Tim got out of the hospital Wednesday noontime and promptly, per Squeaky, disappeared. Throughout the six days he was hospitalized, I listened to Squeaky making it HER ordeal. SHE had it bad because SHE missed him. She essentially came out and said something to the effect of "I mean, he's locked up, but it's just as bad for ME because he's not here!" So she was just rabid to have him come "home" on Wednesday and be all domestic and worshipful with her.
So Wednesday night, for the entire night, she called me repeatedly to ask if I'd heard from him. I hadn't; I'd left one calm message on his voicemail and gone about my business, figuring he'd call when he was ready to call.
Not Squeaky. She called me about four or five times, each time calling to tell me he hadn't answered her calls, or her text messages, or her voice mails--and worse yet, when he stopped back at the house right after he'd been released--rather than putting on his smoking jacket, picking up his pipe, slipping into his slippers, and patting Wally and the Beav on the head before settling down to the evening paper--you know, like a dutiful boyfriend would--he'd just taken a shower, changed clothes, and left. The nerve.
So--fine, whatever, he's a Great Big Meanie and everyone's out to get poor Squeaky. Each of Wednesday's calls ended the same way. "I'll call you right away if I hear from him," I told her. "And if YOU hear from him, please let me know, okay?" "Oh, I will," she said.
I didn't really care what he was doing or who he was with; I was worried, though, that either a) he'd ended up back in the hospital, after trying to finish what he'd started; or b)(far more likely, in my opinion) he'd ended up in jail for some type of drunken idiocy, or for running his mouth at a police officer, or whatever. I wasn't hovering over him--I was WORRIED about him.
Wednesday night slipped by without a word from Tim. Thursday, I tried to call him around lunchtime, figuring he'd be awake by then, wherever he was. No answer. I was getting more and more worried. Finally, at about 8:00 Thursday night, I called Squeaky.
"Have you heard from Tim?" I asked.
"Oh, yeah...he's right here!!" she bubbled.
That was when my head completely exploded.
Let's try this again, shall we?
Hypothetical situation, Squeak: Your recently-suicidal boyfriend is missing. You call his friend, asking if she has information. She has no information. She promises to call if she hears anything. She asks you to call if YOU hear anything, and you agree.
YOU want to know where he is so you can feel slighted that he's not with YOU, worshipping YOU and hanging on YOUR every word and just BASKING in how much you supposedly love him. (This despite the facts: the main reason he was hospitalized in the first place is that his living situation--including you--has become so toxic that he sees no other way out.) His friend, however, is concerned about his safety, and wondering if there is anything that she can do, or needs to do, to preserve his well-being and freedom.
So eventually, the Prodigal Boyfriend comes home. Even though he has been there for several hours, and even though you promised to do so, YOU DON'T CALL TO TELL HIS FRIEND that you've found him??? When, had the tables been turned and the friend was the one who heard from him first, not calling you would have been a MONSTROUS, UNFORGIVABLE SIN????
I simply cannot STAND this girl. From talking to Tim, it's become apparent that a goodly portion of what I was told during his hospitalization--about things he said, about the "threatening" phone calls from Betty "for no reason", and so on and so forth--were either greatly exaggerated, deliberately misinterpreted, or flat-out invented. (He did, however, admit that I had done the right thing by calling 911, even if the source of the information that led to the call was....faulty. "Honestly--not exaggerating?" he said. "I had about...50, 60 pills in me. I took a LOT of narcotics that night--I pretty much took some out of every bottle they had in the house. So yeah...I WOULD have been dead," he said. That, for him, is a hell of an admission; in the past, he's minimized any and all of his self-harming behavior, so for him to acknowledge the likely outcome of his actions...well, that's big.)
He's worked out a plan for himself, which seems like a good one, at least in the short term: he's going to rotate staying with various friends who have expressed a willingness to let him stay for a day or two. He'll end up at Squeaky's maybe one or two days a week; he'll be here a couple of nights, and with other friends the rest of the week. Then, he said, as soon as they can make arrangements, he and Betty are going to move out of state; he's got two friends out East, each of whom has offered him a place to stay and leads on a few jobs, and who don't have an issue with a tag-along. (Betty, of course, was who he was with on Wednesday when he wasn't calling Squeaky or me; actually, he said, he was ignoring Squeaky's calls and mine was just collateral damage. Anyhow, he said, he and Betty had what he referred to as "a 'moment'...or actually, a couple of 'moments'." And then he went on to wax rhapsodic about all of Betty's wonderfulnesses, to the point that I was actually feeling a wee bit jealous. Not of the "girlfriend" thing--Tim and I are NOT meant for that--but because he makes her sound like the most awesome person in his life, the one who keeps him together, and having heard all that, I feel a bit...unappreciated. Ignored. Dismissed. Like he's so willing to sing her praises for changing his whole life just by existing, but I, who have done quite a bit for him in terms of concrete, quantifiable actions, am nowhere near as lauded. I'm sure he doesn't mean it like that, but ::::snarl:::: anyway.)
I'm glad he's seriously considering moving away. I'll miss him, but I think it would be the best thing he could do for himself. Betty's inclusion...well, if it makes him happy and gives him something to strive towards, so much the better. I hope the jobs work out, wherever he goes, and that he takes the opportunity to turn over a new leaf in regard to his drinking.
Mostly, though, I hope that Squeaky won't take his eventual departure--if in fact he DOES decide to move away--as an excuse to call me and get all dramatic about his absence and her consequent misery...because if she does, my personal balance will shift from "well-intentioned-if-slightly-pitying polite dissimulation" to "complete, damn-the-torpedoes honesty"--and THAT transition will not be a pleasant one. Not for her, not for me, not for anyone. And it will very likely end with an equation of the form "I'll call you sometime,"--where the value of "sometime" is roughly equal to "towards the beginning of the next Blagojevich administration" (or, for non-Illinoisans, "when Jessica Simpson wins the Nobel Prize for Physics".)
Showing posts with label dramadramadramalamadingdong. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dramadramadramalamadingdong. Show all posts
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Friday, January 2, 2009
Resolution #1
My first resolution for 2009: No more drama.
It took me, granted, 27 hours of the new year to codify this one; actually, 26 hours and 48 minutes, which was how long after midnight on January 1 that Squeaky called me to tell me that Tim was "eating handfuls of pills"--Benadryls and Advils, before he started going through the OTHER roommate's pills (the 61-year-old guy, who I'm sure is on some heavy-duty stuff, and who will henceforth be known as Old Bastard). And when I told her to call 911, she claimed "I said I was going to, and he snapped at me and shit." Now, Tim, when drunk/whatever, is not always the nice guy he is when sober; he said the only time he ever hit a woman was during a drunken blackout several years ago, and so I wasn't in the mood to put Squeaky in that position. So I told her "Give me the address and I'LL call 911. I don't care HOW mad he gets at ME." (Which is true.) So she did, and I did, and I gave them the address and told them what she told me, and they said they were going to send somebody over there. Past that point, as I told Squeaky, I'm not terribly concerned. If he never speaks to me again...oh well. I would rather have a pissed-off ex-friend than a dead friend. And if he DOES speak to me again, he's going to get an earful; I've been down this road with him before, and I'm reasonably sure that it's a)alcohol-fueled; b)not an actual suicide attempt; c)calculated to get under SOMEONE's skin, probably Squeaky's. I know he's having a positively shitty time right now; he's still jobless, living in a place he hates with people he can't stand, and seeing no viable way out for quite some time. But what he's going to hear from me is: he's making it worse for himself, too. Squeaky and Old Bastard are NOT the only ones responsible for his misery; he's done a fair bit to further THAT himself. Not that I don't understand; but there's only so much I can do, and tonight he basically reached that limit.
This is NOT an auspicious beginning to the year.
It took me, granted, 27 hours of the new year to codify this one; actually, 26 hours and 48 minutes, which was how long after midnight on January 1 that Squeaky called me to tell me that Tim was "eating handfuls of pills"--Benadryls and Advils, before he started going through the OTHER roommate's pills (the 61-year-old guy, who I'm sure is on some heavy-duty stuff, and who will henceforth be known as Old Bastard). And when I told her to call 911, she claimed "I said I was going to, and he snapped at me and shit." Now, Tim, when drunk/whatever, is not always the nice guy he is when sober; he said the only time he ever hit a woman was during a drunken blackout several years ago, and so I wasn't in the mood to put Squeaky in that position. So I told her "Give me the address and I'LL call 911. I don't care HOW mad he gets at ME." (Which is true.) So she did, and I did, and I gave them the address and told them what she told me, and they said they were going to send somebody over there. Past that point, as I told Squeaky, I'm not terribly concerned. If he never speaks to me again...oh well. I would rather have a pissed-off ex-friend than a dead friend. And if he DOES speak to me again, he's going to get an earful; I've been down this road with him before, and I'm reasonably sure that it's a)alcohol-fueled; b)not an actual suicide attempt; c)calculated to get under SOMEONE's skin, probably Squeaky's. I know he's having a positively shitty time right now; he's still jobless, living in a place he hates with people he can't stand, and seeing no viable way out for quite some time. But what he's going to hear from me is: he's making it worse for himself, too. Squeaky and Old Bastard are NOT the only ones responsible for his misery; he's done a fair bit to further THAT himself. Not that I don't understand; but there's only so much I can do, and tonight he basically reached that limit.
This is NOT an auspicious beginning to the year.
Monday, December 29, 2008
No, Really--I'm SERIOUS.
Well, that was a heckuva holiday.
First off—I was one of the two last living bodies to flee my workplace, at 6:30 PM on Christmas Eve. Now. Let’s look at this through the distant lens of logic, which so seldom is found in my office. My work is dependent on a stream of work tickets. These tickets are provided by the first-line phone support staff, who receive requests for assistance via both phone and e-mail. If there were no first-line staff, work tickets would not be created.
So why in the name of curdled eggnog were we still there at 6:30 PM, a full TWO HOURS after the first-liners had shut off the phone, shut down their e-mail, locked the front door, and fled the vicinity on foot or by wheel???
(Answer: because the boss said we had to be there. Good enough reason, I guess.)
So Mom picked me up from work and we stopped at my place to feed the kits, and I picked up my suitcase and my bags of this and that, and went to spend the night at Mom’s, which is part of our Christmas tradition. And we did our little candle-lighting and our Bible reading, and Mom fixed a fabulous dinner, and we began the other part of our Christmas tradition: the Potato Ceremony. (This is actually part of the _real_ Christmas meal, but the preparations involved are time-consuming enough that we have to start them the night before.) And then Mom went to Midnight Mass, and I turned on WGN’s “Bozo, Gar and Ray” special, and wrapped the one present for Mom which had survived the holiday season intact; and placed it under the tree and went to bed.
And the next day, we opened gifts and finished potato-ing, and then we packed up what seemed like half the food in the house (four trays of twice-baked potatoes, two large cheesecakes, and two containers of strawberry topping, along with a bunch of other stuff I’m forgetting) and trekked it down the ice-glazed walks to Mom’s car, and went to The Fun Relatives’ House. (The house belongs to my aunt-in-law; between her and the various people who bring side dishes and desserts, dinner there is a thing of beauty. And they really are fun people.)
Then I went home.
Here was my first mistake:
At about 11:00, later than the usual time that anyone calls me with GOOD news, I picked up the ringing phone to the sound of hysterical male weeping. I mean, just sobbing. My immediate thought was Oh my god, Tim’s cat died. (It was, of course, Tim. Who did you think it would be?) But no—the cat is apparently hale and hardy, though it took some time before I could pick out enough whole syllables to ascertain that such was the case. He was just…bawling. Apparently something something Squeaky’s roommate something mutual friend something tried to tell him but something something and then I just took it straight to him…which I wasn’t proud of but something something….blah blah…probably shouldn’t have called you…I’ll talk to you soon, okay. Click.
Well, I said. That was…perplexing.
At which point the phone rang again. “Listen, G? I’m gonna head out toward you, okay? I mean, it’ll be a while because of the buses and everything, but I’ll keep you posted…”
Oh. Goody.
He showed up at about 3 AM, moderately drunk, as I expected. You know for 100% sure that Tim is drunk when every other sentence that comes out of his mouth is “Seriously?” I guess if you hang around a ditzy twenty-year-old long enough, you get to sounding like one yourself. So anyway—seriously?—he calmed down enough to tell me the story. See, Squeaky’s roommate was a 60-year-old-guy, and—seriously?—he had a crush on one of Squeaky’s friends, who was like 23. Seriously. And so she (the friend) tried to dissuade him (the roomie) and—seriously? (Okay, I’ll stop, I promise. But that’s what the conversation was like—seriously.) And anyway, the roomie didn’t like it, and Tim tried to talk to him and somehow, something just blew up and punches were thrown and the friend fled the vicinity in disgust, and I STILL have no idea what the hell Tim was all hysterical about on that first call, but whatever.
So then we devolved into Various Dark Secrets of Tim’s Past and Present, of which the only one I’m at liberty to disclose is that he’s in love with Betty the Bartender and thinks it’s mutual. But there was a lot more than that, and it was about 5 AM when I finally chugged off to bed. And I was tired. I’d had a very, very busy day, what with the potatoes and the family and the socialization and this and that…
I wanted my peace and quiet, is what I wanted.
Unfortunately, before leaving the room, I had answered “yes” to a very simple, seemingly harmless question: “Hey, G, you mind if I have a shot of your vodka?” I figured, as late in the night as it was, and as stressed as he’d been, he’d have a shot and pass out on the floor for a few hours.
My first notion that this was not going to be the case came when I got up to use the bathroom. “No—wait—don’t go back in the room yet—I want to ask you something—no, seriously—“ He then attempted to stop me from feeding the cats because he didn’t believe “you’ve got them on a schedule? Seriously?” And what, should you ask, was the crucial thing he needed to ask? He needed me to proofread a text-message to Squeaky. And then he came into my room—which from long roommate-ship, he knows is not appreciated—after I’d told him I was tired and I was going back to sleep now, and goodnight.
The next thing I heard was BadCat, yowling and hissing and generally sounding thoroughly outraged, alternating with “Seriously? What. What are you gonna do, huh? Seriously?”
Now, BadCat and Tim are not good friends. BadCat, from kittenhood, has been…concerned…by Tim’s existence. He expresses that concern through loud meows, yowls, and hisses whenever Tim violates his own personal feline zone of no-contact. Even a casual walk-by will elicit a mew of consternation; actual, direct attention gets a concert of yowls and moans and very very unhappy cat noises, increasing in volume. I know those yowls well enough to know that intervention was required.
I opened the door, and Tim was on all fours in the hall, with BadCat backed into a corner. “Dude. Cut it out,” I said. No response. “Dude, I said cut it OUT!” He continued. Finally I stepped forward, put my hand on Tim’s forehead, and pushed. “Tim! Stop it right now. Leave the cat alone.”
“Yeah, okay, sure,” he said. I went back into the room.
Five minutes later, yowl, hiss, meow, Seriously, etc.
The conversation progressed thusly.
“Tim. Leave the cat alone, please. Go to sleep.”
“Tim. Stop it. “
“I’m not kidding. Stop aggravating the cat. You’re pissing me off.”
“You are really, seriously, pissing me off right now, Tim. Go to sleep and leave the fucking cat ALONE.”
And finally, the coup de gras: “You know what? You need to leave now.”
If I thought I’d heard the word “Seriously?” a few times earlier in the evening, it was nothing at all compared to how many times I heard it as he put his shoes on, pulled on a sweatshirt, and picked up his backpack—all in triple-slow motion, because surely I was going to change my mind, right?
I didn’t. Not through “seriously?”, not through “I’m sorry, I’m an asshole,” not through “I thought we had a stronger friendship than that, but whatever.” And he walked out the door in quadruple-slow motion, and it took a good five minutes for him to walk the length of the hallway to the elevator.
And I locked my door, gave BadCat an extra treat for being a trooper, and went to bed.
(He called me about eight times in the next four hours. He left his jacket in my closet, for one thing, and I guess he either wanted to apologize or let me hear him bitching out pedestrians who were cruel enough not to give him a cigarette when he asked. But he also called after he sobered up, and the messages sound, at least, like he recognizes what an ass he was. It’s something, anyhow.)
Christmas, man. What a freakin’ riot.
Seriously.
First off—I was one of the two last living bodies to flee my workplace, at 6:30 PM on Christmas Eve. Now. Let’s look at this through the distant lens of logic, which so seldom is found in my office. My work is dependent on a stream of work tickets. These tickets are provided by the first-line phone support staff, who receive requests for assistance via both phone and e-mail. If there were no first-line staff, work tickets would not be created.
So why in the name of curdled eggnog were we still there at 6:30 PM, a full TWO HOURS after the first-liners had shut off the phone, shut down their e-mail, locked the front door, and fled the vicinity on foot or by wheel???
(Answer: because the boss said we had to be there. Good enough reason, I guess.)
So Mom picked me up from work and we stopped at my place to feed the kits, and I picked up my suitcase and my bags of this and that, and went to spend the night at Mom’s, which is part of our Christmas tradition. And we did our little candle-lighting and our Bible reading, and Mom fixed a fabulous dinner, and we began the other part of our Christmas tradition: the Potato Ceremony. (This is actually part of the _real_ Christmas meal, but the preparations involved are time-consuming enough that we have to start them the night before.) And then Mom went to Midnight Mass, and I turned on WGN’s “Bozo, Gar and Ray” special, and wrapped the one present for Mom which had survived the holiday season intact; and placed it under the tree and went to bed.
And the next day, we opened gifts and finished potato-ing, and then we packed up what seemed like half the food in the house (four trays of twice-baked potatoes, two large cheesecakes, and two containers of strawberry topping, along with a bunch of other stuff I’m forgetting) and trekked it down the ice-glazed walks to Mom’s car, and went to The Fun Relatives’ House. (The house belongs to my aunt-in-law; between her and the various people who bring side dishes and desserts, dinner there is a thing of beauty. And they really are fun people.)
Then I went home.
Here was my first mistake:
At about 11:00, later than the usual time that anyone calls me with GOOD news, I picked up the ringing phone to the sound of hysterical male weeping. I mean, just sobbing. My immediate thought was Oh my god, Tim’s cat died. (It was, of course, Tim. Who did you think it would be?) But no—the cat is apparently hale and hardy, though it took some time before I could pick out enough whole syllables to ascertain that such was the case. He was just…bawling. Apparently something something Squeaky’s roommate something mutual friend something tried to tell him but something something and then I just took it straight to him…which I wasn’t proud of but something something….blah blah…probably shouldn’t have called you…I’ll talk to you soon, okay. Click.
Well, I said. That was…perplexing.
At which point the phone rang again. “Listen, G? I’m gonna head out toward you, okay? I mean, it’ll be a while because of the buses and everything, but I’ll keep you posted…”
Oh. Goody.
He showed up at about 3 AM, moderately drunk, as I expected. You know for 100% sure that Tim is drunk when every other sentence that comes out of his mouth is “Seriously?” I guess if you hang around a ditzy twenty-year-old long enough, you get to sounding like one yourself. So anyway—seriously?—he calmed down enough to tell me the story. See, Squeaky’s roommate was a 60-year-old-guy, and—seriously?—he had a crush on one of Squeaky’s friends, who was like 23. Seriously. And so she (the friend) tried to dissuade him (the roomie) and—seriously? (Okay, I’ll stop, I promise. But that’s what the conversation was like—seriously.) And anyway, the roomie didn’t like it, and Tim tried to talk to him and somehow, something just blew up and punches were thrown and the friend fled the vicinity in disgust, and I STILL have no idea what the hell Tim was all hysterical about on that first call, but whatever.
So then we devolved into Various Dark Secrets of Tim’s Past and Present, of which the only one I’m at liberty to disclose is that he’s in love with Betty the Bartender and thinks it’s mutual. But there was a lot more than that, and it was about 5 AM when I finally chugged off to bed. And I was tired. I’d had a very, very busy day, what with the potatoes and the family and the socialization and this and that…
I wanted my peace and quiet, is what I wanted.
Unfortunately, before leaving the room, I had answered “yes” to a very simple, seemingly harmless question: “Hey, G, you mind if I have a shot of your vodka?” I figured, as late in the night as it was, and as stressed as he’d been, he’d have a shot and pass out on the floor for a few hours.
My first notion that this was not going to be the case came when I got up to use the bathroom. “No—wait—don’t go back in the room yet—I want to ask you something—no, seriously—“ He then attempted to stop me from feeding the cats because he didn’t believe “you’ve got them on a schedule? Seriously?” And what, should you ask, was the crucial thing he needed to ask? He needed me to proofread a text-message to Squeaky. And then he came into my room—which from long roommate-ship, he knows is not appreciated—after I’d told him I was tired and I was going back to sleep now, and goodnight.
The next thing I heard was BadCat, yowling and hissing and generally sounding thoroughly outraged, alternating with “Seriously? What. What are you gonna do, huh? Seriously?”
Now, BadCat and Tim are not good friends. BadCat, from kittenhood, has been…concerned…by Tim’s existence. He expresses that concern through loud meows, yowls, and hisses whenever Tim violates his own personal feline zone of no-contact. Even a casual walk-by will elicit a mew of consternation; actual, direct attention gets a concert of yowls and moans and very very unhappy cat noises, increasing in volume. I know those yowls well enough to know that intervention was required.
I opened the door, and Tim was on all fours in the hall, with BadCat backed into a corner. “Dude. Cut it out,” I said. No response. “Dude, I said cut it OUT!” He continued. Finally I stepped forward, put my hand on Tim’s forehead, and pushed. “Tim! Stop it right now. Leave the cat alone.”
“Yeah, okay, sure,” he said. I went back into the room.
Five minutes later, yowl, hiss, meow, Seriously, etc.
The conversation progressed thusly.
“Tim. Leave the cat alone, please. Go to sleep.”
“Tim. Stop it. “
“I’m not kidding. Stop aggravating the cat. You’re pissing me off.”
“You are really, seriously, pissing me off right now, Tim. Go to sleep and leave the fucking cat ALONE.”
And finally, the coup de gras: “You know what? You need to leave now.”
If I thought I’d heard the word “Seriously?” a few times earlier in the evening, it was nothing at all compared to how many times I heard it as he put his shoes on, pulled on a sweatshirt, and picked up his backpack—all in triple-slow motion, because surely I was going to change my mind, right?
I didn’t. Not through “seriously?”, not through “I’m sorry, I’m an asshole,” not through “I thought we had a stronger friendship than that, but whatever.” And he walked out the door in quadruple-slow motion, and it took a good five minutes for him to walk the length of the hallway to the elevator.
And I locked my door, gave BadCat an extra treat for being a trooper, and went to bed.
(He called me about eight times in the next four hours. He left his jacket in my closet, for one thing, and I guess he either wanted to apologize or let me hear him bitching out pedestrians who were cruel enough not to give him a cigarette when he asked. But he also called after he sobered up, and the messages sound, at least, like he recognizes what an ass he was. It’s something, anyhow.)
Christmas, man. What a freakin’ riot.
Seriously.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
"Oy," Also "Vey".
2 PM, voice mail left on my cell phone:
"Hey, G, it's me. Listen, call me when you get this message because I've been having a REALLY BAD past couple of days and I know it's not your problem but I really need somebody to speak to."
4 PM, same:
"G..." (to someone in background: "Shut the fuck up,") "Hey, G, call me as soon as you get this message, okay?"
Now, Tim knows what my cell-phone situation is, so it was my measured opinion that if it was REALLY important, he would call the HOUSE phone. But the second message, with its background argument, made me curious enough to call him.
He answered on the fourth ring: "G--hey. Listen, I'm on my way up there," he told me, "because I can't be around this crazy motherfucker ANY MORE." And then there ensued about fifteen minutes of that I'm-talking-to-the-person-on-the-phone-but-really-I'm-talking-to-the-person-in-the-room-with-me-who-is-the-real-target-of-what-I'm-saying kind of thing. In fact--once the practical outcome of the conversation had been achieved--I just took my ear away from the phone. He wasn't telling me anything I didn't know already (Squeaky's dad is a semi-crazy, extremely-lazy, parasitical welfare-cheat) and frankly, I wasn't that interested. As I said, the main outcome had been arrived at; Tim's on his way over and will most likely be spending a couple of days--at least--on my floor.
This is going to be interesting.
Curiously, I'm not complaining. I'm learning things about myself, these past few months, and one of the things I've learned is: the neat and quiet life isn't all it's cracked up to be. I need a little messiness, a little (okay, a LOT) of stuff going on; not so much cleaning up after everyone around me, but at least having all their stuff play out in my vicinity. Otherwise I get lonely and bored and BORED and depressed, and grossly uncreative. (Speaking of which--I'm taking my REAL computer in this week, and once it's fixed I'm going to scan in a crapload of my artwork. I've been doing a lot of work in colored pencils, pastels, and conte crayons; I wouldn't call it groundbreaking, by any stretch, but it's surely fun, and some of it is quite pretty. In fact, my next step is to buy some mat-board and start decorating.)
I don't necessarily like this new development--and the minute Tim starts with "Squeaky has no place to stay," my attitude will change 180 degrees, to "And Out You Go Too!!"--but for the moment, hey, what the hell--I'll take care of the world for a while longer.
I mean, SOMEBODY's got to, right?
"Hey, G, it's me. Listen, call me when you get this message because I've been having a REALLY BAD past couple of days and I know it's not your problem but I really need somebody to speak to."
4 PM, same:
"G..." (to someone in background: "Shut the fuck up,") "Hey, G, call me as soon as you get this message, okay?"
Now, Tim knows what my cell-phone situation is, so it was my measured opinion that if it was REALLY important, he would call the HOUSE phone. But the second message, with its background argument, made me curious enough to call him.
He answered on the fourth ring: "G--hey. Listen, I'm on my way up there," he told me, "because I can't be around this crazy motherfucker ANY MORE." And then there ensued about fifteen minutes of that I'm-talking-to-the-person-on-the-phone-but-really-I'm-talking-to-the-person-in-the-room-with-me-who-is-the-real-target-of-what-I'm-saying kind of thing. In fact--once the practical outcome of the conversation had been achieved--I just took my ear away from the phone. He wasn't telling me anything I didn't know already (Squeaky's dad is a semi-crazy, extremely-lazy, parasitical welfare-cheat) and frankly, I wasn't that interested. As I said, the main outcome had been arrived at; Tim's on his way over and will most likely be spending a couple of days--at least--on my floor.
This is going to be interesting.
Curiously, I'm not complaining. I'm learning things about myself, these past few months, and one of the things I've learned is: the neat and quiet life isn't all it's cracked up to be. I need a little messiness, a little (okay, a LOT) of stuff going on; not so much cleaning up after everyone around me, but at least having all their stuff play out in my vicinity. Otherwise I get lonely and bored and BORED and depressed, and grossly uncreative. (Speaking of which--I'm taking my REAL computer in this week, and once it's fixed I'm going to scan in a crapload of my artwork. I've been doing a lot of work in colored pencils, pastels, and conte crayons; I wouldn't call it groundbreaking, by any stretch, but it's surely fun, and some of it is quite pretty. In fact, my next step is to buy some mat-board and start decorating.)
I don't necessarily like this new development--and the minute Tim starts with "Squeaky has no place to stay," my attitude will change 180 degrees, to "And Out You Go Too!!"--but for the moment, hey, what the hell--I'll take care of the world for a while longer.
I mean, SOMEBODY's got to, right?
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Updates On the Drama
So. Um. welll...
Yeah, I've talked to CR again. Several times, in fact, and a few e-mails too. I'm still conflicted--as Tim says, "the more you talk to him, the better the chances he can get you to believe his bullshit and suck you back in" and he's right...
...but honestly, I DO miss the arrogant little bastard.
I'd LIKE to say I don't miss the sex. That would be the safest way to feel, but unfortunately that's not a form of willpower I can muster up; there were times in that relationship when the sex was just fanTAStic. Usually it was when he was sneaking around WITH me, instead of sneaking around ON me. When we were in a relationship, that was when it fell apart, generally. I am aware of this, and can judge my own thoughts accordingly--or, as I told Firefly, "Just because I don't hate him anymore, that doesn't mean I have to fuck him." And he's safely several hundred miles away, at any rate, so the point is even more moot than usual.
So yeah, even though I miss that, I miss other things more. There was a point the other night, when we'd been talking for about two hours already, that we got into one of our typical grooves of conversation--I only half-remember what it even was we were talking about--but we were both yelling at the top of our voices, agreeing with each other, trying to top each others' proof of whatever fact or opinion we were discussing...It was like the best of our entire time together. I told him, "THIS is what I miss, dude. Not the bullshit, and not the stupid stuff you did, and not even the 'relationship' part of the relationship--I miss THESE conversations more than anything. I miss arguing with you about stuff. I miss watching the news with you at night." (That was one of our loudest times of the day, the 9 PM news; we were both firecracker-quick to become outraged, particularly at our state and city governments, and there was a great deal of shouting at the television that always went on between the headline and the weather forecast.)
We talked, too, about some of the lies he told. There was one in particular that he'd completely forgotten; when I reminded him of it, he got very quiet. "Oh, god. I did that, didn't I," he said. It wasn't a question; it was a realization of yet another moment in which he'd made some evil choices. "God," he said. It took him a while to get back to the normal way he defends himself from those memories--calling himself an asshole, telling me how sorry he was, how he never meant to hurt me--those are his defenses. I always knew, when he was silent, that my words had REALLY hit home. He'd totally forgotten this lie, and I think he was happier forgetting it. He says, though, that he wants to face it; well, then, face it all, asshole, is my way of looking at things.
Part of me is nervous, thinking that these conversations are leading to someplace I don't want them to go--places that I know it's in my best interests to stay away from. As Tim said last night, "G, you're on such a good track lately--your life is going so well, and even if it isn't exactly what you planned maybe it's more of a blessing that it ended up this way...But don't let him come back and crap on you some more. He could fuck that alllll up, if he came back and tried to do the same shit. And you know he will--you know he's not going to change." (Curiously, CR says the same of Tim. Since their falling-out a few years ago, back when we lived together, there's been a competition, open and full of contempt, as to which of them can most-effectively "protect" me from the other one. CR says Tim is a user; Tim says CR is a womanizing bastard. CR says Tim will never grow up and be a man; Tim says CR will never stop lying and cheating. To a certain extent, they're both right about each other; the only one they're mostly wrong about is me. I'm sure each of them thinks it's their noble hearts and gallantry that lead them to want to "save" me from the other; I am the only one who knows what the motivation really is. All their posturing and protecting, all their teeth-baring and snarling display of loyalty, is really only the same old competition between them that there's ever been--a competition that existed long before I came on the scene. I know a pissing contest when I see one.)
But about one thing Tim is right--if I let CR back in my life, I'd damn well better be prepared to reap the whirlwind. And frankly, right now my life IS in a very good place. I just found out that, owing to my electrical problems, my building manager has finagled me an eternal rent-freeze; that would be good enough, but before he freezes it he's actually CUTTING my rent for next year by almost $150/month, when all is said and done. The truck is paid off, my bills are slightly more-manageable, and I'm at the end of a contract for a cell-phone I don't really need, now that LJ is gone. In short, I'm on the very brink of getting my shit together; letting Chaos Personified back in the door would be a very, very stupid thing to do....
...even if I DO remember long nights of conversation, of laughing and smoking and sex, silly inside jokes that, for just a moment, put me in mind of how happy I was with JP. I wanted to tell CR that, actually; wanted to tell him Do you remember those first few weeks we were starting to get together, before I found out you were still living with Mona? Do you remember that night that you and I and Sofia drove through the city, and I showed you where JP and I had lived together, and all the holy places I remembered, and we listened to Pink Floyd in the car and then we all three went up to Sofia's parents' place and looked out over the skyline? There was a time there when I thought you were who you said you were; when I thought you were honest, that what you told me was the truth, and all the promises you made. And I felt like finally, finally, after two long years, that the world was coming back into place for me again, that I was resuming the life I'd made for myself with JP. Not that I expected you to replace him, but I thought that you were more like me than...well, than you were. I thought that you were telling me the truth, and we would be together, and there would be another wild round of creativity and fucking and madness and HAPPINESS. And then Mona kicked down that motel door, and told me what you'd said about me, and all those hopes and everything we could have been came down the motel stairs with me like a cloud of mist, and I got into the car and drove away and promised you I'd never come back. Except, of course, I DID...
That was my mistake. I know that now--that when I promised him I'd never return, I promised myself as well. And I've never been good at keeping promises I've made to myself. To others, yes; but not to me.
Which is why I worry when I promise myself: This is as far as I will let it go. The nicest thing about it, of course, is that implicit in THAT promise is another one, one that would be infinitely harder for me to break: I promised myself, and then told CR as well: There will be NO more lying to me nor to anyone else; no more manipulation of me nor of anyone else. And if that happens--if your need to feel in control leads you to "protect" me, or anyone else through a lie, and I find out about it (and believe me, I will find out)-- you WILL have no one to blame but yourself. In short: THIS IS YOUR FINAL, FINAL, FINAL FINAL CHANCE.
And this: ...if (being) the better person means I have to make sure you don't hurt me or anyone else, then I will go to any lengths. To protect ME, yes--but after that, to protect other people who maybe don't yet know how badly you can hurt them. Or those who DO know, but who for whatever reason, can't defend themselves.) Now, if you want to just be a normal person and come real with it--tell her the truth, tell me the truth, pick a side and stick with it instead of always looking for something better--then this won't be a problem.
I will not be hurt again. But neither will I be a part of hurting someone else. That was always a source of guilt for me; knowing that I had been "the other woman"--at first, yes, unknowingly--BUT: I stayed and kept trying EVEN AFTER I KNEW. Because I thought he was mine--he'd told me as much--but he'd told Mona as much too. I won't go down that road again. If that means I have to cut him out of my life again, then so be it; I just....I have enough bad karma already.
So yeah--it's been complicated. I miss him, yes. Do I still love him on some level? Probably a little bit, yeah. I'm not a light-switch, and as he and I always said: "indifference", not "hate", is the opposite of "love". I have never been purely indifferent to him, as much as I have tried.
But: am I going to let him get close enough to hurt me again?? Not if I can help it; I can only hope that knowledge is good enough. Because despite how all this might sound to those who know me only through this medium? I DO know better. I know MUCH better than to make the same mistake again. I honestly think that I can be his friend--from a distance--and not let it go any further.
(But it surely wouldn't hurt if some magnificently-hot guy were to turn up right about now; that would certainly simplify matters quite a lot.)
Anyway. Everything else in my life is...awesome, really. Once I get the REAL 'puter all up and running again, I'll scan in some of my latest drawings. I've found that vodka + boredom + conte crayons = some really cool artwork!
Yeah, I've talked to CR again. Several times, in fact, and a few e-mails too. I'm still conflicted--as Tim says, "the more you talk to him, the better the chances he can get you to believe his bullshit and suck you back in" and he's right...
...but honestly, I DO miss the arrogant little bastard.
I'd LIKE to say I don't miss the sex. That would be the safest way to feel, but unfortunately that's not a form of willpower I can muster up; there were times in that relationship when the sex was just fanTAStic. Usually it was when he was sneaking around WITH me, instead of sneaking around ON me. When we were in a relationship, that was when it fell apart, generally. I am aware of this, and can judge my own thoughts accordingly--or, as I told Firefly, "Just because I don't hate him anymore, that doesn't mean I have to fuck him." And he's safely several hundred miles away, at any rate, so the point is even more moot than usual.
So yeah, even though I miss that, I miss other things more. There was a point the other night, when we'd been talking for about two hours already, that we got into one of our typical grooves of conversation--I only half-remember what it even was we were talking about--but we were both yelling at the top of our voices, agreeing with each other, trying to top each others' proof of whatever fact or opinion we were discussing...It was like the best of our entire time together. I told him, "THIS is what I miss, dude. Not the bullshit, and not the stupid stuff you did, and not even the 'relationship' part of the relationship--I miss THESE conversations more than anything. I miss arguing with you about stuff. I miss watching the news with you at night." (That was one of our loudest times of the day, the 9 PM news; we were both firecracker-quick to become outraged, particularly at our state and city governments, and there was a great deal of shouting at the television that always went on between the headline and the weather forecast.)
We talked, too, about some of the lies he told. There was one in particular that he'd completely forgotten; when I reminded him of it, he got very quiet. "Oh, god. I did that, didn't I," he said. It wasn't a question; it was a realization of yet another moment in which he'd made some evil choices. "God," he said. It took him a while to get back to the normal way he defends himself from those memories--calling himself an asshole, telling me how sorry he was, how he never meant to hurt me--those are his defenses. I always knew, when he was silent, that my words had REALLY hit home. He'd totally forgotten this lie, and I think he was happier forgetting it. He says, though, that he wants to face it; well, then, face it all, asshole, is my way of looking at things.
Part of me is nervous, thinking that these conversations are leading to someplace I don't want them to go--places that I know it's in my best interests to stay away from. As Tim said last night, "G, you're on such a good track lately--your life is going so well, and even if it isn't exactly what you planned maybe it's more of a blessing that it ended up this way...But don't let him come back and crap on you some more. He could fuck that alllll up, if he came back and tried to do the same shit. And you know he will--you know he's not going to change." (Curiously, CR says the same of Tim. Since their falling-out a few years ago, back when we lived together, there's been a competition, open and full of contempt, as to which of them can most-effectively "protect" me from the other one. CR says Tim is a user; Tim says CR is a womanizing bastard. CR says Tim will never grow up and be a man; Tim says CR will never stop lying and cheating. To a certain extent, they're both right about each other; the only one they're mostly wrong about is me. I'm sure each of them thinks it's their noble hearts and gallantry that lead them to want to "save" me from the other; I am the only one who knows what the motivation really is. All their posturing and protecting, all their teeth-baring and snarling display of loyalty, is really only the same old competition between them that there's ever been--a competition that existed long before I came on the scene. I know a pissing contest when I see one.)
But about one thing Tim is right--if I let CR back in my life, I'd damn well better be prepared to reap the whirlwind. And frankly, right now my life IS in a very good place. I just found out that, owing to my electrical problems, my building manager has finagled me an eternal rent-freeze; that would be good enough, but before he freezes it he's actually CUTTING my rent for next year by almost $150/month, when all is said and done. The truck is paid off, my bills are slightly more-manageable, and I'm at the end of a contract for a cell-phone I don't really need, now that LJ is gone. In short, I'm on the very brink of getting my shit together; letting Chaos Personified back in the door would be a very, very stupid thing to do....
...even if I DO remember long nights of conversation, of laughing and smoking and sex, silly inside jokes that, for just a moment, put me in mind of how happy I was with JP. I wanted to tell CR that, actually; wanted to tell him Do you remember those first few weeks we were starting to get together, before I found out you were still living with Mona? Do you remember that night that you and I and Sofia drove through the city, and I showed you where JP and I had lived together, and all the holy places I remembered, and we listened to Pink Floyd in the car and then we all three went up to Sofia's parents' place and looked out over the skyline? There was a time there when I thought you were who you said you were; when I thought you were honest, that what you told me was the truth, and all the promises you made. And I felt like finally, finally, after two long years, that the world was coming back into place for me again, that I was resuming the life I'd made for myself with JP. Not that I expected you to replace him, but I thought that you were more like me than...well, than you were. I thought that you were telling me the truth, and we would be together, and there would be another wild round of creativity and fucking and madness and HAPPINESS. And then Mona kicked down that motel door, and told me what you'd said about me, and all those hopes and everything we could have been came down the motel stairs with me like a cloud of mist, and I got into the car and drove away and promised you I'd never come back. Except, of course, I DID...
That was my mistake. I know that now--that when I promised him I'd never return, I promised myself as well. And I've never been good at keeping promises I've made to myself. To others, yes; but not to me.
Which is why I worry when I promise myself: This is as far as I will let it go. The nicest thing about it, of course, is that implicit in THAT promise is another one, one that would be infinitely harder for me to break: I promised myself, and then told CR as well: There will be NO more lying to me nor to anyone else; no more manipulation of me nor of anyone else. And if that happens--if your need to feel in control leads you to "protect" me, or anyone else through a lie, and I find out about it (and believe me, I will find out)-- you WILL have no one to blame but yourself. In short: THIS IS YOUR FINAL, FINAL, FINAL FINAL CHANCE.
And this: ...if (being) the better person means I have to make sure you don't hurt me or anyone else, then I will go to any lengths. To protect ME, yes--but after that, to protect other people who maybe don't yet know how badly you can hurt them. Or those who DO know, but who for whatever reason, can't defend themselves.) Now, if you want to just be a normal person and come real with it--tell her the truth, tell me the truth, pick a side and stick with it instead of always looking for something better--then this won't be a problem.
I will not be hurt again. But neither will I be a part of hurting someone else. That was always a source of guilt for me; knowing that I had been "the other woman"--at first, yes, unknowingly--BUT: I stayed and kept trying EVEN AFTER I KNEW. Because I thought he was mine--he'd told me as much--but he'd told Mona as much too. I won't go down that road again. If that means I have to cut him out of my life again, then so be it; I just....I have enough bad karma already.
So yeah--it's been complicated. I miss him, yes. Do I still love him on some level? Probably a little bit, yeah. I'm not a light-switch, and as he and I always said: "indifference", not "hate", is the opposite of "love". I have never been purely indifferent to him, as much as I have tried.
But: am I going to let him get close enough to hurt me again?? Not if I can help it; I can only hope that knowledge is good enough. Because despite how all this might sound to those who know me only through this medium? I DO know better. I know MUCH better than to make the same mistake again. I honestly think that I can be his friend--from a distance--and not let it go any further.
(But it surely wouldn't hurt if some magnificently-hot guy were to turn up right about now; that would certainly simplify matters quite a lot.)
Anyway. Everything else in my life is...awesome, really. Once I get the REAL 'puter all up and running again, I'll scan in some of my latest drawings. I've found that vodka + boredom + conte crayons = some really cool artwork!
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