Normalcy Sucks.

Cosmopolitans. Good beer. My monthly women's magazines. Men's facial hair. Expensive leather interiors of expensive European cars. Bubble baths. Sunday football. Snakes. A few of my favorite things.

Writer's block. Or, more accurately, having absolutely nothing of interest to write about. Not one of my favorite things.

There comes a moment in your life when you've laid the past just enough to rest that you're more "more" over it than "less," and in a sort of gray-zone about where to go from there. This moment generally comes around when you've progressed to being friends with your ex; when you have decided that you are perfectly content with the way things are (for the most part); or when you've committed to keep sabotaging yourself or others for the stupid fun of it, but in a very small way. This moment is called A Love/Sex/Relationship Columnist's Nightmare.

I'm the sort of person who could never be happy in a perfectly functioning and progressing relationship. In order for me to remain happy and interested, there's always got to be some small level of drama-- something for me to tear apart over and over again in my head. Average just doesn't cut it for me. That's why I'm so notoriously picky. There aren't many guys who can keep THAT intrigue up. And when there is no drama, no intrigue, and no new news to report, it means that there is nothing for you to read.

So if you've noticed a downswing in the amount of content on this blog recently, sorry. I have no one, and nothing, to bitch about. Boo hoo. Normalcy sucks. I'll try to pick it up. Anyone know an attractive, emotionally unavailable, intelligent man with a casual style and psychological, misogynistic, and mommy issues with an charismatic and addictive personality who just happens to be misguidedly looking for the love that he will never be able to maintain? Kind of my specialty. (Not much of a specialty.) I need a project.

Or a new hobby, possibly less destructive than this.

XOXO

Commitmentstein: A Monster Of Our Own Making.

I am a commitmaphobe. Now, don’t get me wrong—there are some things I have absolutely no problem committing to: a cell phone service provider, a certain brand of mascara, riding boot, motor oil, or restaurant. But at heart, I’m the sort of person who once they agree to do something, spends a pretty good amount of time re-thinking my decision to commit, even if it’s just spending a weekend somewhere or agreeing to meet someone in a specific place at a specific time. Christ, I can’t even commit to how I feel about Phish Food versus Chubby Hubby. I have a nearly chronic grass-may-be-greener questioning nature. As it has been pointed out by one of the people who knows me best—and I mean capital ME; not just the person I project to the world, but the devious, conniving, self-serving, helplessly human ME—I am not happy unless I have something to endlessly worry and puzzle over as I try to decide whether it’s worth it or not, and what it means for ME. Commitment, therefore, is not one of my strong suits.

This, I think, is one of the overwhelming factors in why I am a pathological One Month Girl. One month always seemed to be the perfect amount of time in which to meet someone, convince them I’m great, have them convince me they’re great, and then watch everything fall apart when both parties realize that everyone is, in fact, human. As I say, it usually only takes me one month to get sick and tired of you, or one month for you to see into all my crap and decide it’s not worth your time.

Being such a self-proclaimed commitmaphobe with enough past history, blunders, and failed relationships to substantiate that claim, I recently picked up Elizabeth Gilbert’s newly-published novel “Committed.” Gilbert, of “Eat, Pray, Love” fame (another book I absolutely adore and brought with me to Italy,) is another self-styled commitmaphobe—only in her case, it stems from a bad divorce. She also believes that most commitmaphobes suffer from the same fear of lasting-decision-making. In the second chapter of “Committed,” titled “Marriage and Expectation,” she writes,

“The problem, simply put, is that we cannot choose everything simultaneously. So we live in danger of becoming paralyzed by indecision, terrified that every choice might be the wrong choice…Equally disquieting are the times when we do make a choice, only to later feel as though we have murdered some other aspect of our being by settling on one single concrete option” (Committed, 45).

About the only thing that you could get me to be committed to without being fully thrilled about it would be a mental health facility. And then I don’t think I’d have a choice. As Gilbert writes, “It doesn’t take a great genius to recognize that when you are pushed by circumstances to do the one thing that you have always specifically loathed and feared, this can be, at the very least, an interesting growth opportunity” (Committed, 20).

So why all the resistance to committing? Why are people so loath to hitch their trudging life-pioneer’s wagon to another person’s? Because we are people, and we are fallible. Because we have so many options that the next wagon, the one going faster, with the nicer oxen (or ass) always seems like a better one to take a chance on. Because there is temptation, and laziness, and sheer bull-headed stubbornness in the desire to be a singular individual. Because trying to be with someone else is like bashing your head repeatedly against a brick wall. An attractive brick wall, but bashing your head full-force against it all the same and getting those rectangular lines stamped all over your forehead and now broken nose, nonetheless.

Differences between the genders explain the break of commitment phenomenon quite nicely. Women have a tendency to over-examine, overanalyze, and overhype situations they are in until they don’t even resemble what is going on in reality, and not on the inside of their heads. Men are also guilty of this, maybe to a lesser degree, but they seem to go about it differently, exhibiting more of a “me against the world” fantasy, in which they feel as though they have to constantly avoid being “trapped” in a situation or relationship when in most cases, no one is deliberately trying to tie them down—instead, just a little bit of reliability is being asked of them, instead. A huge imposition, right?

But maybe Gilbert substantiates this idea. She writes, “When it comes to questions of intimacy, I want many things from my man, and I want them all simultaneously” (Committed, 48). That is an almost inhuman amount to expect from someone, and yet, when I look around, it’s the norm that I see, and, in fact, the norm that I expect. The problem is that women get used to depending on something from a man—be it phone calls, someone to make the first pot of coffee in the morning, or someone who always says the right things—and when that expectation is not filled, it feels like the world crashes down around us, rendering us disoriented and moody. “Why didn’t he call? Why didn’t he leave me my two cups of coffee that he knows I need in the morning? Why did he ask me how my day was and then tell me what a dickhead my boss is for making my job a living hell?” And so on, and so on—“Why didn’t he say goodbye? Why wasn’t he on time? Why didn’t he pick up the drycleaning? And it all ends up spiraling into, OH MY GOD, WHAT’S WRONG?!”

Maybe we just shouldn’t expect so much. I know—it’s completely counter-intuitive to everything we’ve been taught, but we were also taught that going to the doctor’s isn’t going to hurt, the Easter Bunny exists, and every Disney princess has a happy ending, ever after (and look at the divorce rates in the U.S). We all know where that got us. What if we could suddenly stop being so disappointed in our partners and relationships and ourselves? What if we could stop being so afraid to commit, because that scary bar could be lowered, and we could do it ourselves?

This is not to say that we should not expect things of people. Surely, there are some things that you should be able to expect from the people in your life, nonnegotiable. You should be able to expect someone who looks out for your best interests, as well as theirs. You should be able to count on someone to treat you with respect and decency. You should be able to expect someone to be there when you say “This is important and I need you.” You should be able to feel confident and comfortable in your relationships the majority of the time.

The only further advice to not expect so much and burn yourself out that I can give you is to be sure not to sacrifice all your time and effort in the name of not expecting so much. Although you may be able to give 112% right now, if your partner is only willing to give 20, don't bend yourself in half to make up for all of their lost effort. You'll drive yourself even more crazy. They'll stop trying to work because they'll (rightly) assume that you'll do all the work for them. It'll piss you off. You'll start to resent them. There is absolutely nothing wrong with taking a mental and emotional health time-out and just letting a relationship lie where it is if it's stalling at the moment. Both of you should still be there when you return from getting your air. And if not—who really wants to be with someone who would leave when things get a little stressed, anyway?

Pure science can prove that not expecting everything from someone is healthier in the long run. Psychologist Carl Jung believed that the first six months of any relationship is pure projection of your desires upon the other person, which explains why at about month five every. little. thing they do start to inexplicably annoy you to distraction and unhappiness. You are, in fact, finding out that they are a real, imperfect person. A person who has their own emotions and moods and problems that don’t involve you. Goethe once said, “When two people are really happy about one another, one can generally assume they are mistaken.” Why? Because we see what we want in our partners. This is not a bad thing; in fact, this is what assures that the human race continues. But perhaps we need to start seeing less of what we want, and more of what is really possible for two people.

“People always fall in love with the most perfect aspects of each other’s personalities. Who wouldn’t? Anybody can love the most wonderful parts of another person. But that’s not the clever trick. The really clever trick is this: Can you accept the flaws? Can you look at your partner’s faults honestly and say, ‘I can work around that. I can make something out of that.’? Because the good stuff is always going to be there, and it’s always going to be pretty and sparkly, but the crap underneath can ruin you” (Committed, 129-130).

How many people can say that they really know their partner after just a month or two? The longer it lasts, and the longer you stay together and learn more about each other, (which is the goal of every relationship, after all—to actually BE TOGETHER,) the greater that chances that you will have to deal with depression and disappointment and unhappiness and quarrels and disagreements and periods of time where you feel alone, even when you’re together, because you are sure—no, CONVINCED—that this is not the same person that you started out with. But it is. They’re going to make you mad, and you’re going to piss them off. After a certain amount of time, you can just see the forest from the trees now, or the flaws from the perfect smile or the charming mannerisms. The sad news is, so can they. And this is where the idea of two people committing to each other comes in, not, as some might assume, at the beginning of a relationship. No, the real commitment is when you can finally sit back, eyeball the big, hairy monsters that your former sweetheart-turned-pariah has been hiding, and say to them, “Ok, I see your self-absorption and tendency toward melancholy, and I raise you my need to be the center of attention, the way that I make everything a much bigger and more frantic deal than it needs to be, and the annoying way I mutter in my sleep. Can you handle that?” And if they say yes, and you say yes to them, then—THEN—my friend, you are in the commitment business. Not when you first get together. Not when you first decide to split time between two residences and share meals and bathrooms and life details. Not when you ask if you are in a “committed relationship.” Real commitment can only happen with time, and a firm grip on the personal reality between two people.

This form of commitment, not to an ideal or a relationship, instead focuses on commitment to a person. A commitment to on the daily accept their “most tiresome, irritating faults.” Gilbert explains, as she comes to grips with the idea of living with just one, flawed man for the rest of her life, “What I am talking about is learning to accommodate your life as generously as possible around a basically decent human being who can sometimes be an unmitigated pain in the ass” (Committed, 132). Because that is what you are doing—you’re welcoming a pain in the ass into your life. You’re telling them that you are committed to being their co-ass. That you like their ass-ish-ness. That you might even, in fact, find it endearing and lovable and value it, quirks and all. And really, once you learn not to expect the moon from someone, and instead take what they can give you, flaws and all, what more could you ask for from them? Nothing. And right about then, you can start to learn to be content. Content, and committed.

But how does this make a commitmaphobe feel better and more like committing to another person, let alone a situation, isn’t the end of the world? Commitment isn’t going to ruin your life. It doesn’t have designs on sapping all of your hopes and dreams and aspirations and tying you down in one place to one person, ‘till death please-come-quickly-and-take-one-of-you apart. Instead, it has the desire to give you a cohort in crime, who, like your parents, will love you inexplicably, no matter what you do or who you are. It gives you a solid constant when the rest of your life is changing so fast it makes your head spin. It gives you someone who always knows what you need to hear, whether it’s a “You are amazing and can totally do this,” or a “Get your ass in gear and stop fucking around.” The goal is to render you not quite so alone and afraid of what someone wants from you. And so, I close with the words that made this one commitmaphobe feel a little more lenient in dealing with the thought of letting other people into her life and dealing with the repercussions. Because sometimes, just sometimes, the only thing that you realize you’re missing to make yourself, your desires, and your life whole, is another person who can handle your shit, too.

“In the end, it seems to me that forgiveness may be the only realistic antidote we are offered in love, to combat the inescapable disappointments of intimacy” (Committed, 133). The trick is not to ask for or expect someone to be something that they're not; instead, sync up who both of your are and what you both want or need. I'm not the sort of girl who you buy Valentine’s Day flowers for. I don’t want to be the girl who you feel like you have to take out for dinners and dress up for, because I don’t really do dates without feeling massively awkward. I'm just the kind of girl you can tell when you hear a good show is coming into town. I want to be the girl who you call when you’re heading home at night. I want to be the only girl who is expected to walk out of your bedroom. Those are my expectations. I'm sure you all have your own. They're pretty pared-down. When it comes down to it, we're all pretty simple. So don't ask for too much. Do not expect too much. Don’t be too harsh, or too judgmental, or too quick to act or make up your mind about something and rule it out. The only way you are ever going to get out of any relationship alive and satisfied is if you first relax your own ideas and expectations enough to let someone else just be the “themselves” that you love, for whatever twisted reasons. And that is pretty phenomenal. More phenomenal than scary, I’d even say.

XOXO

Ghosts: Night of the Living Undead Relationship

Let me tell you a story.

Once upon a time, when I was a freshman in college, new to smoking and growing my hair out, I danced around mutual attraction with a senior for 7 months. Toward the end of the year, playing indoor soccer in the hallway of the dorm, he knocked me over and gave me a massive bump on the head. A week later, I was in his bed. We swapped music, laughs, bodily fluids, and he told me adventures from abroad as bedtime stories. He was the first guy I fell in love with. I’ve loved other people since, but I will always have a somewhat softer spot for him, just like the tender and swollen flesh on the top of my head that he caressed after he picked me back up.

To this day, we’re still more-or-less in touch. If he comes back into town, he calls. We’ve met for coffee dates and spent a few evenings together. Usually, I’m busy and/or seeing other people, but if I can, I’ll make time to catch up with him. After the summer that he graduated and some hard feelings, I’ve gotten to the point where it’s not hard to pick up the phone or send him a message to contact him anymore.

It’s always a fine line between surprise and the inevitable when I hear his ringtone go off, usually right in time with the seasons. I can say to him, “Sorry—I already have a date tonight,” and he’ll respond with an “Ok, what about tomorrow night?” Unfortunately, at some points in the past, I was ambivalent about the person I was currently seeing as a full-time adventure, and so I said “yes” to his part-time adventure. Not one of my proudest moments. It’s not exactly fair, but it’s one of the complications of life.

In the past few months, he and I have finally progressed from the weird holding pattern we were in. He figured out that although I will always find his big blue eyes and puffy lips tempting, I’m not quite the same girl I was 3 years ago. And I’ve figured out that although the girl I am now has no problem moving past the past and keeping up with him, I’m also moving past him.

It’s always hard to see him. “No” is a word that I struggle with sometimes. As I once said to one of my roommates after coming home from coffee with him, “He was supposed to be fat and balding and unhappy, not tan and fit and cute.” But that’s how past relationships work—you’ll never quite get rid of them. They will always be people you look at and think, “I spent a month/2 nights/6 months thinking you were the best thing on Earth, and I know what you look like naked.” It’s a hard act to juggle. He came to Florence first. He was the one who first planted the seed in my mind, and I’ve been following his ghost all over Italy. It’s in the same places we visit and in the same photos I take that were hanging on his room’s walls. It’s something that I look for, almost unknowingly, when I’m out and about. My breath still catches when I think I see him. Ghosts haunt. Not all of us have exorcists on call. And like Casper, not all ghosts are unfriendly. But ghosts do hinder you—other people don’t want to come and play in your little fright-fest. It's not fair to ask other people to put up with your undead companions. So I have since been learning how to say “No.”

I made my choice (moments of weakness notwithstanding,) a few months ago and decided to keep on growing up and moving on. You can’t keep your future open if you’re still keeping your past on speed-dial as a crutch. We’ve more-or-less both moved on, but are still both past and present. In the past, he was my lover. In the present, he’s someone who I have no qualms asking for advice, or sharing coffee, a few beers, or laughs with again. We all have skeletons in our closets. The true test of character is how you deal with them and bury them again when the Bad Voodoo man comes to call and you know zombies aren’t exactly great playmates.

XOXO

The Not-So-Perfect Ending.

{ My Goodies-- Ciara} <--- Means "listen to this, please." See what I did? I'm kinda workin' a theme, here.

So I feel like I deserve to tell you the end of the "Me & Perfect" story. The Final Chapter, if you will. What happened right before I finished that book and apparently, single-handedly, snapped it shut and threw it in the fire.

Perfect and I got into that Epic Fight September 30th. We haven't talked since. Which may be partly because I may or may not have said some really nasty things. But hey. It's not all my fault. My defenses go up when you start blaming me for shit. I'll do a basic recap of WWIII for you:

Perfect: "You're getting too attached again!"

Me: "Excuse me, what could I get attached to? You're 3 and a half hours away. I never see you anymore. I'm sure you...busy, AKA: fucking your way through your freshmen class and any upper-class ladies you can get your big paws on. I'm BUSY."

Perfect: "Well, it just seemed like you're putting too much into this and getting too committed with all the things we've been saying and doing and all the nude pics I've been somehow convincing you to send me without even having to work for them. But short of ogling your strategically covered body, I can't commit like that right now. And you're going and committing!"

Me: "I'm just a tease. JUST LIKE YOU ARE. You're a great guy, except when you're being a complete asshole, like right now, and yeah, sometimes I wish things could be different, buy they're not. Look, I'm driving home from the gym. Can we continue this lovely blame-fest when I get home?"

Surprise, surprise, I didn't heard back from him. And I still hadn't. The other day, after realizing that I hadn't been seeing anything from him on my Stalker, errrr-- Newsfeed on Facebook lately, I went to go to his page to only find out I have apparently been unfriended either by him, or Facebook went on a binge and deleted half of his friends list like half of it is now missing, I did not, A.) Flip a shit, B.) Send him a snark-tasic message asking him to explain his incredibly juvenile actions, or C.) Call him and pick WWIII back up. Instead, I have decided to just brush it off. Whatever. I didn't think our fight was honestly that unforgivable, and I was hoping we could at least try and remain friends considering all that we've been through, because as he said, "Yeah, but I've had sex with you."

But after everything that's happened with Jersey Blunt, I'm starting to realize just how short and unpredictable life is. Add leaving for Italy for four months and a trans-Atlantic flight, into the mix, and I am feeling very, very mortal. And yes, I've been missing Perfect lately, too. There's nothing like one person going missing from your life to bring the other players hiding in the shadows out and to your attention. I miss the good times we had. I miss knowing he was there for me when I needed him. It felt real bad when all I wanted was strong arms to hold me, and knowing I don't have that luxury because the one guy who was always there for that hug is dead and gone, and the other one who might do that for me is silent, almost 50 days going. I'm not taking that for granted, anymore. So I got off my high horse of Pride and texted Perfect today.

"Hey, how are you?" I asked. "Surviving college?"

"Good," he responded. "Who is this?"

It was like a sucker-punch to my gut. But I guess I deserved it-- all the deletion from his life. I said some pretty nasty things.

"Wow, ok," I said. "It's Carissa."

"Hey, yeah-- I'm doing good," he told me.

"Awesome. Look, some things have happened in my life recently and made me realize I really don't want to leave things nasty from the last time we talked. Basically, I guess I'm sorry."

The whole time I drafted this text, (possibly the first time I've actually said "I'm sorry," to a guy,) I was sitting at work, looking at Anthony and going, "If I say, 'I guess I'm sorry,' it still counts as saying 'I'm sorry,' right?"

Can we tell I have a hard time saying this? If it's all my bad, I'm fine admitting it. But, let's face it-- he started it. I don't want to be fully culpable for this mess.

"Yeah, it was kinda weird! But I understand," Perfect said.

"Yeah, it was. Thanks for understanding," I told him. "Hope life's good!"

That was it. Swallowed my pride; made up (kind of), and lived to tell the tale. I feel so much better. I miss that kid.

But now I may or may not feel like the outcome of my dating triumph rides on whatever is going on with Gypsy ending well. It's not rebounding, per se-- it's just the fact that the two of them are so alike and I've been doing such a good job correcting all the mistakes I made with Perfect in what's going on with dealing with Gypsy that if I honestly can't pull this off, I'm going to feel like I failed miserably twice.

But really, I can't figure out what he wants from me. I'm not used to being considered a "prize," something to tap and be able to say, "I tapped that!" As I told Anthony today over dinner when he and Dos asked me why I was with a guy like Perfect in the first place-- heavy on the muscles, lite on the vocabulary-- there are some guys girls date just to say that we landed that; to admire for how warm they are, how nice they smell, how good they look, how much weight they can lift. Yeah, it may seem a bit shallow, but men, when you protest, let me ask you: why are you waiting for the girl with the bangin' body and niceness when there's that average girl friend of you who's super-intelligent, charming, and well-spoken? We're all only human-- we all like looking at nice things.

I'm just not used to being the "hot" girl. I'm not used to being the girl who gets asked over to sit on a sofa and look pretty while not being talked to. I'm not used to being the girl that your other friends stare at. I'm dying for some equal treatment, here. I'm dying for something other than a night that involves the alcohol that Gypsy mistakenly thinks will magically lower my jeans. (Seriously, better chance of me sleeping with you when both of us are sober than when we're drunk. I learned that lesson, and learned it hard.)

So, uh-- how do you tell a guy this without coming off like a total gold-digging tease? Seriously-- you know my "I buy my on goddamn food!" issues-- it's not like I'm asking for a free meal, here. I'm just asking for the sort of old-fashioned, formal acknowledgement of a status that can only be achieved by looking at someone in public (not in their apartment, not a frat house, not at a party in someone else's basement,) while masticating something that counts as sustenance. ("Chewing"...for those of you who instantly went to dirty places and are too lazy to open a new tab, go to Merriam-Webster online, and look it up. I live to serve-- I aim to please.)

Short of getting my ghetto on and telling him, "Playa, I ain't lookin' to be played, so y'all better make up your mind like, right now and we can either fuck and go our own separate ways, or you better be making an honest woman out of me," I am really at a loss. I would like to again make the point that we really are like two supremely socially awkward teenagers about this-- he has yet to make a solid move, and I have yet to throw him a bone. Call me a hopeless romantic, but I'm the sort of girl who really just wants a guy to grab me and kiss me. Fuck the gentlemanly shit at this point-- if I'm crawling into your bed and spending my Thursday nights out with you, I'm not flashing conflicting signs. I'm only talking to Greece more because he actually talks to me. I'm leaving because I refuse to be like any of your other girls and sit and wait for you to come home. I'm a flirt; you don't pay attention, and I'll find something more fun to do. I want you to do something here-- fight for it. Show me it's worth giving it up.

Or I'm gonna bounce to the next. I'm not the most patient girl. And I need reassurance, too.

Sure, he's a player. Sure, if it has a pulse, moves, and owns a vagina he'll make a pass at it. Sure, it's all very casual to him. But sure, it's also getting very casual quickly for me, too. I'm a ticking time-schedule, here. I would like to make something happen there sometime within the next, oh-- week. I'm feelin' it.

Here's to making up, and making out.

XOXO

Settling In The City, and The Chains That Bind.

[“So are you a pipe, or are you a diamond? Because pipes burst under pressure, but diamonds are made.”]

Life’s a funny little bitch. Sometimes, just when things are going right, a wrench gets thrown into the works from somewhere unidentifiable, and then you’re left sitting on your ass, wheels spinning in the air kind of uselessly. Basically, you’re wasting time for a bit.

That’s what I feel like I’m doing right now: wasting some time. Perfect is still rather incommunicado, though we did text back and forth a few times yesterday. Knowing that I’ve been getting the same treatment (if not more contact,) than his family and his other friends keeps me even most days. Also, I’m reminded of something Cait said once: Perfect likes to get close and cling to people, and then he likes to have his space for awhile. Admittedly, we were pretty close in contact the week before he left for college—I’m considering this a good time to let that contact a little loose, give him his head (as we say in the horse world), and let him settle in a bit.

In the meantime, I’ve been doing little things: sending him video clips of guys in flying-squirrel suits jumping off of cliffs in Switzerland and coasting the airstreams; setting up play-dates for him and two of my guy friends who also love downhill and free-ride biking when he comes back home for a visit; and just generally keeping a watch on him from the wings. He’s tired; he’s struggling with being back in school already; he’s being run weary by meeting people, commitments, and starting training for the track season. I don’t need to be another burden right now. I’m being the coolest non-girlfriend there ever was—he better realize I’m the shit.

Meanwhile, I’ve been getting some interesting developments of my own. I get lonely too, you know. I like testosterone and male company in my life. I love to flirt. And lately, there’s been no shortage of available men. I’ve been bumping into my beautiful Writing Lab Boy everywhere, who apparently saw me everywhere this summer: at the mall, on the beach, at a party, on the street, in the gym. (I am so happy I looked tan and fit and good in my itty bitty bikini this summer. Thank you, lord.) The other day, riding the god-awful-early-morning bus to campus for my 8 AM class, Blowdryer Boy sat next to me. The heat coming off of him along with the smell of his cologne and shampoo was almost intoxicating in my early morning haze. (The Bailey’s Irish Crème that may or may not have been in my coffee also helped with this haziness—both to add to it and then erase it. Yes to starting out shitty mornings the good way.)

Blowdryer Boy is one of those people who exist in my group of friends whose path sometimes brushes up against mine. For awhile last spring, I flirted with the idea of ending up in bed with him. I didn’t, though, and most of the time, I’m sure I made the right choice.

The night before, I had had the shittiest night’s sleep since May. I crammed for three hours with homework, and then was kept up from 12:15 to 1:30 by my roommate’s pseudo-boy and his friend laughing in the living room. I woke up at 6 AM, for some reason thinking I had to take the 7:10 bus, and not the 7:35 bus, meaning I missed out on an extra thirty minutes of sleep. By the time I got around to making my coffee, I was already thoroughly disenchanted with life. Missing Perfect profusely—that was the shitty night’s sleep; the feeling of him being there was gone, snapped like a guitar string—and having Blowdryer Boy so near tempted me into the “what ifs” that I generally like to try and stay out of. Like I’ve said, I’m generally a one-man woman. But sometimes, distance and no word can get to be a little much on my nerves and heart.

So sometimes, like this other morning, I like to think about it. But when it comes down to it, Blowdryer Boy would be settling after Perfect. Blowdryer Boy would just be a waste of time and a warm body to replace the warm body that I really want. (And I’m pretty sure that most of the time, Blowdryer Boy can be bitchier than I am.)

Also, I recently found out what happens when you play with other people’s private property: you get fixed up. Generally, I try to keep my hands to myself in matter like this, but there’s this beautiful sport bike that lives in the same parking garage as my Civvy, and Alli and I recently did an impromptu photo-op with it. We touched it as little as possible while still admiring it and handling it with care, and then I posted the pictures on my Facebook profile, thinking that in my protected and private account they’d be safe from any angry Hell’s Angel owners looking for revenge and a new leather jacket made of my skinned hide for touching his bike.

Well, surprise. Facebook—it’s not that safe anymore, kids, at least not when you have mutual friends with said bike owner. A few days after the pictures went live, I got a comment from a friend who said they knew the owner. The next morning, I got a friend request from the guy. I accepted it, thinking, hey—I played on his bike. Might as well be nice. Fortunately, instead of being a hulking antichrist, the guy turned out to be a stocky senior. Who reverted back to the third-grade playground practice of asking our mutual friend to ask me if I’d be willing to meet him for a set-up.

Actually, it went more like this:

Mutual Friend: “Motorcycle Boy would like to meet you; shall I set up a meeting?”

Me, hemming and hawing about if I really wanted to do this: “I'm kinda figuring things out with the guy I was seeing this past summer, so I feel the need to get that disclaimer out there in the disclaimer of not leading anyone on, but seeing as he (unknowingly) let me molest his bike, I would say it's only fair to be able to apologize/thank him in person. Plus, I love meeting new people!”

I thought I was pretty clear about the fact I wasn’t looking for anything more than a new acquaintance. Apparently not, though.

Mutual Friend: “Haha, he was like "Pam I wanna meet this girl!" He’s a sweet guy, haha. He's leaving in December I think, anyway, so it doesn't have to be anything serious. He said he Facebook friended you, so I dunno if he's messaged you yet or not.”

No, he hadn’t. He’s letting our friend do his dirty-work for him. But whatever. I want to get on that bike, come hell, high water, or a fix-up. I just know to be very up-front about the fact that I am in what I’ve taken to calling a “beautifully complicated and daily-evolving relationship.” But seriously. I want to get on that bike. It’s worth it. And new friends are nice, too.

All these boys suddenly crawling out of the woodwork are making me wonder: could I really settle for one of them while I wait for Perfect? The more and more I look at it, the more and more I realize how easy this whole thing is, really. You are attracted to someone. You let your interest be known. You resist the urge to do the right thing and get to know them or categorize your feelings, and instead, just fall into bed with them. You wake up, get dressed, and walk out. Done. Simple. Over.

Can I do that, though? Could I use one person while wanting another? My heart says “no,” while sometimes, my mind whispers “yes.” Perfect would never need to know; Perfect is probably off doing the same thing with all the soft little freshmen co-eds, and that’s why he’s so tired, my mind whispers to me. Just do it. Just work out your frustration and your lust and your feelings on someone else. Don’t waste time, and youth, and beauty, and your body. Don’t go another year without sex. There’s no reason to.

But at night, at times like this, lying on my bed, the bed I slept with Perfect in, and loved Perfect in, in the same sheets that still, months later, at times still hold wisps of his scent, I think no, no, no, no—I could never do it. I miss him, and I want him, and no one else is going to replace him or fill his hole. To try and do so would be me, settling. And after my many past frog princes, settling is one thing I told myself I’d never do again. Settling was the rut that Perfect saw me in and pulled me out. Settling was what he told me I didn’t deserve.

But, am I settling for this distance between us? The air in this state feels so empty, sometimes it’s hard for me to breathe around the hole that seems to be there; something suddenly missing. It feels like there’s a hole in my Vermont, and you better believe it’s a huge one, because that boy is massive. At any given point in time, I can give you a general idea of in what direction the important people in my life lie. It’s a spider-web of love that crisscrosses the U.S, sometimes even the globe, of what I imagine being thin gold chains running from my heart to the other person’s.

The best way I ever heard this phenomenon described was in Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus’s novel, Dedication. (Which I highly recommend, by the way, especially for people who have ever had any interested in the musician/muse relationship.) As Kate Hollis, their main character and heroine, they write:

“…I feel this thing take root in my stomach, this rubber band thing as Jake Sharpe comes back from the concession stand. A twinge tells me to turn around and, sure enough, he has just walked in the doors at the top of the dark aisle. The band tightens as his narrow silhouette approaches. Then, when he slides past I tuck my legs up on my chair and our eyes meet…and it is taut between us. Loosening as he plunks himself at the other end next to Benjy… I slide my hand to the center of my chest while staring up at the screen. This thing is different from living down Jake Sharpe, different from avoiding Jake Sharpe, even different from knowing Jake Sharpe thinks about what I look like. This new Jake Sharpe thing is happening inside me, all the way at the core… I am piano-bench straight, every inch of me realigning to this new state, this Jake Sharpe Compass I have just become” (McLaughlin/Kraus 68-69.)

Like Kate, if you ask where someone is, I can point, assuredly, in a direction after a moment’s thought, giving that little heart-string a gentle mental tug, and waiting to feel in what direction the pull back comes from. It’s how I also know what direction home is. It’s how I know where my roommates are; where my best and dearest and closest friends from home are; the sisters of my heart and mind and soul. And it’s how I can feel Perfect. What once used to be a thick and relatively short gold chain, full of feelings running back and forth this summer is now one of the thinnest links; one that is full of static and loss of sensation and makes me feel empty in the pit of my stomach and heart. There isn’t that proximity. There isn’t the thought that we’re only a less-than-an-hour drive away from each other, if we really needed to be there, standing next to each other, breathing the same air, and sharing the same space, feeling that electric crackle in the air, and then the sublime stillness that I feel when my body is molded seamlessly up against his—weight on weight, cloth sticking to cloth, skin on skin, hands on body, no start and no finish to us.

Instead, I have this three-hundred mile long chain, and a tentative grip on it. I give it a little pull, and wait for it to jingle back in response. Sometimes the return tug is long in coming. I begin to unravel a little bit, but for the most part, I hold strong, using sticky tape and gritted teeth to keep this girl together. I’m tough. I’ve been through worse. I can do this. I want this. I’m a fighter; I don’t just lie down and cry and give in. If he needs his time and his space to settle in and make his life kosher, than I can damn well have the same time and space to use to my own advantage. There’s always more work I can do on myself. Just like whatever is happening between Perfect and I, I am also always a masterpiece in progress, some days darker and more linear, some days bright and effervescent. There’s really never any telling, anyway.

Looking at being part of a relationship like this: he needs his time, I need my time to have no idea what the hell I’m doing and to grapple with feelings—we’re both in different states, at different colleges, leading different lives—how do you try and integrate someone like a significant other into your life like that? How does it work, really? Can two people living in two different circles stay together with themselves as the only constant and shared thing?

[If I never sing another song, another song, another song…can I still sing your tune?]

XOXO

Runaway Girl Does Shop Talk.

I legitimately ran away from Burlington today. Granted, I have a reason to be gone, and it’s a good one, but don’t let it fool you—even if I hadn’t had one, I would have fled that town today like the fugitive from the Cold, Hard Truth that I am.

Or, at least, I tried to flee quickly and quietly. That’s hard when your car’s front right brake is making a sound as if someone is sanding it every time your tire rotates and it feels like a part of your front end is crumpling every time you actually dare to apply the brakes. Luckily, my mechanic guys are less than a quarter-mile from my apartment. I was able to baby the Civvy there and pass it off to them with sound affects and a worried look. As they diagnosed, I tested the multiple lines of my cell phone between my money dealing for repairs with my father, my freaking out about money dealings with my friends, and my texted second-opinion mechanic’s advice from John, who got to reassure me multiple times that while not replacing the “nearly shot” rotors wasn’t great, and the fierce vibration the new brake pads gave under foot when braking as my nasty rotors wore them down (damned if I didn’t get new pads, financially doomed if I got matching rotors—after all, the Civvy’s alternator was just fucking rebuilt last week and the car serviced to the tune of over $300,) I would be ok and not die.

Let it be stated that John has the patience of a saint, the good sense when it comes to women of a seasoned sterling boyfriend, and the capacity to make me a raging fan-girl because of both.

It’s never good news when the mechanic comes and sits next to you. He looked at me with a mixture of wariness and pity—this college girl obviously in over her head, clutching her cell phone like it was a life-line and she could possibly squeeze both another dime and some good luck out of it—and leaned in. “Do you have a dad or a friend or a boyfriend who works with cars?” he asked me.

Nothing like a complete stranger pressing a sore point. Do Not Go There. Abort Mission. No Talking About The Elephant In The Mechanic Shop. “No…” I started flatly, remembering how Perfect followed Cait all over Burlington playing Boy Mechanic, and then paused, remembering John, presumably on the other end of his phone line, pressing key pad buttons to tell me what to do, always the Knight in Shining Honda Armor. “Actually, I have a friend who works at a Honda dealership?” I finished, the end of my statement rising up like a question. Is John really a friend of mine? Would he really follow through on his word and be willing to help me out?

“Oh, he could probably get the parts much cheaper through his dealership discount,” the mechanic told me, getting more animated now that I had given him something he could work with me with. “He may even be able to replace them himself. It would be much less expensive.”

I loved Mechanic Man at this moment. Most would be telling you that they are the only person capable of caring for your car properly, and at an exorbitant price. This is what returning a mechanic’s wrench will do for you, it seems—you watch out for them, and they watch out for you.

My favorite caveat from my Mechanic Man friend was the words of wisdom he gave me as I climbed into my driver’s seat. “Pump the brakes a few times and test them out. Don’t tail-gate. If your rotors get really hot and you slam on the brakes hard, they could explode. And then the only way you’ll stop is when you hit something.”

I looked at him, wide-eyed. “Or when I pull the emergency brake?”

“Yeah, that, too.”

Excellent. I am driving the Amazing, Exploding, Vibrating Car. We are one sex-toy step up from the Ford Pinto.

On the way home, I got to ponder life a lot. Specifically, though while it may suck sometimes, today really is not when I would want it to end. I cannot die pissed off with Perfect. And the more I thought about Perfect and how mad I still am at him, and how lovely John is, even through my frantic texts to him, the more I wanted to just stop running, stop driving, stop the car, pull over, and collapse.

I’m not a crier. I just find it emotionally and physically exhausting. I can’t muster up the emotion enough to care to cry. Nine times out of ten, if I do cry, it’s out of frustration. Get me angry, get me frustrated, and there come the waterworks. Hurt me, cause me pain—no thanks. I’ll sleep it off. If I feel like I really need to cry, I get into the shower and let the water hit me in the face so I can pretend the droplets streaming down my face and off the tips of my eyelashes are my tears. Just feeling them makes me feel better. Crying, I find, is over-rated.

Because I’m home, I substitute the Jacuzzi bathtub for the shower, though I also love the shower, particularly for singing in, as when you get pitch-perfect, the glass walls emit a lovely reverberation. I was, admittedly, a mistake of my parents. They weren’t expecting a child in their house on the reclusive mountain, and so were in the process of fully-loading it when my mother discovered she was in the family way. Large entertaining deck? Check. Jacuzzi? Check. Library? Nope—make that a child’s bedroom. My father, the sort of guy who doesn’t deal well with his plans being changed, didn’t speak to her for a week. (That, I just find unfair. It takes two to tango, after all, let alone to do the horizontal no-pants dance.) The Jacuzzi is my thing—it’s where I learned how to doggie-paddle, where I used to wash my below-waist long hair through elementary school, and when stress found my life around the same time as high school and the start of manual labor jobs and then demanding retail jobs, it became my oasis from the world.

It’s still one of the first places I go to when I get home. I light all the candles I’ve hoarded into the bathroom from all over the rest of the house with my cigarette lighter, my worst of the Bad Habits. I’m partial to my light because it’s so multi-use friendly—I’ve used it to light up; most of my closest friends have used it; boyfriends have used it; it’s been all over with me through the good, the bad, and the indifferent; it’s lit the road at night, warmed fingers in the winter, and lit candles in again, the good, the bad, and the indifferent. (I’m actually quite a sentimental person about little objects like this. If you look around my room, you’d notice all sorts of little trinkets—stones, shells, bottle caps, ticket stubs, hair ties, pieces of paper, and the big one, fortune cookie fortunes—all with memories behind them. Little touchstones, some with lessons, some sweet, some bitter, some bittersweet.) I let the water run until it’s steamy like a sauna in the bathroom, and then me, book, bathtub and moonlight-filled skylights get re-acquainted.

This may be one of the few times in life I really just breathe. There is something about candle light, water, and music that just strips me down and makes me let go of the things that I normally keep balled up into a tight little bundle of nerves that keeps me vibrating with thoughts and worries day and night. I don’t—ha, as if this should come of any surprise—let go of things easily. Usually, the Jacuzzi, like the barn, is one of those places I let go, if nothing more than out of habit, knowing that I should.

Tonight was different. Tonight was hard. Tonight, I couldn’t keep my attention on the book’s pages, or in what I was doing, or even in the zip code I was in. It seems running from Burlington to home wasn’t far enough to go to lose the things howling and nipping at my heels. It seems as though I’ll have to go even farther. Yes. I am the kind of girl who runs away from things. Last time, it was to get away from Perfect the night we slept together and he spent the night. In the morning, I had to leave by 9 AM to meet my trainer to go to Jersey. This time, although technically it’s to go help my trainer again, it’s really to get away from Perfect again, and all the things left unsaid. (Both times I’ve run away from Perfect, I’ve been wearing the same underwear. This makes me wonder about how much of it is what’s in the panties. Am I really a big pussy when it comes to him and relationships?) So far, I’ve put over 2 hours and 60 miles between us, and it’s still not enough. I’ll let you know when I can figure out when to stop running.

So I finally fell backward and lay at the bottom of the tub, wondering if I could just live there, head underwater, buffering the sound of the world. Me, the Jacuzzi and I…that’s all. Maybe I could hide at the bottom of the porcelain pool forever. Maybe no one would come looking for me. Maybe I could get my mom to deliver meals in twice a day for me. She always says how she misses me; why not move home to avoid life? I had everything else I needed—hell, I’m already in a bathroom, lying in a tub. I have all the water I could ever want or need. There are windows directly above me, a radio, and reading material. With my head underwater, ears flooded, the sound of the radios bass and my heartbeat are the only thing I can hear. No thoughts. No worries. Nothing to run away from anymore. Silence, I don’t get so much of anymore.

XOXO

Open Letter to the Damned, AKA: Perfect, If You Find This Blog, Read This.

In the 1957 article in the Atlantic by Nora Johnson that this blog gets its title from, she states, “Promiscuity demands a certain amount of nerve.” So does writing things like this blog. I recently had to edit a past-post that included my full name after it was brought to my attention that when you Googled me, you came across my blog on the top of page 2. Now, it’s pushed back to the last page, and I really hope that, say, Perfect doesn’t have the time on his hands to Google-stalk me and find this.

But sometimes, I think if he were to, it would save me a lot of time with the explaining and having to do the whole “talk about my feelings and relationship” thing. I’m a writer by love, nature, and trade, obviously. It’s so much easier for me to write what I’m feeling than actually have to look at a person I have all these thoughts and emotions about, and in most cases, deeply care for and have to say hard things to them. So, I do things like this: I write open letters. Sometimes, I hope the people that they’re intended for find them. Other times, I’d be perfectly happy if they never saw the light of day in that person’s eyes. It’s just getting the words out there, somewhere, anywhere, that helps me to get it off my chest and out of my head.

I’ve got two such letters today. One is short and not so sweet, born out of frustration and the fact that I can’t seem to tell the people that I love when I’ve had enough. The other has more depth, as it’s written for a character in my life who we all know, and some of us love, who just can’t seem to find a time to get close enough to breathe the same air in the same space I am so I can say this to him. As of today, and a failed trip to Worcester, I’m at my wit’s end, and really starting to consider writing this and somehow getting it to him if he doesn’t get that fine ass of his to Burlington within the next, oh, WEEK. Summer’s ending—he’s leaving, I’m going to be getting busy with my jobs at school, and there are still things left very, very unsaid between us. What do you think? Do I write him the sort of letter that he, in his helplessly, lovably narcissistic way would probably keep for the rest of his life, and his grandchildren would find years and years from now and be like, “woah, Grandpa, you were a lady-killer! You put this bitch through the ringer!” (Yes. His grandchildren would speak exactly like that, smoke a pack of Camels a day, and die early in ATV- and too many Pabst Blue Ribbon -related accidents. Actually, we may be talking about my potential future grandchildren. His would never use the word “bitch” to describe a woman. His would wear plaid and flannel and denim and be musical and unfailingly polite and everyone would love them, just like him.)

To certain girls who have perfectly lovely boyfriends who they constantly can’t seem to help but make drama with and then complain about said drama to me: “I don’t want to hear it any more, really. You’re a great friend, and I love you to bits and pieces, but I just can’t handle listening to you bitch and moan about things that half the time are your doing. At least you HAVE a boyfriend. At least you’re not totally, hopelessly, foolishly crushed over a guy who doesn’t seem to want you back.”

To the boy who made me so very, very happy, and then, so very, very confused with good chances of happiness-showers to break up the gray days: “My only regret is ever letting you go, letting the time and the distance get in the way of the words that I wanted to say to you, but never seemed to get the chance. Well, here they are. Some things, you cannot avoid forever, no matter how hard you try. I can’t avoid saying this, and you can’t avoid hearing it.

You know what? It was scary for me, too. I’ve never brought a guy home. And I’ve never let them stay the night at my place. And I certainly haven’t let them come back and spend hours and make themselves so comfortable as you did. And after you left, I had a panic attack about it, about how happy you were and how comfortable and natural it seemed. And you know what I did? I thought about it, about why it scared me, and then I got over it and said, “hey, whatever happens, happens. I know the way I feel, and I shouldn’t let fear and worry and the past and stupid stubborn independence get in the way of that.” I got over my scares. Which is why it just kills me that you let yours get to you.

I was willing to work. I was willing to put time and energy and gas and money and emotions and sweat and tears and laughter and joy and sadness and pain and maybe even after time, love, into this, and I don’t think you know that. I don’t think you know that I’m not the type of girl to just give up when you hand me an obstacle. I don’t think you know that challenges are what excite me, and finding a way through them is something I consider crucial to life. You’re willing to risk life and limb for the adrenaline rush—diving, biking, traveling, whatever—but you seem unwilling to try when you see the potential for pain emotionally. I, on the other hand, can’t fathom any good reason for taking the risk to hurt myself for fun and entertainment, but when it comes to emotions, I am reckless in them and how and where and to whom I hand them out, and I think I live a better life because of it. You cannot live always worrying about getting hurt; it stunts your growth and opportunities. And it drives me absolutely CRAZY that you can live your physical life one way, but be so cautious emotionally. I’ve been hurt, too. I’ve been cheated on and literally abandoned by the man I loved and never heard the words “I love you” in return, but I’m still here, playing the game, asking for more. If you’ve already lost so much, what do you have but more to gain? Yes, you’re going away soon, and yes, life will be changing for you, but that doesn’t mean you have to lose all of what you used to have or have now. You’re going to find that there are some things worth taking with you, some things you never want to lose, and some things that are willing to work with or for you to make things happen. “Change” doesn’t have to mean “let go.” Change can be mutable, fluid, and accommodating. I was more than willing to change with you, let you test things out, and see what would happen. Yes, you were right—it would hurt less to end it now than in the fall if things didn’t work out, but it still hurt. We still lost things—a summer of fun, the chance for something, weeks and days and hours. What did we gain by ending? We had a great month—then, what?

When we last talked like this, you told me what you thought would work. I agreed that your logic was sound, and to try it. (You are such a logical and methodic and thoughtful person, and I am not. I am illogical and spontaneous and challenging and blunt.) Now I’m telling you, bluntly, that it’s not working. I’m not happy. This, whatever this is between us, or more to the point, whatever is not going on between us isn’t working for me. I’m finding that despite time, and distance, and our agreement to be friends, that I still miss you, and how things were.

I’ve met a lot of people since we ended; hot guys, smart guys, nice guys, funny guys. Guys who cooked. Guys who spoke French. Guys taller than you. Guys who complimented me. But none of them were quite you. None of them seemed to be what I wanted, or what I needed. And every time I met a new guy, I found myself missing you a little more.

I miss you waking me up on the morning on your way into work, and I miss how I used to not have to debate with myself if it was ok to send you a text or call you or not. I miss your voice and your hands and your smile and your laugh and your heat. I even miss the way you made yourself so comfortable dislodging pillows on my bed; your hair, and your dog’s hair that I still find in my sheets; the thought of you being there for me when I needed you for anything from a bad day and the blues to a friend’s pregnancy. I miss the way you talked so easily with my friends, and the way you would look at me as we laid side-by-side in my bed, ridiculously tiny for the two of us, yet somehow never cramped. I miss rolling over in the night to face-plant in your underarm hair that I could braid, and the way you looked mortified and then chuckled as I rolled back over quickly. I miss you steaming up my car in the rain so I had to turn the defrosters on and kiddingly berated you for your metabolism. I miss watching how much you could possibly eat, and how you can eat a cupcake in just two bites. I miss your kisses and your stellar hugs and the feeling of being safe tucked in close to your chest. Obviously, there’s a lot I miss about you. This isn’t even the half of it.

(It also kills me that drunk sex with me is the only sex you know with me. Um, there is no delicate way to put this, but I am much, much, MUCH better than that. I have tricks that have tricks, and that night I was so loaded that I forgot to lip-nibble! I FORGOT TO LIP-NIBBLE! That is beginner’s stuff! That is, like, the foundation on which they built the pyramid of Good Making Out! Let’s not even get into what personal favorites of mine I forgot to bring out and play during sex…you get the point. You’re wandering around the world thinking that that is how I have sex, and I’m telling you right now—it’s not. Please, let’s go for a ride again. You owe me four shots of vodka and mutual orgasms, anyway, before I consider us even. I do not RSVP to a party and then not come.)

Basically, what I’m trying to say here is that I worked with you once to reach a conclusion that suited you. (Personally, that was unfair. I would do almost anything you ask me to, including putting on flippers and diving into the sea to pretend I was a mermaid for the rest of my life. Just saying.) Now, I’m asking you to work with me and possibly re-work something to suit both of us. Awhile ago, I was told that you still had feelings for me. Granted, it’s been a long time since then, but I tried my hardest to get to you; it just never worked. If you still have those feelings, or even a shadow of them, I want to try again. This time, With Feeling. You taught me so much in such a short time—how to open up and trust someone; how and why I would want to be honest with someone; how to talk about what I felt or needed; what a good relationship should look, feel, sound and even taste like; that I don’t, and shouldn’t, have to settle for the guys who either won’t or can’t give me those things; and what it feels like to be with someone who actually cares about you. I never had my doubts, just so you know. I may have been by turn jealous or suspicious or had low self-confidence or was confused, or doubted myself, but I never doubted either your feelings for me, or if you were doing right by me. You always, even still, do right by me. I couldn’t, and I don’t, ask for more than that.

Why can’t we meet in the middle? How can we fix, mend, repair, or re-start what was lost? If we can’t, if it’s over, and you’re done with it, then just know—I do miss you, and I do still want to be a part of your life and have you be a part of mine, and I thank you, so much, for both showing me a good time and what was possible. I had fun, killer.”

In other, non-related news, I just saw a porn in which a girl got ejaculated on her tramp stamp. I don’t think they were going for irony, but they achieved it. God bless American couples with video cameras and a desire for self-voyeurism, a bad break-up, and a vindictive ex-boyfriend. (Another reason why if you do decide to make a video, there should only be one copy, which the woman gets to keep possession of.)

So, I’m a little loathe to post pictures of Perfect here for obvious reasons, like, using his image without his consent, or him finding this blog. (Somehow, I think it would be worse if he found it with pictures of him rather than just, you know, with all these posts and posts and posts about him…I don’t really get the logic behind that thinking either; I’m just weird like that.) Anyway. I’ve found this ( http://www.jercoons.com/?s=media ) guy, who is, funnily enough, like a version of Perfect 1.5. (If you were wondering, the real Perfect is version 2.0.) They look similar enough—same hair, similar smile, similar eyebrows, both from Vermont, both musically inclined. The real different is that one of them plays shows and tours, and one of them does not. (I found the stay-at-home version.) Just give Jer a bass instead of a guitar, a deeper speaking voice, longer eyelashes, another, like, fifty pounds and biceps that could be nicknamed Thunder and Lightning, and (you’re going to have to trust me on this one,) make him a little more rugged and handsome, his music a little less pop-y and more brooding, and you have Perfect. I really debated adding a link to Perfect’s band’s page, buttttt…again, maybe a little too close for comfort.

I’d really like you to hear Perfect’s music, because that boy has the voice of an angel. Really. Me, Miss Not-In-Touch-With-My-Emotions; Miss Keep-It-Bottled-Up, Please; Miss I-Love-Hip-Hop-And-Alternative-Rock—I get a little gooey every time I hear him sing. Ok. So maybe not a little. Maybe like, a lot. Maybe like a puddle of girl on the floor, seeping through the cracks. Maybe like, he wrecks me. I’ll admit it. Once he played one of his songs for me in bed one night and sang along to me, that was it. I was done. I listen to it every night now—it’s become my lullaby. It instantly transports me back to that night, and how warm and bubbly and safe and comfortable and happy and, yes, drunk I felt. Once you’ve had an experience like that, there’s just no going back. I've been sleeping the best of my life since then, lulled to sleep by that song. (It's "Breakdown", if you really want to know, and the part that Perfect says he hates the most is possibly my favorite part of the song.)

If anyone really wants the link, ask for it personally, and I’ll give it to you. I can’t let you doubt Perfect’s musical integrity after listening to someone I tout as him, but a lesser version. Also, I don’t want any of you dying from curiosity. Also, I’d love to in an off-hand way get his band more coverage, because as I told him when we were together, it’s virtually a sin that they don’t plays gigs and don’t actively record more. And John, my Knight in Shining Honda Armor, is his absolutely amazing self-taught guitarist. Adorable and talented John, and perfect Perfect together. Who could resist that? Can I please consider this both Doing A Good Deed and Helping A Friend Out? Please?

Now, I have a cake to go have and eat it, too. Isn’t life grand?

XOXO

P.S-- Oh, ohohohohohh, I have to admit: I've been having the most crazy-realistic dreams lately. Even if I may not be getting a lot of action lately, my subconcious is. I had dreams about Perfect and sex with Perfect two nights in a row, so detailed that I could feel his hands on mine, the smoothness and softness of his skin and hair, his body-heat and sweat and weight on me, and then last night, a dream about-- surprise, surprise! Talk about a blast from the (not-so) past!-- Jersey Blunt, and let me tell you, the feel of his package did not disappoint. Here's hoping for more such dreams tonight, whoo-hoo!

Stuck: Beauty and the Beastly Confusion

[“I’ve always been best at rushing into things, and then running away from them,” she said. “It’s the wanting to run to things that scares me, and the leaving them in a slow and organized fashion.”]

I’ve been feeling “stuck” a lot lately, both figuratively and literally. I got “stuck” between Cait’s bathroom door and sink, which is no mean feat for a petite girl like me, but I somehow managed to get momentarily wedged in there, which was hilarious at the time. What was not so funny was getting a slug “stuck” between the bottom of my foot and flip-flop during the spur-of-the-moment 4 mile EpicTrek Alli and I took last night to find the best view of the heat lightning across the lake. Or getting a beetle “stuck” between my toes later during the same adventure. (Alli seemed to enjoy my utterly girly shrieks though, so it wasn’t all a disgusting loss.) But most aggravating of all, I seem to be “stuck” somewhere half-in and half-out of a relationship with Mr. Perfect.

I feel as though I am in a science experiment no one ever decided to tell me about. There’s the control group: women who have been broken up with; the standard: women who are in relationships; and then me, toeing the line somewhere in the middle because although he opened the “friends” door, Perfect neglected to throw the chain off—AKA: things are pretty business as usual. I am beside myself with confusion.

My hypothesis: although we both know that in the overall scheme of things, a relationship would not be the wisest thing to start at the moment (hence that discussion a week ago), neither of us are exactly willing to let go. Or, it seems, really change anything. Apparently, Perfect got the Hostage Relationship memo, because he’s doing his own job of keeping me quiet, close and (somewhat) satisfied rather well.

Being “stuck” and confused does not suit me. I am someone who is constantly in motion, be it physical, or, in the odd moment you can catch me lounging and seemingly doing nothing at all, most likely mental. For example, the time during my morning shower when because I am “stuck” doing the things I do by motion memory in my 10’-by-4’ white cubicle is my most mentally productive. That’s when I come up with my best ideas, revelations, and thoughts. Now that those wheels are clogged and slow with relationship un-bliss, I am not a happy camper.

I feel an overwhelming desire to get out of the city. But then, I get “stuck”. Where to go? What to do? I don’t want to go home yet, or to go ride my poorly neglected (and apparently, ever increasingly wide) pony, because Cait and Alli and I are going on a road-trip next weekend to go swimming with waterfalls and my fixed (read: nonexistent) income doesn’t allow for another tank of gas to be bought. So, that leaves me “stuck” in the city until the 3rd or the 4th, and I’ve already done all the requisite city things to keep busy—strolled Church Street, shopped, took myself out for tea, went grocery shopping, visited friends, went to the beach, etc. I have a slight feeling that my urgent desire to physically flee Burlington may be directly correlated to the fact that I am “stuck” emotionally, and there’s nothing I can do to evade that problem short of having another one of those lovely chats I am so not fond of of the “what are we doing, again?” variety.

What we are doing is what’s confusing me. I know, I know, I was the one plotting to keep this relationship hostage—I just didn’t plan on it actually happening. I’m “stuck” somewhere in between trying to figure out the right amount or timing of texts and messages to make them “friendly”, while Perfect is still sending me my morning wake-up texts. Our conversations, though while a little more awkward than originally—let me tell you how hard it is for two very sexual people to try and purposefully cut the “sexual things” out of their communication for the sake of being “friends” and not “overly friendly”—are still frequent and charming. I am still the first person he responds to when he gets coverage, and I still take priority when he’s out with his friends, but is still texting with me. He is still the first person I think of to text whenever I have news or am bored out of my mind, which is frequently. We are “stuck” being large parts of each other’s lives, but with no idea as to where or how we’re supposed to fit. It’s an odd transitional period that doesn’t come with any sort on instruction manual or handy survival guide—I’m having to make the rules up as I go along. A “stuck” girl is a girl in trouble.

What does a “stuck” girl look or act like, you may ask? Look for a girl with two primary facial expressions at the moment—perplexed/frustrated or zoned-out/bored-to-near-tears. Look for a girl who’s a little bit flustered—possibly saying or doing things that aren’t in agreement, or frequently losing track of her thoughts or what she was saying. Appearance-wise, she’ll look as pulled-together as normal, although when you look into her eyes they may be a bit panicked. A guy’s name will (totally uncontrollably) be every third word out of her mouth. There will be some obsessing going on, running the gamut from about him, to about her, to about life, to about the date on the milk carton and wondering if it’s ok to drink it one day past the sell-by date. A “stuck” girl will try to distract herself from her “stuck-ness” many different ways, so look for someone busy, busy, busy with self-made hobbies or activities of really no importance, or a To-Do list a mile long. Or for your best example what a “stuck” girl looks like, stop by. I’m usually home and in need of distraction from being "stuck."

Meanwhile, in between all the self-made reading and writing and tanning and visiting with friends, I am “stuck” dissecting over and over and over what went wrong or how I could possibly fix whatever is going on. Without a job to take up my time and mind, I have turned into a professional worrier. Possibly, a professional sign-reader. Without any clothing folding, phone answering, or customer servicing to distract me, I have taken to trying to interpret the deep and imagined meanings of all the texts Perfect is sending me. I fret the differences between the two-line texts he used to send me, and the one-line texts I sometimes receive now. (Does it mean he’s trying to blow me off?) I (try to) delve into all the possible emotions behind a “Haha”, a “LOL”, or a two-word message. The exclamation points that used to drive my perfectly punctuated self mental are now mourned like dead children if they don’t appear in a text. When he doesn’t respond to one of my non-response-needed texts (AKA: “I woke up at 7 this morning and still feel like a morning zombie after coffee. And an hour drive.”), it sends me into frantic spirals of “is he ignoring me?”s and “did he used to not respond to these?”s. I am driving myself, and I’m sure everyone else around me, crazy. But I am working my ass off to maintain the light, normal and un-weird conversations of days and weeks past, and I feel like I need to be thrown a bone before the next text I send is, “Perfect. I’m working my ass off here. Throw me a fucking bone and act normal.”

So to the age-old question: should I call him on his weirdness? Or is it weirdness made up in my own head because I expect things to be weird? Or like all women have a tendency to do that I believe goes hand-in-hand with flirting with disaster, am I thinking about this too hard? What if the problem is all in my head? But would I rather be “stuck” there, or really have hit the brakes with Perfect and be “stuck” with him in the real world? Where would it be harder for me to live with myself?

Obviously, the only thing that can really solve any of these (often asinine) questions would be to speak with the man himself. I don’t know if I’m ready to do that yet. Granted, it’s been the longest time yet that we’ve gone without seeing each other and he’s due up for a “girl’s visit” with Cait and I ASAP, but I don’t know if I can handle another “what’s going on?” conversation so soon. I know, I know—I bitch when I can’t talk to him, and I bitch about not wanting to when I could. It’s a woman’s prerogative, you know. But really, what could I say? “Stop being weird even if you don’t think you’re being weird because I’m desperately trying to maintain the charade that everything is fine and peachy here and I am fine and peachy with everything that’s happened even though I periodically burst into tears in my room when I try to open the windows and I can’t and the only thing that I can think of is that if you were here, you, in your hulking manliness and weight-lifting strength would surely do it for me if I asked nicely?”

Yeah. That would be an Oscar-winning speech.

In the meantime, I am not (physically or anatomically) dead. In fact, I was recently turned away from a research project UVM is doing on Women’s Sexuality because after answering the phone interview questions on things like sexual appetite, sexual desire and desired frequency of sex, it was determined that I would be an outlier and skew the data. Oh, yes. The libido is still alive, folks. It just has no outlet other than being beaten into submission at the gym. (I now think I understand Perfect’s two-hour gym-sessions. That poor man must be more sexually frustrated than I am, though I just clocked in my first hour and a half work-out. And have upped both the weight and the number of reps to my weight training.) Cait once said that I have “cute guy” radar like nobody’s business—I scope them out like a professional hunter, and if one is within a two-block radius, I will find them. It’s true—I do have a weakness for attractive men, and yes, I do look quite a lot. (I even found myself looking—to my utter mortification and to Cait’s amusement—when she and I and Perfect were all out for dinner one night. Hot man after hot man kept passing. It’s a wonder I didn’t get whip-lash from all the looking I was doing while Perfect was blissfully and thankfully unaware, mowing down single-mindedly on his lo mien beside me.) I am, I guess, the little girl that never grew up, and the world is my men-stocked candy store. It’s just the fact that though I may look, and appreciate, and possibly even flirt, when it comes down to it, all it takes is to get a text or hear a particular deep and velvety voice or see a certain face with beautiful bone structure, a long and straight nose, and red cheeks for me to think, “Yes, that is the most attractive man of them all. That is who I want to be with. Still.” I am “stuck” in Single Girl’s Hell—wanting, waiting, and wishing.

XOXO

(I'm not 100% pleased with this post yet, though I've been, haha-- "stuck" writing it for the past four days. Expect edits in the future. I just need to clear it off of my desktop for right now, let it lie, and the come back to it when I can (hopefully) think more clearly.)