Les Affaires de Coeur: June 2009 Archives

"Great. More exciting adventures in sitting." - Simon Tam

Being sick is always a surreal experience for me. My daily life is composed so much of movement, and being sick is all about sitting still and waiting to heal.

"I hate waiting." - Inigo Montoya

Me too.

Even though I occasionally get something extraordinary out of the experience, like what happened to me last night when, watching PBS with a desultory eye, I had a revelation about what I'd like to do next with my professional self. Or rather, how my unasked-for talents for evil could be put to better use.

I shan't go into specifics, since I like to preserve a little proscenium here. But it was a grand idea, and I intend to see what can be done about it - though I have, of course, no real idea of how to proceed with the transition.

"You keep using that word." - Inigo, again.

Yeah, I do - even though it is perhaps my least favorite activity in the universe. Boywich pointed out to me the other day that, despite my reputation as a change-resisting stick-in-the-mud, I've actually been changing by leaps and bounds. I suspect a lot of it is going on at a level I'm not quite aware of. But I do find myself experimenting with things I never thought I'd be able to do.

{pause for coughing fit that scares cat off my lap}

{another pause to retrieve oatmeal I'd forgotten about. I always forget about oatmeal. However much I may like it, it's just not a memorable food. I wonder if anyone will speak of me in those terms, after I've left. Anyway...}

One of those things is -erm- "interacting" with more than one person at a time. No, I am not referring to the menage a rouge, or any other color. I just mean that until quite recently, it had never occurred to me that I could or would have any desire to juggle multiple lovers. I am not even sure now why I am doing it, apart from the fact that the opportunity exists, and that neither one of them is in any way a serious thing.

Actually, that last bit may be the most surprising of all. There's nothing doing, romantically, with either of them. Never thought I'd be down for (up for?) that. But the list of things I never thought I'd be, or do, or want to be or do, has been getting exponentially longer.

There's always a space on an online personals questionnaire that asks you to project yourself into the future, and I always heave a huge sigh about that. The longer I'm here, the more solidly I realize that planning isn't the point of life. Or at least of my life.

Quite the opposite, in fact. My goal has become to simply get out of my way as much as possible. To let myself breathe, and be here, in this moment, in this place, to see it and hear it and smell it and taste it. To experience the sweetness of that lady behind the pharmacy counter after I joked that I'd gotten sick helping out a friend, and mock-swore that that would be the last time I did something nice. She looked into my eyes, assessingly and with good humor, and said, "You're lying. You'd do the same thing all over again. Because that's how we are with friends and family." I told her she was absolutely right, and we laughed, and it had that delicious sweetness of the real.

Sometimes I feel like we're just here for that - to connect, to interact, to share that knowledge of what it is to be here, to be human.

You know, the funny thing is, with the two boys...despite not being in or planning to be in a "relationship" with either of them, neither of those connections feels false or stale or empty. It's not callous or meaningless, and it doesn't seem to need anything attached to it, or to lead anywhere else, in order to have value. It is its own thing, sitting there in time and space, me and him, in my room.

*with apologies to Talking Heads.

Earth to Lizbon: Honey, you do not want a boyfriend.
Lizbon: Right. I forgot.
Earth: Because, it makes you crazy. Witness how uncomfortable it made you to even contemplate having a proper date.
Lizbon: Right, I forgot.
Earth: Remember how you called me up in the middle of the night and begged me, please, to send you a backdoor man? Or two?
Lizbon: I think I'd actually like three, if you're offering.
Earth: Yes, well, we'll see what can be done about that. So, here, my love, on a silver platter, are two lovely backdoor men. Use them wisely, okay? And don't get all bent out of shape over it.
Lizbon: Yes, Earth, darling. I will try.
Earth: And ride your damned bicycles.
Lizbon: Hey, I never stopped doing that. Give me some frickin' credit.

Me: Complain complain complain. Boys are a pain.
Boywich: Well, it's a transitional time.
Me: That explains why I hate it.
Boywich: Chuckle.

Really, I wonder sometimes if I am actually female. The moment that I let on to boy number two that I liked him, I wished I could take it back. Ack! I'm trapped! Oh shit! Must find a third! Stat!

Changed my perfume and everything. Okay, I didn't change it; I'll go back to the usual tomorrow, no doubt, but I suddenly felt like pulling out all my imps and looking at them.

So I am going out with friends tonight, and getting a pedicure with Special J tomorrow (hello, Sweetie. I love you.). And then we shall see what we shall see, which is a shame, rather, as I'd really like to get laid again sometime this century.

Did I say that out loud? Yeah, probably.

Stop reading, mom. Stop reading right now.

Okay, she doesn't read the blog. Special J does from time to time, but she's heard much worse come out of my actual mouth. Boy number one once teased me that if I were introducing someone as an ex-lover, I'd not only not be shy about using that term but would offer details, "We did this, and this, and this."

He's wrong about that; I actually do have a shy side, but then again I will also absolutely tell it like it is. I happen to like that in myself, but Boywich tells me it's not a quality in high demand these days. I think he's right. People seem to not know what to do with the direct truth, served up plain and in the exact words I mean to put it in.

Maybe they're so used to reading behind the lines that they start doing it anyway, and think - oh, just to coin an example - that when I said "like" I really meant "love." And they get all gawky and weird about it and wonder what it means that I am looking them directly in the eyes all of sudden.

What it means, cutie, is that I happened to notice what a pretty colour your eyes are; hadn't really looked too closely before. Sigh. You can see how I get myself into trouble, yes?

I feel that I should carry a warning label, sandwich-board-style. "Warning: Truth Teller. I say what I mean, and I mean what I say."

"Play long enough, you never change the stakes. The house takes you. Unless, when that perfect hand comes along, you bet and you bet big, then you take the house." - Daniel Ocean.

With apologies to Juno, I am borrowing her very own format to relate a conversation we had over IM yesterday. Okay, it's excerpts from two conversations, but the second was really a continuation of the first.

Juno: You told him you wanted to like, date him and stuff?
Me: I will tell you exactly. It was very cute. (long tale of how I asked new boy out)
J: I'm so proud of you.
Me: I'm glad I didn't make myself wait for the "perfect moment" or the perfect way to do it.
J: You just have to observe Dan Savage's campground rules.
Me: Campground rules?
J: When you are older than someone to a significant degree, your obligation is to leave them in better shape than you found them.
Me: That is a lovely rule.

Do you ever find yourself learning the same lessons, over and over and over again? I mean, it isn't even exactly re-learning them, but trying repeatedly to learn them in the first place.

Today's lesson: coping with uncertainty. Okay, not just coping but learning to hover right above it, to be at peace with it, and maybe even to enjoy it.

I'm not saying all kinds of uncertainty should be enjoy-able (as in, something that can be enjoyed, rather than something that is automatically delightful). Fiscal uncertainty sucks.

But uncertainty about this boy or that boy liking you or not liking you, and uncertainty about your own feelings toward him, well, that seems like it ought to have some element of pleasure about it.

I've tried and tried to enjoy the grey area. Or rather, the brightly colored area, the haze of uncertainty in which the air can seem to be dancing with motes of electrical energy, with a look in his eyes or yours that might or might not mean something is going on between you. And you just don't know. And moreover, you don't even know if you want it to mean something.

I woke up this morning thinking, oh I'm glad I didn't tell him yesterday that I have a crush on him, because now I am not certain whether I do. I mean, I kind of do. But then, there are so many cute boys in the world - just look at them all. All those boys on all those bikes, and they are all flirting with me, and we are all going to ride down to the beach together. And there we will play in the sand and pretend, for a day, that there's no reason for anyone on earth to have a care other than, perhaps, frisbee, and wondering if the water's too cold yet for swimming.

So I had this great day, despite the uncertainty, and though the uncertainty was a tiny bit painful, it might have also been a bit delicious. Does he or doesn't he? Somebody hand me a daisy and I will find out.

Or I will just wear the daisy in my hair and think, He might. He might not.

PS. Nikon. Click for bigger.