Outside the Cars are Beeping Out a Song Just in Your Honor

Sometimes we bring heartache on ourselves.

I emailed Goose. To be more specific, I included him on a group email with a link to the photos from my most recent vacation. This was a pretty wuss way to contact him, but I thought that a more casual group-type email would be easier on both of us than if I just told him I'm in love with him.

When my mom was here, I told her that when I decided not to go to Las Vegas with Goose, I thought one of two things would happen. I thought either he would come around to what I wanted (breaking up with his girlfriend and at least giving something between him and me a chance) or I would stop missing him. Neither of those things has happened. I don't know if he and his girlfriend are still together, but he hasn't told me that they're not, and I'm still in love with him. Mom told me that you never stop being in love with people you truly love. The best you can hope for is that someday, you meet someone else and can make room for that new person in your heart. This was not exactly what I wanted to hear, but my mom's specialty is "shit you don't want to hear."

I shouldn't have emailed him. I know this. I have no one to blame but myself for the fact that I'm feeling like someone poked my heart-bruise. I know this also. As naive as it may seem, I thought he might be glad to hear from me and maybe we could at least be friends. I think I'd rather have him in my life in some capacity than not in my life at all. Apparently, he does not share that feeling.

The Way We Were

In the past week, I feel like I've taken the table that is my life and completely upended it. I've basically taken a few situations that I was manageably unhappy about and taken the risk of changing them. I've already mentioned my job, but wait! There's more!

I also started speaking to my father again after barely talking to him for the past eight years. My father and I had a troubled, tumultuous relationship for most of my childhood and young adulthood, and, as I've said before, I severed contact with him not long after I graduated from college. It doesn't take a psychology degree to know that my flawed skills at choosing suitable male partners stem from my fractured relationship with my dad. A lot of people think I'm attracted to guys with girlfriends, but it's more complex than that. I'm attracted to guys who have something else in their lives that is their number one priority (see, e.g., Goose, who has a girlfriend but whose main priority is his job), like my dad with his work and his money and his hoarding problem. What I continually hope for is the guy choosing me over whatever this other priority is, which will make me feel important and worthy. So far, this hasn't happened.

My mom held the strong opinion that "healing the relationship" (her words, or maybe Dr. Phil's) with my father would allow me to stop the cycle of choosing unavailable men and maybe get, like, a real boyfriend. I'm not so sure. My dad is still who he is. I don't know how to accept him the way he is and not feel disappointed in his lack of fathering skills. I am trying though. I emailed him to wish him a happy birthday the other day, and he sent me a short, pleasant response. I was surprised, since I thought he would send some overwrought email simultaneously praising me for renewing contact with him and lambasting me for freezing him out for so long. He showed admirable self-restraint though, so maybe I don't know him as well as I thought. So, getting back in touch with Dad ended up being anti-climactic, but I hope it's leading toward a positive end.

In the sillier realm of things, I also planned a trip to Asia for September and bought a new couch from a neighbor who is moving away. I know putting a new piece of furniture on par with a new job or a fresh start with my dad is ridiculous, but when all the changes started piling up, I felt overwhelmed.

She Only Knows If Someone Wants Her

"I'm not a concept. Too many guys think I'm a concept or I complete them or I'm going to make them alive, but I'm just a fucked-up girl who is looking for my own peace of mind. Don't assign me yours." -- Clementine Kruczynski, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

I miss Goose. Missing Goose is like having a bruise that never heals. Most of the time, it's just a dull ache, but sometimes, something pokes it into a sharp pain that cannot be ignored.

I haven't had any contact with him in almost three months, since I declined his invitation to meet up with him in Las Vegas. I have used tremendous willpower to resist checking his Facebook page (since this will only lead to further heartache, I am sure) or emailing him. Even so, I find myself trying to come up with any flimsy pretext to email him. No matter how much I churn the problem around in my mind, I can't come up with anything. Given how much I've considered it, even as I hate myself for doing so, I must conclude that there is no pretext for emailing him other than because I want to, which is not so much pretext as...text.

In my mind, Goose is the one who needs to email me first if there is to be any resumption of contact. He may believe the opposite, since I'm the one who refused to go to Las Vegas after he invited me twice, or he may not care. One thing I learned from my recent revelation that Doug Funny got married is that I am capable of thinking that a man has deep, though perhaps complicated, feelings for me when he in fact probably doesn't even remember my last name. That realization feels like shit. When Goose and I were together last summer, there was an intense connection between us. When we parted at the airport and I saw his face for the last time, he was looking at the ground, heartbroken, not wanting to let go of my hand. When we hugged each other good-bye, I let go first, and he pulled me to him a second time, when I again let go first so he wouldn't miss his flight. But now, it seems like he just wanted me for a warm place to park his junk while he was on vacation and I imagined these tempestuous feelings.

When does this get better? I think there are two answers, both equally true: eventually and never. I loved Doug Funny so much that it took me years to get over him, and yet I never really did, as evidenced by the fact that I was just recently looking him up online to see what he's up to. If I keep on keeping on with my plan not to contact Goose, I see no reason why the recovery process will not unfold the same way. And yet, I don't remember still hurting this much over Doug Funny this long after the last time I saw him. Perhaps that's just my mind playing tricks on me, since I met Doug Funny almost six years ago and it is hard to recall the exact color of my emotions. Or perhaps it's because Doug Funny and I had very little contact with each other after we separated in July 2004. In fact, I don't think I spoke with him at all between October 2004 and December 2007, and I communicated with him only three or four times between July and October 2004. Goose and I spoke much more frequently, and there was the invitation to meet him in Las Vegas. Perhaps it's because I love Goose more than I loved Doug Funny.

I'm sure there is also something to the fact that I met Goose at a time when my professional life was in a shambles. This may prolong my grief at our relationship's non-starter status, much as my professional woes compounded with the loss of Doug Funny to make for an exponentially worse time of things. When I find a permanent job, maybe that will lessen the hurt. (I would sure like to test that theory by finding a permanent job.)

Everything about this situation seems to pile on everything else to make it worse and worse. I miss him, but it's made worse by my perception (based on his silence) that he doesn't miss me. I love him, which is made sadder and more poignant by my perception (again, based on his silence as well as his unwillingness to break up with his girlfriend) that he doesn't love me. It all leaves me with the sour feeling that I am not lovable but rather only desirable, that these men want me for what I represent (in my Serena van der Woodsen fashion) and then get tired of me and never think about me again.

To the Left, To the Left, Everything You Own in a Box to the Left

Oh, Mango...

Mango hadn't talked to me much in a few days, apart from saying good morning. I was a little disappointed, but I let him have his space. After all, the man has a serious girlfriend, so it's unseemly for me to chase after him. If he wants to talk to me, my desk is six feet away from his, so he knows where to find me.

Today, he came over to chat. We got onto the topic of his girlfriend, and I asked if he plans to ask her to marry him. He laughed and said I was going to get him in trouble. I gave him a confused look and asked him what the story was there. He told me that he isn't ready to get married, and the two of them moved in together under extenuating circumstances (he was graduating from school with no job and nowhere else to go). He flatly told me that sometimes you do things for the wrong reasons that work out for the best, but he sounded like he didn't believe that. I said, "But you're happy you're living with her, right?" He unconvincingly said he was.

There was a time (let's call that time "before I met Goose") when this conversation with Mango would have filled me with hope. Now it just grosses me out. He's three decades old, and he's been living with this woman for a year or two and dating her for some period of time beyond that. When he says, "I'm not ready to get married," what he means is "I don't want to marry this woman." That's fair enough, but then he shouldn't lead her to believe he wants to marry her by living with her.*

From what I've seen, situations like Mango's end very badly. At some point, his girlfriend will press the issue of marriage. He will tell her he doesn't want to marry her either directly or, more likely, by continuing to hem and haw about it. She will then boot him out on his ass. So, all he has really done is delay his homelessness by a few years. I don't want to be anywhere near this situation when the explosion inevitably comes. Frankly, this whole thing makes me think less of Mango.

*I'm assuming his girlfriend wants to marry him and that they haven't discussed his reluctance. These assumptions could be false, I concede.

April, Fools.

One year ago today, I found out that I was being let go from my job. Early 2009 had been pretty good to me. I got involved with The New Guy, and I thought we would probably be married before long. I had been doing well at work after receiving some negative reviews the previous fall (these reviews were unfair, but they nonetheless existed and were something I had to overcome in spite of not having deserved them in the first place). My estranged friend Sniffles had sent me a birthday card in March 2009 in the hope of reconciliation, and I had strongly considered it because I was so happy and wanted to share that happiness with my former friend.

It was truly amazing how quickly everything changed. The New Guy and my employer nearly simultaneously revealed themselves to be duplicitous and unkind jerks. After that, my life went spinning off down a path I had not anticipated. I moved, I went to Peru and met Goose, I worked at various temporary jobs. There were good moments, but it was not a good year.

It was, however, an eventful year. I learned how much change can be packed into one short year. When I found out I was losing my job, I thought I would have a new one before my three-month lame duck period at my old job elapsed. I never dreamed that a year later, I would still want for permanent employment. And, of course, I am not married or even dating anyone at the moment.

Right now, I feel like I'm just treading water. Everything I do is just to keep my head above the surface, and none of it feels like I'm advancing toward my goal or toward any positive outcome at all. I send off resumes and hear nothing. The last two interviews I have had did not result in job offers, and the companies did not even have the courtesy to send me a rejection letter. (I have to say that I think that is very rude. If someone goes to the trouble of being interviewed, the company owes that person the courtesy of a rejection letter.) I've entirely abandoned any serious thoughts of dating. I try to remind myself that I can't know what seeds I've sown will germinate, but it feels like none of them ever will.

I'm trying to remind myself that just as things changed dramatically from April 2009 to April 2010, things might change equally dramatically (and, I hope, for the better this time) between April 2010 and April 2011. I'm just so ready for this ordeal of the employment search to end. It seems like other people I know are finding other jobs with ease, and that makes me feel more discouraged than ever. I know I have to keep trying, but it's hard to keep up my enthusiasm for the project. I am tired of looking for a job. I am tired of getting advice from my friends on what I "should" do (all of them seem to think I should be a writer, which is very flattering, but it's not exactly something you can just magically do and I think it pays only a few people very well at all). I just want to get a job that is at least moderately enjoyable and have some real health insurance again.

Freedom's Just Another Word for Nothing Left to Lose?

When I was in high school, dating my first serious boyfriend, I said something about "if [boyfriend] and I got married" in biology class. My biology teacher immediately scoffed and said, "You're not going to marry him." She thought it was ridiculous to think that anyone would marry her high school sweetheart.

I did not marry this guy. In fact, we broke up my sophomore year of high school and, in typical high school fashion, ignored each other's existences for the remainder of our time in high school. When I was in law school, he passed away under mysterious circumstances that were thought to be either suicide or drug overdose. Very sad. I also didn't marry my subsequent serious high school boyfriend, who later married my Asian doppelganger and impregnated her, not in that order.

Despite my having fulfilled my biology teacher's prediction, I have learned that a large percentage of my high school classmates did indeed marry their high school sweethearts or people they knew in high school.

I find myself now having just turned 30. Unlike most of my high school classmates, I am not married and I have no children. I have not even had a serious boyfriend since that second high school paramour. The man I consider the love of my life (Goose) is currently off in his own country, shittily ignoring me. My current life plan involves disentangling myself from my commitments to home ownership and steady employment to (eventually) travel the world on a more full-time basis.

Did I miss my chance to get married and have children? I realize that, biologically, I'm not out of time yet and probably won't be for ten or more years. But given that I rarely meet men I'm interested in and never meet single men who are interested in me, I can hear my ovaries giving up the ghost. Should I have tried harder to make things work with my high school boyfriend? I thought I would have lots of other choices after him, but it hasn't turned out that way.

When I had dinner with my friend a few weeks ago, she told me that she's in love with her husband and very happy, but she didn't marry the love of her life. If I get married, I feel like that's how I'm going to feel too. In one way, it would be a happy ending to find someone I can be happy and share my life with. In another way, it's a sad ending because I want to be married to the love of my life. It's hard to imagine committing my life to someone when part of my heart belongs to someone else.

Am I throwing myself into travel because I'm running to something (finding myself, or whatever you want to call it) or running away from something (loneliness, regret, a sense that I should have gotten married younger and had some babies)? Is it sad or brave to make the best of your life when you haven't made the best choices or when the one you want doesn't want you?

Thirteen Going on Thirty

I'm back from my birthday travels! It was a great trip with my family, but now I'm exhausted, and I have a sunburn on my scalp. (That's always a delight, especially when it starts to peel.)

I'm hoping to start down new, more positive paths in this next decade of my life. While I was away, I decided it was time to shake off my case of nerves concerning my dealings with my insurance guy. I emailed him today to thank him for his concern (regarding my finance issues) but tell him that I'm still canceling the policy. I didn't want to be nasty to him, but I wanted to be firm. I think I accomplished that goal. If I end up finding another lucrative, permanent job, I will pursue other investment vehicles anyway (possibly through another agent, since I'm still a little huffy with this fellow for not immediately bringing up this issue when I got laid off).

I'm also hoping to cauterize my Goose-related wounds. No one will be surprised to hear that he did not acknowledge my birthday at all. After I knit him a beautiful scarf for his birthday, he didn't even write "happy birthday" on my Facebook wall, a feat performed by many people I barely know and rarely speak to. Unacceptable. Unacceptable. No more.

So, at this point, I'm still trying to get unpacked from my trip and get photos together to send back to local people we met who agreed to be in photos with us and who I promised to send copies of the photos to. I'm also trying to wash volcano dust out of the handbag I took on the trip, which is a new one for me, and find places to display all the treasures I brought home with me.

I decided the tone for my next decade was set by a little episode that occurred on my birthday. When my family and I were descending from our hike to the top of the volcano, we ran into some American tourists who had run out of batteries in their camera. This is a major bummer for many obvious reasons, not least of which is the fact that we were in one of the few countries in the world that allows tourists to monkey around atop active volcanoes. I had spare batteries in my voluminous handbag and was able to save their day by giving them some. They were incredibly appreciative. The good karma from that act should start me off in the right direction.

Octopussy

Sometimes, I find myself doing something that repulses me as I'm doing it, yet I cannot stop myself. Specifically, I'm in this situation with a guy I'll call London Calling in which I think I've led him to believe I'm madly in love with him and he doesn't reciprocate those feelings and I don't even really feel that way. What the hell am I doing, and when did I turn into a clingy Carrie Bradshaw?

London Calling is, frankly, a pretty awesome guy. He's handsome, funny, smart, and exactly the type of man I'd be interested in dating if he lived nearby. However, as his blog moniker suggests, he does not live in my country. It's pretty rich for me to discount London Calling as a potential partner for living in another country when I'm madly in love with Goose who lives on the other side of the world, but I'm in love with Goose. That makes a big difference. London Calling is someone I'd like to get to know better, but geographic differences make it difficult. If either of us was really enamored of the other, I think the distance would be surmountable, but I guess we're just not that interested.

And yet. AND YET. I have been acting completely clingy to this man. I am fawning all over him and throwing myself at him, and I hate myself for it, yet I haven't been able to stop myself. It's like watching a car accident in slow motion and being powerless to stop it. This guy probably thinks I am planning our wedding -- and I couldn't blame him for thinking that -- but I'm in love with someone else.

So, why am I acting this way? I've been going through a lonely period since I was laid off last June. I'm just not in a good place in my life right now. I feel like I'm going nowhere or maybe even going backward while my friends are progressing in their personal and professional lives. My friends are getting exciting assignments at work, getting engaged and having babies. I'm not saying those are necessarily the things I want, but the point is that they are moving forward, and I'm staying in the same place. It's sad to be left behind, and it's scary to think my friends might be outgrowing me as they have all these new experiences I can't relate to. I'm very lucky to have friends and family I can talk to about my job-related concerns or my romantic concerns, but it's not the same as having a partner by my side on a daily basis. It also doesn't help that I have all this emotion related to Goose percolating, which I can't unload on Goose. So, I end up transferring that emotion to London Calling or other random people.

Clingy behavior is, obviously, quite unattractive. I don't like when other people cling on to me, and I'm not normally an octopus, but I'm just floundering around for something to cling on to because I feel adrift.

Don't Look Back in Anger

Until recently, I thought of myself as a woman in touch with her emotions. That changed when I realized how much trouble I have expressing the feeling of anger directly or sometimes even acknowledging that I feel it.

I was reminded of this when I was writing yesterday's blog post. I wanted to link to the post in which I wrote about knitting Goose a scarf for his birthday, so I Googled "known associates" and "scarf." That didn't lead me to the post I was looking for; it led me to another post that included an email I received from The New Guy and my response to it.

When I look back on my brief relationship with The New Guy, I remember him being a jerk, but I also have some pleasant memories of sweet things he said to me. When I reread the email from that post (the text of the email is reprinted there completely, changed only to remove people's real names), I was shocked by how much of an asshole he was being. Even more than that, I was shocked by how sweet I was to him in response. I didn't completely let him off the hook for all his shitty behavior, but I largely absolved him of treating me completely like dirt. I should note that The New Guy is not a perfect example of someone I was angry that I failed to confront adequately because I genuinely feared that he might hurt me. The New Guy initially seemed like a kind-hearted, genuine person, but he quickly revealed himself to be emotionally abusive and on the way to being physically abusive. It was not a good situation in which to assert myself because there was a very real possibility of physical retaliation. Even so, when I reread the emails, I felt angry all over again.

Recently, I also thought about a woman I used to be friends with. We were such close friends that I chose the neighborhood I live in and where I bought my house because she and her husband lived here. Then, a few months after I moved into the neighborhood, she became elusive. She responded to emails and phone calls, but she wasn't as receptive to hanging out. On one occasion, I invited her to do something on a weekend, and she told me she couldn't because she would be out of town, but I thought I saw her and her husband leaving a local park. Because I viewed her as such a close friend, I gave her the benefit of the doubt and assumed she was busy. I thought things had turned a corner one weekend when we met up with our dogs at the dog park and spent some time together chatting and catching up. About a week after that, she sent me a venomous email in response to a series of posts I wrote on a previous blog I had. That blog, like this one, served as a diary, and I used the posts that offended her to work out some issues I had with family. In other words, none of the posts mentioned her or impacted her directly. I guess she just found whatever I had to say to be self-indulgent, and she thought that she had had a more difficult life, so I had no grounds to complain about my life. She contended that she said these things because she cared about me, but we never pursued the friendship beyond that. I didn't respond to her at all for a week before finally telling her that I was sorry she felt that way and asking her to return some things of mine she had borrowed.

I wish I had told the bitch where to stick it. What kind of person sends a mean email to a friend, calling her names and belittling painful experiences from her life, and claims to do it because she cares so much? I also have no patience for people who say that just because they have suffered something worse than you, you don't have the right to be upset about some misfortune that befell you. If that was a valid argument, nobody could ever be upset about anything because the Holocaust happened. Ridiculous. She also got some facts wrong in the email, such as saying I hadn't done anything for her birthday when I had, in fact, called her and bought her an expensive gift. Anyway, as you can tell, I'm still a little bit angry with this person.

What do you do with this residual anger? After a certain amount of time, it's not really fair to confront people out of the blue. I guess if I ran into this woman and she tried to be nice to me, I could tell her not to bother acting like we're friends, but it would be pretty strange of me to email her now and let rip all the things that pissed me off about what she did.

Obviously, the best thing to do with anger is let it go. But how do you do that? It's the question of how you stop caring what other people think all over again. I don't know how other people work, but I can't just say, "I no longer care about this" and then automatically no longer care about it. Even though I recognize at an intellectual level, the anger does not serve me nor does it hurt the person I'm mad at, I can't just decide to be done with it. So what do people do to let go of their backlog of anger?

"The One That Makes Me Scream," She Said, "The One That Makes Me Laugh."

One of the hardest parts about trying to get over someone is trying not to care what he thinks anymore. When you fall in love with someone, you integrate them into your consciousness in a profound way. You see things that remind you of them or that you want to share with them. After the relationship ends, you might secretly hope that he will find out you're with someone else and be consumed with jealousy. Most of all, you hope that he will realize what a huge mistake he made in pushing you away and will make a grand (or even a petite) gesture leading to reconciliation. (Side note: I have never been on the receiving end of a grand gesture. I don't know anyone who has. I think this very common movie plot device might be entirely fictional.)

My birthday is coming up soon, and since I am not even close to being over Goose, I am already winding myself up about how he'll respond to that date. His birthday was a few months ago, and I knitted him a beautiful scarf out of baby alpaca yarn I bought when we were in Peru, thus giving him something handmade that was also a souvenir of a trip we took together. That was a damn fine gift. There is basically nothing he could do to respond to it that wouldn't be something of a disappointment. But I am guessing that he will not react to my birthday at all. At most, he might post something on my Facebook wall or send me a short "happy birthday, dude," email.

I'm turning 30 this year. It's a big birthday, and I'm not entirely psyched about hitting this milestone. The last thing I want is for this guy to ruin it with his indifference. But it's so hard to disengage from him to the point that I don't care what he thinks. Maybe it's just something that happens over time.

I Am Serena van der Woodsen

I had dinner last night with a friend of mine from school. I hadn't seen her in four or five months, so it was nice to catch up. (She paid, and that was nice also.)

I filled her in on the most recent developments with Goose (the Las Vegas invitation), and she called him the most selfish person she had ever heard of. She took the position that he knows that he's going to hurt me by having me visit him, but he's doing it anyway because it's what he wants. She also advanced the hypothesis that since he has feelings for me (which she believes he does, and I believe he does) and since he knows he can't give me what I want, he should want me to be happy and want what's best for me instead of wanting me to pay attention to him.

My friend made the rather obvious point that I attract a lot of men who are already in relationships. I knew that already, but she added to my existing awareness of the problem by giving her theory on why that is. Relationships are hard work. Everyone I know, even people who are madly in love with their partners, tells me that relationships can be a grind. I assume that if you are not really in love with your partner, the humdrum quality of being in a relationship is even more grueling than it is for someone who has a more deeply-felt reason to slog through the low points. My friend says that I am a free, open spirit, that I am beautiful and joyous and fun and one of the least judgmental people she's ever met, that I am accepting of people as they are, and that I blow into these men's lives like a breath of fresh air to show them how their lives could be if they discarded their tiresome girlfriends or wives. Which they never do, at least not permanently.

I choose to believe what my friend says -- primarily because it's filled with compliments toward me, but secondarily because it makes sense. Goose, for example, may care about and love his girlfriend, but in no way do I believe he is in love with her (nor she with him, to be fair). I don't know why they stay together, but it isn't because they are soul mates. When I came along, I probably felt like a relief to him. It probably didn't hurt that we met during a vacation, which is a situation designed to maximize fun and joyousness. I'm sure he loved the way he felt when he was with me, which is why he stayed in touch and why he invited me to rendezvous with him in Las Vegas. But he's still not discarding the girlfriend.

Maybe these guys don't break up with their girlfriends for me because, at some level, they know that being in a relationship with me would inevitably turn into the same drill they already have. I contend that this could be improved upon if they're in love with me, but that doesn't mean there won't be sad, tedious, frustrating or annoying moments being with me. In 2004, Doug Funny actually did break up with his girlfriend for me for a very short period of time before going back to her. I don't know why he left her for me, only to leave me for her seemingly moments later, but maybe it was because he realized that there is no such thing as a relationship without work. (As a side note, I should say that I don't believe any of the men I've ever been in these situations with has been in love with his girlfriend. I have met a lot of scorching hot, really kind-hearted men who were madly in love with their girlfriends or wives, and I shared no attraction with them beyond friendship.)

Unfortunately, my friend did not offer any suggestions about why my joie de vivre fails to attract available men, but I think I'm further along in understanding my life than I was yesterday.

It's Okay That I Pray That You Will Miss Your Flight and Have to Stay With Me Another Night

And...after all that, Goose didn't have anything else to say. Of course. I shouldn't have let myself get emotionally drawn in.

We're Living in a Powder Keg and Giving Off Sparks

Goose got back in touch. I was writing stuff on our mutual friend's Facebook wall about the mudslides in Peru and my contact with our tour guide. I knew Adam would be able to read it, and I was trying to get his attention. It worked, because he said he was glad to hear our guide was okay and he invited our mutual friend and me to come to Las Vegas, where he will be for the next 3 weekends. I said, "Have fun, [mutual friend]. I already chose to pass on this particular opportunity." Goose wrote back and said, "And I am still emotionally damaged by said rejection." (Sarcasm?) And I said, "Same here."

Fight or Flight

I read recently that a lot of the tension that people (like me) feel in their neck and shoulders is caused by suppressing the fight or flight response. When a person is confronted by, let's say, a mastodon, the body engages the fight or flight response. (In that case, it would probably be "flight" since humans who chose to fight mastodons probably didn't live long enough to pass their genes on to us.) When the person is out of danger, the body relaxes. However, in our modern, largely mastodon-free world, the fight or flight response kicks in at a lot of times when it isn't appropriate. Like, when someone yells at me at work, I can't very well punch them in the eye or run away, even if that would be fun. So, the adrenaline or energy or whatever it is from the fight or flight response stays in the body and keeps the muscles tense.

Maybe the solution is to be more honest. I can't punch people in the face or run away from them at top speed, but I coudl be more up front.

With Goose, my options were literally fight or flight. I could fight with him or for him, or I could fly to him or from him. I chose to walk away from him. I still think it was the best choice of my available options, but I have been struggling with it. Lately, it has felt worse, probably because he'll be in Las Vegas in the next week or so, and I keep thinking about how I could be seeing him in a week or two instead of sitting around here on my ass by myself wishing I was with him.

I thought that maybe he would email me, but he didn't. It sucks. It's bad enough to miss him and love him and want to be with him, but the hardest part is knowing he doesn't feel any of those things.

Your Love is Like a Shadow on Me All of the Time

I recently started listening to podcasts, and I heard one by a life coach (Cheryl Richardson) analyzing the movie version of Sense and Sensibility. It was pretty interesting, and only about 20 minutes long. She made one statement about Marianne Dashwood's attraction to the caddish John Willoughby that resonated with me. She said that women are attracted to "bad boys" because they allow us to express our darker sides.

That got me thinking about what attracted me to Goose to begin with. I've never made a secret of the fact that sex scares the shit out of me. I've been a sexually reserved and selective person my whole life, but after being assaulted at 21, I pretty much shut down completely. At some semi-conscious level, my mind and body are trying to protect themselves from ever being harmed that way again by making me avoid sexual situations and freeze up when they are presented. Then, you can add to that initial defense mechanism my worries that it has been so long since I had sex with anyone that I won't know what to do or be any good at it. And on top of all that, until about eighteen months ago, I had a minor physical issue that made sexual activity painful (though that has now been resolved, I didn't know that it was just a little bitty physical thing that was creating this problem -- I thought there was just something wrong with me). So, there's a lot of shit going on here that basically makes the prospect of sexual congress a horrifying and nerve-wracking one for me.

Goose did two things for me. First, he made me feel safe around him. He managed to be both sexual and non-threatening at the same time, which is surprisingly tough to do. I've had a lot of male friends I found non-threatening, but I found them non-threatening because I completely lacked sexual interest in them. On the other hand, there are guys like The New Guy in whom I had a (brief and ill-advised) sexual interest but who intimidated me in a lot of ways. I don't know that Goose's particular formula here could be replicated in the sense that I don't think I could become unthreatened by or sexually attracted to men who did not make me feel like that initially. Second, he created a safe space for me to express my more sexual side without feeling threatened or judged. Mostly, we just joked around about stuff, but I felt like he thought I was funny and that it turned him on. Whenever I tried to be more sexually flirtatious with The New Guy, he acted like I was being a total whore and if I was being more aloof, he acted like I was being a total prude.

Goose has a lot of problems, at least with respect to trying to interact with me. Chief among these is that he doesn't tell the truth to himself, so he can't tell the truth to anyone else, and this leads to he and I not being able to have a relationship founded on truth or even one in which truth makes the occasional cameo. However, one thing that I must thank Goose for is that he allowed me to be this more sexual person for a little while. I learned from spending time with him that that person is still in there and that she can surface under the right conditions. Maybe I don't have to enter the convent after all.

Who's Gonna Take Your Place? There Ain't Nobody Better. Oh, Baby, Baby, We Belong Together

I dreamed last night about shopping for wedding rings with Goose. Fuck you, subconscious mind.

Maybe I'm Crazy to Suppose I'd Ever Be the One You Chose Out of a Thousand Invitations You'll Receive

So, I think I've figured out what's going on with Goose. It's basically The Only Living Boy in New York all over again. Goose craves the attention he gets from me, the ego rush of having a girl he can constantly make sweat over him, because he's deeply insecure. He doesn't care that he hurts me by stringing me along because it serves him to do so. Just as The Only Living Boy in New York coaxed me into agreeing to be his friend with benefits and then dropped both the subject and me because all he wanted was the boost of my agreement, I'd wager that Goose would find an excuse to bar me from the Las Vegas trip if I actually agreed to go. It hurts to love someone so much and realize that he only associates with you because it makes him feel better about himself. It hurts even more when it happens again and again.

2010 will be a year of changes for me. 2009 was easily the worst year of my life, but it'll be over in a little more than an hour. I hope to make 2010 a rebuilding year -- get my life in order, get some bills paid, figure out at least a rough sketch of where I want my life to go in the future, take better care of myself, surround myself with people who support my goals and who care about me.

Hot Hot Hot

I just got the following MMS from Goose.

Congratulations you've made [Goose]'s hottest 100 for 2009. Prize can be collected from any pub in the new year. Happy new year and keep being rad.

How many whores did he send that to, I wonder.

I Don't Even Have an Opinion on That Tramp That You Are Still Seeing

Response from Goose:

Just to clear things up, I will still (as far as I'm concerned) be with Clare when I'm in Vegas, the invitation to Vegas was merely as friends, that said, it is a long way to travel for a milk and cookies and sans sex catch up, so I'll understand if you don't make the trip across.

I literally cannot believe this fucker.

When I Saw You Kissing That Girl, My Heart, It Shattered

Still nothing from Goose. What a fucking asshole. His current behavior pisses me off on a variety of levels, but none more so than the fact that my soi-disant friend is telling me with his invitation and subsequent silence that he doesn't think I deserve to be anything more to him than his side piece. Nice.