’t, and I’m glad.  Reciprocal sex that I have had over the last 6-years is what I like.

I didn’t have full, reciprocal sex with my college gf, but because we knew each other sexually, I could reach fulfillment with little contact from her, and we just got used to that being our dynamic.  At first, it was just so great to be with a woman again, so I think that I should tell that story, because a lot of it is very sweet.

She wasn’t my roommate at first.  But, our roommates were from the same town.  We went to a commuter campus for the most part, so the dormitory would become empty on weekends and often except for a handful of girls who were socially awkward, we’d be the only two left on our floor on Friday night through late Sunday afternoon.  She had a terrible frat boy bf for about two-months that fall.  He would make her cry a lot.  I gave her solace.

Honestly, she is one of those girls who is naturally sweet and cute.  Now, she is 5’9 & 1/2, and has huge blue eyes, and that fair, freckled skin that I love, but she is mostly a total sweetheart who has no idea how beautiful she is.  In that vein, the Halloween of our freshman year she said, “Let’s go buy pumpkins, because we should carve jack o’ lanterns!”  We did, and when we lit them, she moved against me and put her head on my right shoulder while we sat in the dark.  I hoped that she couldn’t hear or feel my heart beating.  I’m sure that it was also racing visually through my neck.  She said, “This is nice,” and I said, “Yes, it is.”  She said, “I really like your voice.”  I wanted to sink through the bed.

We moved in together the following January.  We would lay on each other all of the time.  I never kissed her, but she always wanted to sleep in my little twin bed, so she did.  We got through that spring.  I stayed away–I went to college out-of-state–that summer and moved into my own mother-in-law apartment that I could afford and tended bar all summer.  She stopped living at the dorm the following fall; although, she had a new roommate and spent every night with me.  One night after we had practice for a musical that we were in, I took off her shirt, and as I traced her stomach and between her breasts, then she turned on her side and started kissing me.  We were together off and on and between her bfs for about 2.5-years.

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Communication and “Stuff”

I know that inadequate or misinterpreted communication has been the kiss of death with me and the ending of all my relationships.  However, I didn’t realize until yesterday that my ex has kinda fucked up the way that I see people and what I will tolerate from anyone as well.  There are things to reflect on and try to alter slowly.

My friend connected me and my artist, if I’m being honest.  It would have been circuitous and next to impossible to talk with her had I waited on one of my best friends to connect us, and as I have written earlier, I would have never had the guts to approach her anyway.  I have noticed this past weekend, however, that she like most drop-dead beautiful women who has her own stuff relative to the way that she sees herself.  I’m sure much of that comes from what Ani says, “And everyone harbors a secret hatred for the prettiest girl in the room.”  I digress.

To be concise, my friend, who connected us, slowly cancelled plans over the course of Saturday.

My birthday was somewhat challenging, and the experience relates to my Saturday this weekend.  I was juggling a book, leftover soup, and my wallet.  I had left my cell in my car.  While trying to hug my parents and our friends, I asked my son to  hold my wallet, and he did, but when we got home, it was gone.  I called the restaurant.  I went to the parking lot, and then I called my friend who’s been in my life for 12-years and we searched my car with flashlights.  She was cool and nice and said, “I’ll withdraw cash, we will buy you a new wallet for your bday, and we will get together Saturday night and make sauce and have girl time.”  She is a big promiser.  It’s just her thing.

With her too, you can’t always be sure much will actually come to fruition, because her life always has roadblocks and things that she deals with constantly.  For example, I was SHOCKED when she and I did a long summit which was over 15-miles this past July.  She has been “climbing” with me for years, but it did actually happen, and we completed a summit this past summer.  That’s good.  Dinner did not happen on Saturday, and that’s not shocking.  I got a text from her early in the morning saying sorry that she didn’t check in on Friday and that she probably had to cancel cooking because she had a friend coming.  I said, “Let’s all get together,” and then when my artist asked what I was doing on Saturday, we both felt like we didn’t want to be apart after I left to watch my son’s game.

In summary, I was hanging out with my artist and her youngest son on Saturday morning and it was obvious that she was thinking that she should join, and I wanted it too.  So, I texted my old friend and she said, “Of course.”  All day she got more lukewarm on our plans in general.  Then late in the afternoon that became a complete cancellation due to a “bad mood.”  I honestly think although she denies it, there is some jealousy here, which I confronted head-on.  She has a child boy toy who is 17-years her junior who now has a gf and has dropped off the face of the earth, and I am currently dating her friend of nearly 25-years.

We couldn’t have a rational conversation about the way the cancellation went down and it was all weird.  She cussed and used exclamation points via text.  TRIGGER.  I realized our conversation was completely unproductive so I asked her to table it, and she went into MY ISSUES.  I have some for sure, but the whole thing was odd and was based on the time that I had to cancel hers and my plans when I didn’t have a penny to my name for ingredients for us to cook with, or for screen patches that we were going to use to do a home repair.  One time that I cancelled.  I’m not getting into that.  Space is better.

I can’t text fight.  I can’t read cussing, which is directed at me, and exclamation points.  I feel badly being brushed aside and really was upset that these plans being cancelled effected my son, and my artist’s youngest kids.  These feelings all result from dealings with my ex during 2012.  I have really high standards now with respect to how I will be treated and what I’ll tolerate.  I’m not going to her house again and I am not getting in touch with her.  It was toxic.  (If she wants to hang out again, we can do stuff at my house.  She never comes over here and was furious that I dropped off DVDs and told her that I’m not her boy toy.  I actually said, “I’m not ____ .”  I still know that there is something more than wanting to be alone here, but she doesn’t want to talk about it, so I’ll just take space from her.)

I wound up bringing food to my artist’s place that I bought thinking that we were going to BBQ at our mutual friends’ house.  I bought stuff that was kinda difficult to cook indoors, but we made it work.  After dinner, which was fun and some games with our boys, we did the dishes and talked.  She grabbed me from behind at my waist and her fingertips were in my spine and she said, “Now, that is a nice spot.”  I haven’t been touched by anyone the way that she touches me.

I have a pretty assertive presentation, so unless you are physical with me, you don’t note that my dynamic is also one of “green light” waiting for signs or first moves.  That is just me.  I certainly would not have made out with her in her dining room while we were setting the table, or would I have felt the muscles in her low back.  When you run, those get really tight and defined.  I certainly noticed them on my ex, and it felt great to have her notice mine on me given that I have worked really hard since March of 2012 to get into good shape and stay healthy.  After I stopped pressing her against her sink and burying my head in her hair, we played a game.  We laughed hard.

Before I left, I told her that I know that when I was writing here and in my journal as well that it was like a soul reach.  I know it is her with whom I’d like to explore a relationship.  I told her that I waited for her.  After the night waned and morning came, these assertions resulted in her feeling scared.  She told me, which is good.  But what I don’t get is why it scared her.  She started these things with emailing me back after the wedding and said, “Not to scare you, but I have only seen that expression in one photograph of me and it was when I was with my ex and I was in love, but trying to hide my affections.”  OK.  Then she wrote the most genuinely loving message on my FB wall on Thursday for my bday with the words “love and kisses” in it.  OK.  She told all of her boys, her sister who is local, and her Dad that we are dating.  OK.  So, I told her where I am, and it scared her.

What was my result?  I figured that she does “push and pull,” and that we don’t work.  So, after church, I rode 20-miles on my road bike.  That helped.  Then doing laundry and cooking dinner for my workout partner helped even more.  I just need to have this tough conversation.  It will have to be this weekend if we do take my son away, or at a later date, but this stuff is ripe and should not be buried because I do know that letting it lie can lead to resentment.  I don’t know how to have these conversations.  I still struggle with whether or not I deserve to stay in relationship.  My ex has fucked me up and I let her.

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Love and Gratitude

I am 39 today.  That seems like an important birthday.

I’m going to try to call her and see if my Dad will cook dinner for me.  He really wants me to see his old professor friend who is in town only tonight–this guy teaches at American.  I will make an effort to drive over there; although, I don’t have much gas and don’t know if I have any money in my account.  It would help me get my son fed too, and because my Dad is stable, and has been for four-years, my son has a wonderful relationship with him that I am glad to get to see.

My father called me twice yesterday when we were meeting with large team regarding a hold that was put on a child who was unsafe.  I had to work really late as a result, and my cold took over my body.  That meant that I had little energy, so I took my son out to eat quick Chinese and then we traipsed around a used book store that we like.  I’m still on the prowl for a Disney anthology from the early 60s that has an abstracted version of “Old Yeller” and “Toby Tyler” in it.  I couldn’t find it last night, and I still have no idea why my aunt won’t let me have the copy that I read all the time that my grandmother had.  Who knows?  Now, I still need to meet with my Boss (I was way too sick last night), as I was supposed to last night, but couldn’t because I felt really sick.  I need to get that scheduled in the next five days so I can keep up with my dissertation.

My artist is a good difference and contrast to any of these things.  My son embraced her so tightly in church on Sunday when he came back to us and left Sunday school.  I miss her.  I know that I saw her Sunday, but I really miss her and last Thursday was such a powerful date.

She has admitted to me that she has not made it 7-years with anyone.  I have not had anything approximating serious less those two different relationships that I had during the years of 2009 through 2012.  Those were short though.  Both were about two-years, but had break-ups in them, so they don’t feel sustained enough to actually call them longterm relationships.  I can’t imagine where I’ll be in 7-years.  I’m just setting weekly goals right now.

My goal today is to get ahold of her for a few minutes on the phone.  I’d like to ask a boring question regarding her custody arrangement with her little boys.  Mine is basic.  I have him always less every other weekend.  She knows that.  She also knows that I have love and gratitude for her.  I sent her a CD and wrote a love letter in it.  I didn’t say, “I love you,” because I want to say that someday in the future, in person and unplanned.  I did say many things that I love about who she is though.  I also wrote a paragraph about my gratitude for her opening this door for us, because I know that with a woman this beautiful, that I may have not been able to do so even with the knowledge that she is bi.  She was touched by the letter and CD.  I’m glad, because my workout partner cautioned against this effort and gesture.  I’m just doing what is in my heart right now, and following my passion.

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Truly new

My ex finally removed me (and for the fourth time) off of FB.  She also took off my cousin and my close friends.  I may at some point take off the three women from the bday trip that we took last fall, but it’s nice to know that she won’t look at anything related to me.  She didn’t block me this time around, but maybe she can leave it alone.  I hope that she does understand that you can’t treat anyone like complete shit and say horrible things to her and expect that you’ll be friends.  I have no interest in a big shot who thinks that she is better than everyone and really seems to have an entourage of minions.

So, I’m starting something new and it’s going slowly.  We cuddled in church–my son was in Sunday school–and then my son sat between us when he came out during prayers.  They are teaching him The Lord’s Prayer.  He had a workbook when he came out that my artist looked through.  She is so great with boys and has a way of listening to children that is enviable.  She’s kind and gentle in addition to being so striking.  She almost made me turn red saying something a little dirty to me, and then I was struck that she would make reference to something kinky in church.  I am going to have to get my brain around a lot of things before I make love to her.  She’s genuinely intimidating.

I don’t know when I’ll see her.  I don’t even want to go out of town to climb mountains this weekend for my birthday, because it has really gotten cold.  If I don’t have an audience in my office today, I’ll call the B & B over the lunch hour and ask how much snow they got.  I’d rather see my artist a couple of times, and write and clean.

That’s what I think happened.  I think that I got on top of some of the highest points in North America starting in July, and then I put out my intentions into the mountain air.  I also think that since February of 2012, when I kept saying that I wanted a kind and gentle girlfriend, that began what I would seek.  Should I read through previous entries, I know that there are other things that I put “out into the universe” as they say.  Now, I am scared and should have a friend say to me, “Be careful what you wish for.”

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Naked

I have to admit how scared I am.  I need to talk to her about it. Tomorrow may not be the best time, but maybe my son would play Wii or watch Netflix after church.  I will have to gamble with my heart…  Again.  I’ve done it twice.  I looked at her in 2005 and then touched her hand, and knew that I’d avoid her, but then we had to work together.  Here is what I wrote:

“Why did she fall into the chair next to mine in August of 2007?  Who knows…  Because our journey unfolds and we cannot effect or alter it.”

That ended so painfully.

I don’t even think that when I was in the throws of the aftermath mess of my ex that it remotely held a candle to that level of heartbreak that I felt in 2008.  I fell in love again four-years later after my fall of 2007.  That sitch was probably built on bullshit though, as I’m learning, but regardless I did love her very deeply.

Now, I’m at the door.  I very much want to throw it back.  I need to tell her that.  Can I tomorrow?

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Good luck with that

Well, she and I have been emailing a bit, and I told her that I would take her away on a weekend trip if she could find this blog.  It’s too bad much of this one currently is about my shitty experiences with my ex who was the Master of Push and Pull, but that just lead me to where I am now.  I’m thinking that she will give me some new material 😉  I like this stage.  It’s exciting, it makes my heart race, and is pretty scary, because I know that I’m in trouble with this woman.

How do you say, “You look beautiful,” to a woman who has probably been told that more times than are possible to count.  But, she really is.  She has a way of carrying herself too that is incredible.  I wonder if she will find me and my blog.  I don’t know how feasible it is, but if she should–and good luck–she should know that I can fully embrace that I may very well fall in love with her.

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Bam

I just don’t have those slow, organic developments.  I don’t.  Girls and I just tend to know what we would like.  The big difference now is that after the girl from last summer and I had our thing for a second in July of 2012, and then all her lies started unraveling, I realized that I need to know someone’s friends and they have to know mine before we hook up.  That was my mistake with her, but I also think that I didn’t feel that mutual chemical bam also means something.

My artist told me via email that the only time that she saw herself looking the way she does once before, as she in the picture that was snapped by one of my hs friends at the wedding Saturday.  It was apparently when she knew that she was in love with a man who she later married and had two kids with after she could no longer hide her affection for him.  Wow.  I haven’t ever been that flattered.

Now I’ve got two days to pretend like I can easily sleep and feel stable driving dinner over to her house.  She writes like I do.  She loves music and reading.  I think that I kinda could feel that.  I have obviously looked at and been impressed with her paintings, but when my workout partner asked what I wanted, I said, “I want to snuggle under a huge, fuzzy blanket and watch movies.”  That is how I feel about her.  She is so beautiful, and definitely funny and cracks jokes, but I just want some time to share with her.

I get that chance on Thursday.  I don’t want to ask stupid things like, “What are you looking for?”  I’d rather reflect on our energy.  There is a lot of sexual energy there, but I also liked when we were laughing and joking on the back deck too.  I didn’t think that this year would end with no connection, but I had no idea that it would end with a chance to quickly fall in love.  I am ever-amazed with the beauty and the seeming lack of predictability in life.  I’ll write again on Friday morning.

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You haven’t got it so figured out

I had a wonderful day Saturday completing the summit with the woman with whom I had an emotional affair.  She and I talked incredibly easy regardless of elevation gain, and she is the most suited climbing companion that I’ve ever had.  That’s sad.  We talked through the pointed flirtation at several intervals after the summit.  I held her twice when I dropped her off and told her that I wouldn’t mess with her and that she needs to get her shit together.  We are super compatible.  We talk, joke, laugh, are both inappropriate–especially in terms of our sense of humor, both love kids and working with them as our primary clients, we are both highly energetic, have good vocabularies and think that being outside and then following it up with a beers and a burger is one of the best things that there is.  We talked more about the lack of us on the way back down.  I told her that it didn’t matter how compatible we were, and if we made this–whatever-the-hell it is–into physical that it would not only be immoral, but it would wind up fucking both of us up big time and diminish the level of connection that we have and what could be.

Then, I came home and made a cool mountain album to put up on FB and got ready, because I was going to a wedding.  It was the coolest wedding that I had ever attended as well.  It’s not because the Governor officiated it, it was because it was short, sweet, simple, and outside the couple’s home with the block sectioned off so that street performers could perform and we could eat BBQ and drink microbrews.  There were probably 300 people there.  One of my best friends who is like a sister to me has a friend who is a talented artist.  I had been to one of her art shows last year.  I guess that she said to my friend, “Are you with ______ ?” and she said, “Don’t you think I would have told you if I started seeing a WOMAN?  No, we have been friends for years.”  She said, “Oh, well, I think she is really hot.”  That was so flattering.  She is magazine quality beautiful.  She pulled me out to dance, which I hate, but she eventually let me off the hook.

We didn’t flirt overtly or out-of-control, but we had an intensity.  One of my friends from high school who knows both the bride and groom as well asked me yesterday morning if this woman was in love with me.  I told her flatly and easily, “No, but I am not sure who I will wind up actually dating next.”  She texted more and eluded to the level of sexual chemistry that could be felt when we were sitting with each other.  So, what am I going to do?  I’m going to email her this morning.  She has four boys.  She is a talented artist.  She has had pain in her past.  She looks like the child of Jane Seymour and Audrey Hepburn, and it was highly flattering to have her express interest in me.  It made yesterday very interesting too!  At least I won’t skip any workouts anymore 😉

After my friend from the swings got out of church, she called me.  We had a wonderful and good conversation.  However, the breakup with her gf does not even approximate clean.  They did an open relationship before ending their relationship, and the woman with whom she had the polyamorous connection is now pursuing her exclusively, but indirectly has shared that she will likely sleep with her ex for always.  I haven’t been down that exact road, but I know that I am not cut out for open.  I like stability in relationship and not wondering why I don’t give someone enough.  I’m smart enough and have been in enough classes to understand that sexual experiences and intimacy vary for everyone, but when she said, “We will have to be different now,” I did tell her “I don’t think that is possible.  You started off with only a sexual foundation and found each other seeking an open experience.  Also, the intention that you put out in the universe was that you a wanted polyamorous connection.  That was your intention.  I don’t think that it can convert.”

The sad thing is that this girl wants to continue an intense relationship with her ex.  My friend is done with her ex.  For right now, I’m done thinking about my friend in any other way than that she needs good friends, who like my climbing partner from Saturday, does not need to be fucked with visa vi a potential love interest.  She has a load of stuff to figure out completely independent of me.  Her mother and mother’s bf loved me.  I’m pretty good with parents in general, and it was nice to meet her mother finally and be part of their home.  I am going to write a Thank You Note to send this am after I have woken up with my coffee.

I can’t believe the wrinkles that get thrown up.  I kept saying that I would prefer not to date another mother if I didn’t have to.  I get that you choose who you date.  But, honestly being on the receiving end of that much attention from a completely beautiful woman was encouraging.  I’m going to email her and I would like to bring her dinner one evening next week before I leave town for my bday.  She doesn’t drink at all, which would probably be a good break for me too.  I am very much looking forward to seeing what is there.

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Hold the phone

I spent time on the swings last March with a beautiful woman.  The activity was sweet and innocent and lovely.  It was such a contrast to things that my ex and I would do.  You know walk her sweet dog while she screamed at her.  Anyway, that whole Sunday fucked me up.  I thought she was beautiful when I met her nine-months earlier, and then time with her was just so easy and she is so good with my son.  She wants kids.  She is four-years younger than me.  Perfect.  I also am very close with one of her best friends from hs, so my knowing her for 15-mos feels like longer.

She is coming over on Sunday.  She is coming over being newly single on Sunday.  I can’t wait to hug her and have dinner and conversation.  I want to get to know her better.  When she came to my church when I spoke, I was so excited.  I thanked her over and over.  I think that she is interested in going to church with me too.  I suppose given that she has spent time with my son, and the fact that I know that she will need some time to get through her relationship ending, it’s probably ok that she continues to spend some time with my son.  I have a natural barrier with that next weekend because we are in the mountains in a cabin with friends next weekend.  I’m just so excited.  It makes Saturday a walk in the park…  Or up a mountain.

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Tests

I had decided that because the woman who I’d met was flirting with me openly on FB, I’d ask her for a drink.  Just a drink too, because I think that she is mostly a jock and I don’t know except for loving Ani, if we have a single thing in common, but I did it.  I was a little pissed that I didn’t hear from her for a day and some change.  Last night we talked about the quality of one of the mountains that she had done.  (I’d done it this past July.)  When I met her at the end of July, she was on again off again with her ex, which I have certainly done, and now she is dating someone new who she had just climbed a mountain with this weekend.  Wow.

I moved that fast once.  I didn’t want to be with my partner anymore after the Christmas of 2010.  She drank the entire time, refused to have sex with me, and had an episode of PTSD, which I had to piece together slowly over the course of the next three-months because she kept her military history from me.  Instead of flatly putting my foot down, I flew several more times to see her.  I almost didn’t go to my bday trip two years ago, but ultimately I did, and it was scary at times.  I figured that I owed her a f2f breakup convo.  You really don’t owe anybody anything.  I know that now.

Sure, I met my ex three-weeks later.  Of course, I was clouded.  She seemed so different than my ex-partner.  I jumped into an intense relationship.  The most intense that I had ever had, which included my kid, because I loved her kid.  Too much too soon is what they say, and that is what we never recovered from, and I know that now.

It had been about six-weeks since I slept with her the summer of 2012.  This other woman was old school pursuing me.  The whole thing.  Flowers.  “How are you” texts.  She laid across my legs one night and I got up.  I didn’t ever want to sleep with her.  I got loaded at karaoke one night and had hung out with her for 6-weeks solid, and when she knew all of the lyrics to every song including shit kickin’ ones, I decided that I would sleep with her.  So, I did that night.  In the morning, I told her that it was a one time thing.  I didn’t even have a dopamine hit that was required for feelings, namely because she didn’t kiss worth shit, and physically, she had one good feature.  She is tiny like a kid is, and doesn’t even weigh 100.  She is silly.  When she started dropping bombs that next week about what she really did for a living and analyzing how I live my life, so I bounced.  When I talked to her a few weeks ago via text, I found out that she is in school to finish.  That’s good, but it’s independent of me.

What this woman who I had an emotional affair with is doing with her life is also independent of me.  I hope that she hates dogs.  That will be the only companion who I have when I spend 10-hours with her on Saturday.  I wanted a buffer in the mountain woman.  I only asked her for a beer so I could look like someone who dates.  I don’t date anymore.  It will be 9-months for anything physical for me in twelve days.  Now, I will be tested with an unhappily married woman.

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The long haul

On Sunday, I was sitting in the pew with the woman who I had the two-day emotional affair wherein one of the men who had been out at a church fundraiser the night before came over.  I apologized for teasing his friend what was then, last night.  He said, “Oh, you mean my wife?  No problem.”  I asked how long they had been married and he said, “Sixteen-years.”  The women who I was sitting with and I reacted as if we were impressed with the number.  After reflecting this morning, I realized that had I stayed in the land of repression and just accepted that I was married to a friend who really didn’t have an ounce of ambition, I would have been married for 15-years this fall, and I’m way younger than this man.

I made it nine-years.  I got tired of being breadwinner, motivator, and not being allowed to do things that I wanted to do because he wanted to sit around and do very little.  One time he didn’t work for eight-months and didn’t make a single meal, but managed to cut down the apple tree that was next to the Master bedroom.  You don’t need my degree to figure that one out.

I think that everyone wants someone who is a good companion to him or her.  I think, too, that everyone would like to have arms wrapped around them in passion or simply in warm exchange.  I don’t think that those aspects in a love relationship are too much to ask either, but I think that when the foundation was shaky or simply only built on sex, that it tends to fade off, and then you notice chewing with mouth open, or that you don’t help with dishes after dinner, etc.

I have a host of habits that I think some of which have changed that annoyed my ex.  She is a neat freak, so she cleans stuff up in fervor.  One time her pitching everything out included my favorite stocking cap that I eventually found buried in her garbage.  I thought that my son threw it out.  Then, because it had only been just under three-months, I began to note the bulldozer of disposal that ensued when she didn’t have house guests any longer.  It was like ridding herself of others.  She also didn’t like that sometimes I get excited when people share a story and I either punctuate it or ask questions that can change what is being told.

My ex called me in July and I listened passively.  When there was a really long pause I said, “That’s funny.”  I do think that a good outcome is that I listen more fully, and with the exception of my workout partner, I don’t punctuate convo anymore.  I guess it’s rude.  She actually just says the same things all the time, and they are devoid of emotion, “Good job,” and “Way to go,” are really the only things that she says in affirmation.

I would have grown really tired of my imperfections and quirks being thrown in my face and being so religiously criticized.  I don’t miss her at all.  We don’t have similar views on much of anything.

Now, I’m left with very few choices, so I require a new pool.  I don’t want someone morally compromised, I don’t want to sleep with a liar, and I don’t want to chase either.  I asked out a mother last month, and I asked out a girl that I met on an outing on Meetup too.  Both expect me to pursue and not just ask out and then see.  That is not my thing.  I like the one-on-one connected conversation over a beer or on a hike.  I don’t want to chase in hopes of something developing, because it’s not me.  Something will happen when it’s meant to, and it will be something that is meant to last.

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Women

It has been a long, long time.  I’ve gone slightly longer one time, and hope not to go again.  I’ve had these moments seeing calves, the backs of arms, the swell of the top of an ass in a skirt, or the nape of the neck wherein I am barely able to not run my finger tips across the skin.  Because it is not connected to a particular person, but is what happens visually when some women walk by, it’s a bit objectifying.  I really love everything about women’s bodies.

Our site coordinator on my Wednesday gig is a guy.  He is brilliant and hilarious.  I had a pretty good day, but can’t wait to be able to do things as a team, because both of the other women on it who are still there from last year are completely cool and talented.  We have an intern as well, but I don’t know her well yet.

Last night, the girl who I had a two-day completely emotional affair with emailed me.  I’m more inclined to develop a purely professional relationship with her and see if she can get hired where I work as she is a mental health provider too, and where she works doesn’t pay shit and requires waaaay more hours.  Last night she said that she sent me a non-professional and light email.  The only thing is that it had sexual content.  Not from her, but from what one of the really talented male musicians was pretending to do to her.  Gay males I know are shameless.  Not shocking.  Then I do note that I have  response, which I thinly veil as saying that I just need to date a reasonable girl or that I wish I could just stomach sleeping with Peter Pan.

I can’t.  I was never attracted to her.  She would, but most of me wants to just hold out for something good.  I am going to grab a couple of beverages tonight, because I have a driver.  My former intern and my workout partner are coming over tonight and wanted to make me dinner.  I want to get back to my house by 10:30, so I’m refusing to let them cook.  One time we ate at nine when they did.

I’m climbing with my intern from two years ago tomorrow morning.  Then I’m taking my cycling partner out for her birthday, which was actually at the beginning of the month.  I have to be at church for a long time on Sunday, and then I can clean, weed, and write.  I want to ensure that I have a dinner companion on Sunday, and if I don’t, I have been thinking lately about kicking around the bookstore near downtown by one of the high schools.  I know that I need to be more visible.  You hardly are when you’re on a trail ascending a peak.

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Approach

You have to approach a summit with care and planning.  Further, you have to recognize where you were and how far that you’ve come when you climb a mountain or simply make changes in your life.

I did a hike with one of my friends yesterday that I had not done in 5-years, and it is funny that I remember the last legs of it being very different than it was.  Some of it could be in part due to the fact that I did my first summit alone.  But, who really knows why it was so different yesterday than my memory of it was. Is it because I know how to watch and go forward with planning of my next steps?  Is it because it was my first and I’ve done 13 others now?  Is it because it’s just not all that scary and I’ve gotten accustomed to making summits? I don’t know. The metaphor is good though. I certainly haven’t always been careful or have I planned everything.

I know now what I seek, based on where I’ve been, and I’m good enough on my own not to engage in something that will yield nothing for me or my son.  I realize that is a selfish interest, but I try each day to give back and approach with good will everyone who I run into so as to share the gifts that I have, and express my gratitude.

I was sitting in a salon that is new to me to get an expensive as hell haircut last Tuesday night.  I was a little tired, and the new gay male stylist (new to me!) was running late.  I didn’t want to read the article that I knew I’d have to put in my proposal by three the next day, so I was half-heartedly looking at magazines on the table next to me but had not picked up any of them.  I saw a thick dining guide for our city and the neighboring university town.  I thought of my ex partner. She abuses alcohol, but when she is not drinking or just having one or two, she is the best companion over a meal or walking around looking at art. So?  I snapped a shot of the magazine cover and emailed her.  In it told her that when I see things like that, I miss her tons.  She didn’t get back to me until a day later, but we had an authentic, well-connected, and warm series of interactions.  I think that she is still in love with me.  Although, I was never actually in love with her, I love her like a friend and still do, but I wouldn’t want to ever get involved with a woman who is addicted to anything.

That’s a lesson yielded from this now 6-year journey of being single. There are times when you just need to push through lots of pain and there are times when you just need to sit and wonder.  I’ve had little hook-ups or stints that yielded nothing but that it is possible to eventually be able to have an orgasm from someone other than who you thought was the love or your life, and it’s good to learn to make red enchillada sauce from scratch.

There may be some things that you engage in too, that don’t yield much of anything. I just am.  I know that I will have a more complete family some time in the future.  I love yesterday and am grateful for climbing, connection, loving interactions with my son, and hearing him say to one of his good friends two Moms, “We are all going out then as a family.”  That innocence and pure love makes me hopeful for what the next legs of this journey shall bring.