Emotional Honesty

What came first?

Well I don't know. What I do know is something sure as shit happened. A sure as shit, trembling, growling, shakin' in your space boots, wipe up the puddles and vomit, carry on, vibrating colors in the air now, something shifting in the background until somebody quotes Bonnie Raitt and I step back a minute and think maybe I ought to chart this thing out so I can see it. And when I did see it, well, it hit me upside the head. Hard.

Really?! Really, Alecto? So this is what it comes down to? This is what it took? I kind of want to ask myself, why didn't you do this sooner? But I don't think that was really the issue. People look at me, or have looked at me until I shut the hell up about it so they'd stop asking why I didn't just choose to step left, move on, get over it as if it was something I could just do, or a switch I could just flip like I was being wilfully stubborn and I wanted to scream in frustration. So I just cried quietly instead. In frustration. And I got used to the loneliness more or less; I got used to the being alone and in the end, being alone was a conscious choice.

The conscious choice happened on the 68th date. I'm pretty sure I wrote about this, or something. The 68th date when it became painfully clear that every man was a no go from the start, no matter what. So why bother? I'm not going to do this anymore, at least not until I can get past whatever it is that's got me stuck. Or figure out what it is I'm stuck in, or something like that. And I'm not talking to anybody about it either. Because just like an asshole, everybody has an opinion and there comes a time when you just can't take a single other opinion. It was finally just plain my stuff.

I had to let go. I couldn't even take my own opinion anymore. When it comes down to self judgment, I can be a real asshole.

So here's what happened when I wasn't looking. There's a time line for a reason.

On December 30 I was trolling Facebook and I stumbled across a Contra conversation that I wouldn't for a million years have jumped in on because it was way over my head except there was this one thing that just blew my mind about gender balancing at certain dances, like I said, way over my head, and since my Contra world is about community, and building community, I was so upset I felt the need to insert a comment into the conversation as a newish dancer about how offensive I found the idea given the nature of the dance. I tried to be polite. I acknowledged that I understood why a dance might need to be gender balanced if there were too many women, which there often are. And then as an after thought, in the very next comment, I mentioned that I'd do anything to avoid sitting out a dance which meant I ask to dance instead of waiting to be asked and I'm learning to lead. Apparently a lot of women will dance only with men and women over 30 really don't want to or will not do the asking. They'd rather sit out. Or will pay a good amount of money to go to a dance weekend and sit out a lot of dances because there aren't enough partners.

Wow.

I was flabbergasted. So that's how I got into the conversation and I stayed in it and one other for quite awhile. Later I got a message asking if I came to one or two dances up North and would I ask him to dance if I did, either role because he'll dance either and will, in fact, swap roles mid dance. Oh. I explained that I'd been there once and that it was a very long round trip drive and I'd be again but I didn't know when. He sent me a link suggesting a dance on the 20th. I didn't think it was likely. Middle of the close and all that.

And there's one other thing. There weren't any photographs of me from the Fall Ball, at least none that I found, until I looked at his profile and realized he'd taken some and there I was. I asked to be tagged. I didn't issue a friend request. Too daunting.

So on the 9th of January, I do not know which came first so there is a blue arrow and a red arrow. I got an email from The Closer about my refi and I made a decision about driving to Greenfield that Sunday because we did have MLK Monday off even though it was a maintenance weekend and I could expect all hell to break loose with the servers that Saturday. Somehow I decided. It's crazy, because from the point of that email I went numb and my stomach knotted and I couldn't see straight. Someday I'll find the time stamps on those two million emails and compare them to the Facebook message although that doesn't guarantee anything. I really would like to know.

He said... he might be there and I thought... how odd. And then I promptly stopped thinking about him.

And I went on with the close and the vomiting and all that crap and got on with my life and sometime between the 12th and the 20th, which isn't very long, there was some percolating going on that I really didn't know much about and when we all arrived at the dance I don't suppose I was even looking for him and there he was, in the middle of a dance, suddenly in my arms.

Where he will only be for 8 beats during a swing and I said his name, hello and it only took about two beats before he said my name right back. As he was progressing to the next set of four, I was asking him for the next dance but he was already too far away and I wondered if he'd remember or if I'd ever find him in this crowd again.

Well I did find him, almost as if he was waiting for me, and that was a wonderful dance, just like flying. Later he danced with Elizabeth because I asked if he would because the dance was just too much for her. Too many people and she wouldn't ask anyone to dance. She wandered out into the crowd one time and ran back to her chair, cowed. No one even noticed her. She danced another time with another friend of mine and the Godfather of Callers asked her to dance. I was taken for the last waltz by the time he came for me. By the time we left I had a serious crush on the guy but there wasn't anything I needed to do about it given the distance. I just liked that I had a crush in the first place because it's good to know you can.

And the next day there was a very nice, if not relatively formal FB mail hoping I'd had a nice time. And I responded, thinking, this guy is doing a nice job of protecting himself so never mind the crush, but he sure is cute. And then the next day he came back again and suddenly I received my first facetime request ever and it was at the office so I ran off into the hallways and big open spaces of TheBigBank and nearly hyperventilated. And still, he came back. I decided to sit still and listen. I know, right?

And he just kept coming back and the funny thing is, every time he came back a wall fell down, one of mine. It's been REALLY dark in here. Blink. Blink.

On the 24th I decided I was going to the dance flurry in Saratoga Springs despite, well despite a lot of things. I'm just going. Oh, every red arrow after the 20th represents direct contact. Anything after the 21st is at least 2 hours of significant communication even though I get the feeling he's trying to stop himself. I'm just sitting still. He's stopping at the Hartford dance on the way home from, well, after a six hour cross country flight on the 9th. Really, he ought to be right here but he's not and that's probably a very good thing.

I was thinking the other day, you're careful, careful, careful stepping into this or not into this is getting in the way of my sex life when really all I want to do is kiss you (and then probably a whole lot more) and really, this is probably a good thing. This 114 mile gap. And I don't have to know the answers. All I have to know is that I'm right here, right now and he has my complete attention. Also, he could go away tomorrow, well, I think I'd still be putting out whatever I'm putting out right now.

Who knew.

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My deepest, darkest fear was that eventually I would give a damn, that I would care enough to be vulnerable and when that happened my heart would break wide open and I would cry and cry and cry and that would not be alright. That would not be acceptable at all. That would mean I was a broken, shattered mess. One of the walking wounded, unfit to love or be loved. A piece of wreckage left behind, so damaged as to be rendered untouchable and that until I managed to put myself back together and be a perfect, clean shining example of womanhood, able to give and receive without any baggage at all I was going to have to sit in the dark until I figured it out. It's been really horrible in here.

That might not be true. Apparently.

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Ever see the movie Practical Magic? The woman who really can't bring herself to have any part of another relationship, has written down the ingredients for a perfect man:

"he has one blue eye and one green eye, can ride a pony backwards, can flip flapjacks in the air, and his favorite shape is a star"

She takes a little bit of shit for this because it's clearly not going to happen, but she did put it out there in the form of a spell. What is a spell really, other than an incantation of desire flung out into the universe? Be careful what you ask for. Your intentions are what drive the incantation. Where are your intentions? Eventually that guy showed up in her driveway.

There's no such thing as the perfect man. No such thing as the perfect anyone. But I did have an incantation, now didn't I? I just didn't mean it for awhile. By the time the door opened wide enough for me to mean it, I'd completely forgotten I'd put it out there.

I SO did not see that coming.

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Elizabeth's commentary: you just spent 2 hours on a facebook chat.

Me:    Yes, what about it?

Elizabeth:    It's with that guy from Greenfield.

Me:    Yes, it was.

Elizabeth:    You have a crush on him.

Me:    What if I do.

Elizabeth:    Ewwww... gross.

Me:    Why is that gross? You liked him.

Elizabeth:    Yes, I do like him.

Me:    So what's wrong with him?

Elizabeth:    That's not the way you're supposed to do it!

Me:    What?! Not the way I'm supposed to do what?

Elizabeth:    Mom! You're supposed to meet guys on Match like normal people! Jeeze!

Comments

[shadowmoss]

I'm blaming my last relationship, he was just so nice and we just weren't in the right placaes geographically or in our lives. I also blame geography, as I'm a couple of thousand miles from any male I have anything in common with (not grammatical, but I can't figure out how to fix it). I hope I'm not a lone from now I. I may be. I have little patience with other people in my space right now, so I guess being way down here is where I need to be. I'll be popping popcorn and taking notes as you proceed.

[florkow]

:) Forget geography!

[Alecto]

I'm not the least bit worried about geography :-)

[jules]

We put up walls for a reason. They come down in their own time.

Good on you for recognizing and being open to possibility.