click head to enlargeI am going on the big ego here now. It is late Friday/early Saturday and I am working on AJC stuff still after going to see “Thumbsucker”, which I would recommend, with A tonight. This morning, standing in my boxers and waiting for the shower to warm up, I looked at myself in the mirror and realized this thing was growing on my face. I know I need to do something with it. I think I will mow this weekend. I just thought I would post this here so you guys would realize exactly how bad it can get. I thought of posting a full body nude photograph of myself here as well, so y’all could see how much weight I have lost (28 pounds since the beginning of August, or roughly 1/8 my previous body weight), but realizing I plan to keep the weight off until I see all of you, I decided to spare you and me the embarassment. Besides, the company that hosts bullpencatcher will not host pornography, even though I assure you, despite the facial hair, this would not be pornographic or titillating in the...
I know that some of you think that I should be over this by now, and I guess I think it at times too, but I am still struggling with the breakup. G was the one, so I thought and still do to a certain extent, and it is just so hard to get over that. The days are going on and our relationship now has become mostly electronically epistolary. It is frustrating at times to have to wait for a response to an email, to not be able to just call her up – even more, not to be able to see her. It is odd that one of the people that you love most in the world, and that you think the highest of, is also a person that you cannot just pick up the phone and call. I guess that’s what most people feel when standing on my side of a breakup – a little bit helpless, a little bit crestfallen, and a little bit confused. It is just as frustrating when you know that person hurts. I mean, you miss the good times, and the physical proximity, but it is when they are hurting and you can do nothing about it that it really hurts. One of the complaints about me in the relationship was that I was not enough of a protector and caretaker. I think I am a caretaker by nature, though, and it pours out of me when I know that G is hurting, confused, frustrated, or getting down on herself. I try to do what I can, but ultimately that is...
Awh, babe! Where are you? I know you are there, I felt it tonight. See, it has turned cold out – a little nip in the air tonight – the first of the season, and I am coming back to this house, and this bed and the AC is finally not working overtime, and I have to keep socks on as I walk around on these wooden floors. Out tonight, late, I went to retrieve T on his return from gambling wonderland, he did not win. From the airport and to the Winchester and a sandwich and then delivered him to the highrise and all of that. I didn’t even mention you one time to him tonight. Nothing about where my heart is, or if it is hurting, healing or just hanging on. Just a sandwich too late for proper sleep and rest, and then home. And during the getting back part it takes me by that place where you are, and I feel it, up the steps with lights out and two hours into slumber and I feel my heart adhere lock-step to the beating of yours, and I feel warm, and the bed seems less lonely, and I know that this cold winter may be a little easier to get through, now that I have found...
Oh, it’s Friday and I greet these weekends with relief and apprehension. They definitely have not gotten back to being the relaxing time they once were, although they slowly move in that direction. I left work early for a 1 PM therapy session only to wait in the waiting area until 1:25, then to find out that my therapist was not in. I knocked on the door and there was no answer. I checked voicemail, but nothing from him. I imagine he either had an emergency, or he simply forgot. I left a message and hope to hear the reason soon. I am at home now finishing up AJC work and watching the ESPN movie about Roger Bannister. An hour or so ago I had the idea to check my caller ID history to see if G was still on there. The queue holds the last 50 calls and as I went through, 47, 48, 49… 50, there she was. I was half inclined to unplug the phone so she would stay in the queue. My mother then called and now G is off the caller ID entirely. I don’t know why I hang on to these things. I have also been holding onto text messages that span a while back now. One from Aug. 16 says “We can again”. One from Aug. 18 says “i miss u already” from when I was making my way to a plane to Tunica, Miss. From Aug. 29, the Monday before we broke up on Sunday, there is “i love you too baby”. After the breakup there is Sept. 17 with “You...
The things they didn’t tell you when you checked into this world… it was all printed in a booklet given to your mother just after you had descended the birth canal and she was in no state to be the keeper. It was written in type way too tiny for little baby eyes to read anyway. They intentionally keep this information from you, and you eventually learn the hard way. There will be no repairs, refunds or exchanges for certain types of damage caused by misuse, or any of these other scenarios: 1) Death of a parent: Such as while my world was beginning to fall apart at the beginning of August, my college girlfriend’s dad lay dying, finally to pass on Aug. 5th. I found this out yesterday via email. D, the college girlfriend, is now a psychologist and a tough girl, but I feel so sad for her as I know, although we are constantly being prepared for dealing with the death of parents (it is something we know is coming), it never seems to be the right time… never. It can’t be, and no amount of therapy can prepare us for that grieving. This is the third friend of mine whose parent has passed in the last 2 years, and there’s another whose father is slowly trying to recover from a stroke. I guess this is the age we are at, early to mid 30s, starting to get things figured out (we hope) and then those stalwarts of normalcy (for most of us) start to drop and we are sent reeling again. It’s times like these,...
Sitting in this room that I have known for years, yet now looks nothing like the one in which I put you to bed those nights. Kissing you on the cheek. Then I wanted to go to sleep, as I did just after the sky fell and I started my medication. Those nights when slumber came so easy knowing that you were still there, in there, waiting for me. We would awake in the morning, and like the night before go out on the porch, and it would be cold, and we would smoke cigarettes and the cold would work up through our feet to our head and it would be like drinking a milkshake too quickly before we became mutually lactose intolerant. I haven’t figured out the pill for that. Or were we just intolerant, and irritable, and the pharmaceutical companies haven’t yet made a cure for those things. Now I sit here in this bed, and it is me this time, and it is late, and I realize that indeed the sky is still there, the world is round again. I am not falling, I am not falling, I am not falling! But falling in love was so much easier than falling out of, and so in one sense I am now, as always, falling a little. Round and round and round, like the cosmos are really settled in quicksand. Whoa! Today though a little glimmer of hope. Things I need to do. Karma cleansing. No, I haven’t made up for all the lies I told yet! I haven’t even figured out what they all were, but...
I guess this is the way it is. Funny thing memory. Funny how it works. Or the cosmos. Oh them? Are they conspiring again? A man’s book across from me upon closer examination is Marathon: You Can Do It by Jeff Galloway. A word on the crossword was “a city in Wyoming.” You can only guess. All of this within an hour. And the news from New Orleans. Another crossword, another clue: “Relative of the cello” – guess you can figure the answer there as well. I am not making this up, folks. It is written out like the stars may spell your name if you squint and tilt your head appropriately. We live in an intricate trap. Everywhere there’s something to totally floor you, or lift your spirits to the...
Tuesday was one month since G and I broke up. Yesterday was her birthday. In the month after the breakup I worked on a long series of short pieces about G and what she means to me, why I love her and such. So much had become confused in me and in her and between us in the last few months and I needed to start sorting it out in my head. All of the pieces were attached to a memory of her, and involved me remembering small details and talking about what those details taught me about her. The aspects of G that were brought to light ranged from the very cerebral to the somewhat goofy. All of it was heartfelt, and I spent many tearful hours sitting over the keyboard to work out all of the stuff. I gave it to her for her birthday yesterday and I hope it means, and will continue to mean, a lot to her. Yesterday in my therapy session, I was discussing these writings with my therapist and he made the suggestion that I might think of doing the same for myself. He said that part of the process that I was going through right now was learning to like and value myself more, and that he thought going through this process would maybe help me identify some things that would move me in that direction. As I cannot seem to write anything unless I at least have an imaginary audience, I thought I would post them here. Most of my readers here are my friends, and it is the 21st...
Today is G’s birthday. She turns 28. I think she is still plenty young enough to give away her age. Those of you that know her may want to drop a line and wish her a happy one. You can post the wishes here or send her an email if you have her address.
I realize that the hardest to get through time of day that I have is the hour or so after I arrive home every afternoon. When G lived here with me I always seemed to be in a bad mood when I arrived home from work. Looking back, I really do not know why. It seems foolish now. Why wasn’t I happy having the life I had? Now I get home and I am not in a bad mood, just a sad mood. I think every afternoon I start partially daydreaming as I am driving home, and when I get here I expect to find G watching Oprah or taking a nap. It never turns out that way. Walking into the house feels lonely and empty. I think that is why I have started writing this at this time of the day. It gives me something to do until I start feeling better. Most days I call someone and talk for awhile during this period as well. Sometimes my mother, sometimes dad, sometimes a friend that I know is available. It helps also, but I don’t like getting off the phone. I am so afraid that the emptiness will return again. I have to figure out better ways of dealing with this transition to home every day. I cannot believe now what a problem I made it when G was still here. I cannot believe that I didn’t realize it could be a lot worse. That indeed she could not be here. That indeed I might not be able to find anyone to discuss my day with. That I...
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