Before I tell this story, I feel the need to reiterate: I am not trying to be malicious. I am not putting this shit out here to make anyone feel bad or to make myself look better. It isn’t about power. It isn’t about shaming someone. It’s all 4 Non Blondes, Hey! What’s Going On! business as usual. So if you don’t like it, write me. Hell. Write something I can post here. Whether you know me or this situation or not.
That being said.
You know those situations where nobody’s gonna leave with any dignity?
You know how most of my life/blog is all about those situations?
Well, here’s one that I’m not happy about. I hope it makes you laugh, too. Because damn.
This guy and I dated. It didn’t work out. Big deal. Happens all the time, certainly not the first nor the last time something romantic won’t work out. As I am often a fan of dramatic gestures, I didn’t want him in my life after it didn’t work out. I decided that I didn’t want something nice dangled in front of me that I couldn’t have and that I didn’t care about him enough (given that he’d already done some questionable things during our time together) to keep him around if it wasn’t gonna work out anyway.
When people go back on their gut decisions, it’s funny. Especially when they were right all along.
So we didn’t talk for a few months. And it’s my birthday. And I’m feeling magnanimous: Hey… maybe I was wrong. Maybe we can be friends, just friends, and everything will work out great.
That’s the first night we hook back up.
We have The Conversation. Shit gets real. I feel hurt and rejected. But ya know, it’s over. He still doesn’t want me and that’s ok, cause I don’t really want to be with him. So we can move on.
…..
Nope.
A little while later. We hook up again--during my birthday party….
After another round of “Right… there’s a reason we don’t need to do this…” perhaps NOW, now we can have some peace. But nope, looming around the corner is a themed quiz night and we know how we looovveee our trivia in these parts. You guessed it… hooked up again. Again with the talks. Again with the oh, god, is it fucking over?
Cinco de Mayo comes. Sigh. There’s no polite way to put this. I got blotto. I was doing some sadness drinking partially ‘cause of this situation and partially ‘cause Ex About Whom This Blog Was Intended to Be and I didn’t get back together and I’d kinda thought we would (that’s another story, that I prrrrrroooobbbabbbbllly won’t tell).
But regardless, I got horribly undignifiedly drunk. He ended up carrying me into my house. Both he and my roommate were concerned that I would stop breathing. I’m obviously a rather garrulous individual and I COULD NOT MAKE WORDS. I tried to tell a story about Tacky Redneck Bar (we once hooked up there, when I invited him out for karaoke) that I like to go to and I physically couldn’t. But hey! We didn’t hook up!!
A few nights later. There’s a tricky night where he comes and haunts my bars (where he NEVER hangs out, btw) and looks for me. He finally texts me at last call.
We hang out talking til like four in the morning and he tells me that I can spend the night, since I’d decided he was too drunk to drive and I gave him a ride home. I decline and we end up going back to the bar to get his car and we hug. I almost weaken. But NO! I am strong. I am strong like an Amazon.
Now, my feelings at this point are pretty convoluted. I don’t particularly trust this guy. Nor did I have 100% certainty of my feelings whilst we were dating. I do NOT want to get back together. But I do have feelings for him. And moreover, I am sick of this shit.
Another weekend comes where we hook up. And I finally decide I am done. But I don’t know what to do-- I am clearly not strong enough to resist this gentleman‘s siren song… and he isn‘t strong enough to keep himself from singing to me.
Oh! Alcohol! The cause of and solution to all of life’s problems!!!
My friends have a sketch comedy and film production company. To celebrate their upcoming trip to an Irish film festival they’ve been accepted into, they have a showcase with their films and performances downtown. The best part? It’s sponsored by a whisky company!! A guaranteed good time, right?
Wrong. But that was my choice. Just like all the times I let this homeboy bookmark me, calling me up when he had nothing better to do, pulling me out like leftovers when the restaurants were closed.
Regardless. The Showcase.
He leaves a party for his Sports team, where he received an award and got liberally sprayed with beer. A veritable beerkkake. He, my best friend and I go downtown. I am bursting with pride for my film friends. And I’m drinkin’, ‘cause drinks are free. There’s a pennyfarthing and fake mustaches. It’s all lovely.
We’re talking to one of the stand up comedians and I reach for his hand. We’re holding hands. And something icy cold and terrible drips down my spine. I have to make this stop. I am going to end up tearing my heart out over someone whose only interest in speeding my pulse up involves me naked and his roommate having to turn up his stereo (…. sorry, buddy… I’m usually quieter?)
Then like a fucking miracle from heaven, comes a line from the book Confessions of A Recovering Slut by Hollis Gillespie. How do you get people to leave you alone?
“Don’t do mean. Mean don’t work. Do CRAZY. People’s scared o’ crazy.”
Crazy, huh? I can do that. So I drink more. And I let it all hang out. I mean, the mushiness. The sweet nothings. The snuggles. This is the stage I remember being at during my last drink. And I’ve seen photographic evidence that we were there well after the last drink I remember. And I was obnoxiously clingy. We’re talking EMOTING all over the fucking place. My embarrassing drunk texts are oddly ambiguous “You actually said you weren’t going home with me.” Was I relieved? Was I actually sad? Was I simply broadcasting? The follow-up where I invited him to come pick me up from Best Friend’s was even more precious, not to mention when I had trouble using my phone and sent him a picture (of my skinned knee, get out of the gutter) to his email, rather than his text inbox.
I woke up the next day and bawled. I felt dead. We had what I was praying to God would be the last of our fucking talks. The words “I have some kind of feelings for you, but I don’t know what to do with them” were shared. I think I actually stamped my feet as I ran out his front door so he wouldn’t see me cry. But it was over. I was never gonna feel like trash again. My battered dignity and slightly bruised heart could finally rest. We. Were. Free.
HAHAHAHAH Psych!
A couple weeks later. Last call. I get a text. “Hey. I’m leaving the Montgomery area. Are you still out?”
The only reason we didn’t hook up then is because I didn’t see the text until after he’d already given up and gone to bed.
It’s at this point I start having a real problem with this situation. I acted like a fucking crazy bitch, on purpose. I did everything I could and this kid STILL wants me? What gives? Is he in love with me and just can’t handle it? Is really enough of an asshole to keep hooking up with someone like a frat guy? Is he really the kind of dude to just get me drunk and bang me, because he can? All of my rampant insecurities come into play. I can’t eat. I start smoking two or three times as many cigarettes-- shit, I actually start buying them again instead of just bumming. I get conflicting advice from every sector. What it all boils down to is, he doesn’t know what he wants and I get to suffer for it.
Some time passes. He comes to hang out the night before the 4th of July, even though he “knows it’s probably a bad idea.” I started drinking heavily the minute I heard he was coming. We’re at the bar. He buys us each a shot. Then he buys me one drink, two drinks. I’m doing ok not flirting with him. I’m mostly just terrorizing this guy trying to hit on our mutual best friend. Then suddenly it all hits me at once. And the idea that he’s gonna come over to ‘see my scooter’ is decided. But I’m trying to be sneaky and using parts of my conversation with best friend to make it all seem ok. Because this situation is that fucked. I can’t summon any decent response. Thankfully, best friend cockblocked us (which as I put it in the text “is probably ok.”) When I insisted they both come over anyway, we pretty much sat there and watched him fall asleep on the steps of my house.
And I wish I could say that getting cockblocked by our mutual best friend stopped us. But nope.
I apologized for my behavior the next day. He didn’t for his, just accepted my apology. He restates his position, that he isn’t trying to have anything but a friendship with me. Just like I don’t want this situation to happen any longer. Sounds pretty rich, right? Neither of us want this situation to continue. Well, no wait. If that were really true, it wouldn’t happen anymore, just like it wouldn‘t have happened any other time in the last six fucking months. I don’t know what his reasons are. But I am starting to understand mine. Because it’s fucking intoxicating to be chased. Even when you know it isn’t real, it feels like something you should want.
If you give someone that much power over you, it’s sad. It really is. I should have more respect for myself. But given who I am, it’s completely natural that I’d want someone to chase me like he has. Hell, I’ve had honest-to-God committed boyfriends who put less work into chasing my ass down. The amount of energy this guy has put into fucking me is pretty impressive. For all that he says he “doesn’t want anything other than to be friends,” it is pretty hard to believe that when you add up all the times we ended up in bed together. As I'm pretty sure I actually yelled at him during our LAST session, "So do you have to get drunk to want to fuck ALL your friends then, or am I just special?" I dunno if I used those exact words. I was pretty drunk.
Because I want to believe that he isn't just coldly using me, that he isn't That Guy. I want to come up with some fluffy reason behind it that makes me feel better about myself. I'm sure the mental gymnastics I put into justifying it everytime I'm drunk or defending it make fucking beautiful word pictures. But it isn’t real. I’ve spent too much time trying to make the math add up and it never will. As nice as it is to think “well, maybe his feelings are just too confusing,” in actuality, the situation doesn’t have a lot of depth. You can justify it a thousand ways but like I said it in an earlier blog, ladies:
Homeboy don’t think you’re rad. Homeboy just wants to fuck.
It’s kinda weird being on the other side of homeboy. Oh well.
In five years time, when I look back at this, it'll be another story of a time I made a decision with my feelings, not my brain-parts. And if what he says is what we go by, he'll look back and see the time he used someone who happened to have both a soft heart and a soft head. It isn't that big of a deal. Because while nothing and nobody can ever make me feel like a victim, it's for damn sure that he'll pretty much feel like a dick.
(Originally published 7/22/2012)
That being said.
You know those situations where nobody’s gonna leave with any dignity?
You know how most of my life/blog is all about those situations?
Well, here’s one that I’m not happy about. I hope it makes you laugh, too. Because damn.
This guy and I dated. It didn’t work out. Big deal. Happens all the time, certainly not the first nor the last time something romantic won’t work out. As I am often a fan of dramatic gestures, I didn’t want him in my life after it didn’t work out. I decided that I didn’t want something nice dangled in front of me that I couldn’t have and that I didn’t care about him enough (given that he’d already done some questionable things during our time together) to keep him around if it wasn’t gonna work out anyway.
When people go back on their gut decisions, it’s funny. Especially when they were right all along.
So we didn’t talk for a few months. And it’s my birthday. And I’m feeling magnanimous: Hey… maybe I was wrong. Maybe we can be friends, just friends, and everything will work out great.
That’s the first night we hook back up.
We have The Conversation. Shit gets real. I feel hurt and rejected. But ya know, it’s over. He still doesn’t want me and that’s ok, cause I don’t really want to be with him. So we can move on.
…..
Nope.
A little while later. We hook up again--during my birthday party….
After another round of “Right… there’s a reason we don’t need to do this…” perhaps NOW, now we can have some peace. But nope, looming around the corner is a themed quiz night and we know how we looovveee our trivia in these parts. You guessed it… hooked up again. Again with the talks. Again with the oh, god, is it fucking over?
Cinco de Mayo comes. Sigh. There’s no polite way to put this. I got blotto. I was doing some sadness drinking partially ‘cause of this situation and partially ‘cause Ex About Whom This Blog Was Intended to Be and I didn’t get back together and I’d kinda thought we would (that’s another story, that I prrrrrroooobbbabbbbllly won’t tell).
But regardless, I got horribly undignifiedly drunk. He ended up carrying me into my house. Both he and my roommate were concerned that I would stop breathing. I’m obviously a rather garrulous individual and I COULD NOT MAKE WORDS. I tried to tell a story about Tacky Redneck Bar (we once hooked up there, when I invited him out for karaoke) that I like to go to and I physically couldn’t. But hey! We didn’t hook up!!
A few nights later. There’s a tricky night where he comes and haunts my bars (where he NEVER hangs out, btw) and looks for me. He finally texts me at last call.
We hang out talking til like four in the morning and he tells me that I can spend the night, since I’d decided he was too drunk to drive and I gave him a ride home. I decline and we end up going back to the bar to get his car and we hug. I almost weaken. But NO! I am strong. I am strong like an Amazon.
Now, my feelings at this point are pretty convoluted. I don’t particularly trust this guy. Nor did I have 100% certainty of my feelings whilst we were dating. I do NOT want to get back together. But I do have feelings for him. And moreover, I am sick of this shit.
Another weekend comes where we hook up. And I finally decide I am done. But I don’t know what to do-- I am clearly not strong enough to resist this gentleman‘s siren song… and he isn‘t strong enough to keep himself from singing to me.
Oh! Alcohol! The cause of and solution to all of life’s problems!!!
My friends have a sketch comedy and film production company. To celebrate their upcoming trip to an Irish film festival they’ve been accepted into, they have a showcase with their films and performances downtown. The best part? It’s sponsored by a whisky company!! A guaranteed good time, right?
Wrong. But that was my choice. Just like all the times I let this homeboy bookmark me, calling me up when he had nothing better to do, pulling me out like leftovers when the restaurants were closed.
Regardless. The Showcase.
He leaves a party for his Sports team, where he received an award and got liberally sprayed with beer. A veritable beerkkake. He, my best friend and I go downtown. I am bursting with pride for my film friends. And I’m drinkin’, ‘cause drinks are free. There’s a pennyfarthing and fake mustaches. It’s all lovely.
We’re talking to one of the stand up comedians and I reach for his hand. We’re holding hands. And something icy cold and terrible drips down my spine. I have to make this stop. I am going to end up tearing my heart out over someone whose only interest in speeding my pulse up involves me naked and his roommate having to turn up his stereo (…. sorry, buddy… I’m usually quieter?)
Then like a fucking miracle from heaven, comes a line from the book Confessions of A Recovering Slut by Hollis Gillespie. How do you get people to leave you alone?
“Don’t do mean. Mean don’t work. Do CRAZY. People’s scared o’ crazy.”
Crazy, huh? I can do that. So I drink more. And I let it all hang out. I mean, the mushiness. The sweet nothings. The snuggles. This is the stage I remember being at during my last drink. And I’ve seen photographic evidence that we were there well after the last drink I remember. And I was obnoxiously clingy. We’re talking EMOTING all over the fucking place. My embarrassing drunk texts are oddly ambiguous “You actually said you weren’t going home with me.” Was I relieved? Was I actually sad? Was I simply broadcasting? The follow-up where I invited him to come pick me up from Best Friend’s was even more precious, not to mention when I had trouble using my phone and sent him a picture (of my skinned knee, get out of the gutter) to his email, rather than his text inbox.
I woke up the next day and bawled. I felt dead. We had what I was praying to God would be the last of our fucking talks. The words “I have some kind of feelings for you, but I don’t know what to do with them” were shared. I think I actually stamped my feet as I ran out his front door so he wouldn’t see me cry. But it was over. I was never gonna feel like trash again. My battered dignity and slightly bruised heart could finally rest. We. Were. Free.
HAHAHAHAH Psych!
A couple weeks later. Last call. I get a text. “Hey. I’m leaving the Montgomery area. Are you still out?”
The only reason we didn’t hook up then is because I didn’t see the text until after he’d already given up and gone to bed.
It’s at this point I start having a real problem with this situation. I acted like a fucking crazy bitch, on purpose. I did everything I could and this kid STILL wants me? What gives? Is he in love with me and just can’t handle it? Is really enough of an asshole to keep hooking up with someone like a frat guy? Is he really the kind of dude to just get me drunk and bang me, because he can? All of my rampant insecurities come into play. I can’t eat. I start smoking two or three times as many cigarettes-- shit, I actually start buying them again instead of just bumming. I get conflicting advice from every sector. What it all boils down to is, he doesn’t know what he wants and I get to suffer for it.
Some time passes. He comes to hang out the night before the 4th of July, even though he “knows it’s probably a bad idea.” I started drinking heavily the minute I heard he was coming. We’re at the bar. He buys us each a shot. Then he buys me one drink, two drinks. I’m doing ok not flirting with him. I’m mostly just terrorizing this guy trying to hit on our mutual best friend. Then suddenly it all hits me at once. And the idea that he’s gonna come over to ‘see my scooter’ is decided. But I’m trying to be sneaky and using parts of my conversation with best friend to make it all seem ok. Because this situation is that fucked. I can’t summon any decent response. Thankfully, best friend cockblocked us (which as I put it in the text “is probably ok.”) When I insisted they both come over anyway, we pretty much sat there and watched him fall asleep on the steps of my house.
And I wish I could say that getting cockblocked by our mutual best friend stopped us. But nope.
I apologized for my behavior the next day. He didn’t for his, just accepted my apology. He restates his position, that he isn’t trying to have anything but a friendship with me. Just like I don’t want this situation to happen any longer. Sounds pretty rich, right? Neither of us want this situation to continue. Well, no wait. If that were really true, it wouldn’t happen anymore, just like it wouldn‘t have happened any other time in the last six fucking months. I don’t know what his reasons are. But I am starting to understand mine. Because it’s fucking intoxicating to be chased. Even when you know it isn’t real, it feels like something you should want.
If you give someone that much power over you, it’s sad. It really is. I should have more respect for myself. But given who I am, it’s completely natural that I’d want someone to chase me like he has. Hell, I’ve had honest-to-God committed boyfriends who put less work into chasing my ass down. The amount of energy this guy has put into fucking me is pretty impressive. For all that he says he “doesn’t want anything other than to be friends,” it is pretty hard to believe that when you add up all the times we ended up in bed together. As I'm pretty sure I actually yelled at him during our LAST session, "So do you have to get drunk to want to fuck ALL your friends then, or am I just special?" I dunno if I used those exact words. I was pretty drunk.
Because I want to believe that he isn't just coldly using me, that he isn't That Guy. I want to come up with some fluffy reason behind it that makes me feel better about myself. I'm sure the mental gymnastics I put into justifying it everytime I'm drunk or defending it make fucking beautiful word pictures. But it isn’t real. I’ve spent too much time trying to make the math add up and it never will. As nice as it is to think “well, maybe his feelings are just too confusing,” in actuality, the situation doesn’t have a lot of depth. You can justify it a thousand ways but like I said it in an earlier blog, ladies:
Homeboy don’t think you’re rad. Homeboy just wants to fuck.
It’s kinda weird being on the other side of homeboy. Oh well.
In five years time, when I look back at this, it'll be another story of a time I made a decision with my feelings, not my brain-parts. And if what he says is what we go by, he'll look back and see the time he used someone who happened to have both a soft heart and a soft head. It isn't that big of a deal. Because while nothing and nobody can ever make me feel like a victim, it's for damn sure that he'll pretty much feel like a dick.
(Originally published 7/22/2012)
