Chapter Afterstand up, dust off, and get moving

I just broke up with B__.

I’m a complete and total coward, so I did it over the phone. I told her we could get together to talk if she wanted, but that I couldn’t bring myself to tell her in person. My suckage was noted, apologized for, and said apology deemed lacking. She asked if K__ and I were getting back together (I laughed, “no”) as well as saying several other mean-but-reasonable things in her moment of hurt. Some of them were probably dead right.

I tried to walk that thin line between telling the truth and not hurting her feelings, and I always end up either hurting or lying more than necessary. I said I couldn’t give her what she deserved, and I couldn’t go on doing that anymore. Even though she says she’s ok taking it slow, she’s not.

It’s a replay of “the first time” a few months ago, and I probably didn’t do a better job, which makes it that much worse. She asked questions I had no answer for; I wished them rhetorical, despite their so-very-not-ness.

I have I__ tonight, so there are pressing issues of dinner and bedtime to attend to. But I thought I could quickly break the update drought in the meantime.

B__ is at the Pitchfork music fest, so I’m flying solo this weekend. Very low-key so far; hot/humid, stoned, bored. I should be getting a bunch of work done, but I’m — how’s it go? — oh yeah: not. I’m hung up on an odd cocktail of emotion: equal parts excitement at the prospect I’m free to go out and behave like a single man should I choose, guilt that I’d even think such a thing, laziness, garnished with mild social anxiety. It’s Sunday, and I’m doubting I’ll get out tonight. I miss B__. I don’t. It’s upsetting that I miss her. It’s upsetting that I don’t.

Laundry, house-cleaning, grocery-shopping, and other nobody’s-going-to-do-it-for-you realities of single life await, and await some more.

For all my arm-chair study of happiness research, I do not, I think, structure my life around those principles I know to be (proven!) effective in producing long-term happiness.

It’s Friday afternoon leading into a long Independence Day weekend. Today, B__ hit me up for a lunch date, and we ate sidewalk cafe-style in some truly wonderful mid-day weather. While we walked, she asked what was going on this evening and I said that I didn’t know but that I would / should probably work late. She quickly concluded that I must not want to hang out tonight, and lamented that all of her friends seem to be out of town or have other plans.

I have annoyed both K__ and B__ with this Zen-like, nonchalant attitude with which I approach my leisure time. I’m content to work until I don’t feel like working anymore, then I pick up the phone and see if anyone I want to spend time with is free in the immediate future. I’m fully aware that most people “make plans” and that this habit communicates an unintended I-don’t-care.

To what extent should a person bend to the preferences of their loved ones vs “being themselves”? Most suggest that some balance is called for in such situations, but that answer isn’t particularly helpful in finding it. What I find absolutely fascinating is how extreme the acceptable difference of opinion is at the beginning of a relationship, and how narrow it becomes at time goes on.

We had a good time at lunch, I think (at least I did), and managed to make pleasant conversation as long as it didn’t reference any of our hang-ups. She walked with me back toward my office and her car where she gave me a hug and a kiss on the neck. Her disappointment was palpable, and I wondered to myself whether it was specific or general.

I can feel myself all but imperceptibly backing away except for those moments when her magnetic field sweeps me in and spins me dizzy. The net result brings us ever-closer together, but the imbalance is unsustainable. Something has to give.