It's 4:30 in the morning, and I'm still awake. I am at the crossroads of deciding whether or not I should don my flipflops and go for a walk over to see the Brooklyn Bridge and the Eliasson Waterfalls as the sun rises, immediately followed by a toasted bagel and green tea, or if I should stay up reading, or simply crash into bed.
I'm not usually faced with these decisions. When it's 4:30 and I'm somehow still conscious I'm usually drunk or getting ready to go to the airport. In the case of the former, I'm more than HAPPY to oblige the hibernation factor. In the case of the latter, I'm usually waiting to stop at WaWa so I can become a functioning human being, with a mix CD for the ride to Philadelphia and prepared for some of the most meaningful conversations I've had with my family to occur. Blueberry muffin in hand.
But, the reason that I'm still awake is that I stumbled into a really open, honest, spacious, frustrating, debilitating, frank, depressing, careful, daring, uplifting, relentless, gracious, and ultimately fulfilling conversation with Casey. The reason I just listed an egregious number of adjectives is because I'm still reeling from the whole experience. I am trying to be cautious and not attribute a value judgment to the whole thing, so I am not allowing myself the capacity of labeling it positive, negative, or both, but simply am trying to separate fact from emotion, both in myself and what I can try to perceive is coming from him.
I guess it really is no secret that this past semester was dually explosive and beautiful for me-- in a way full of much more calm and love than I have previously known in myself. Very often I would turn to Joan throughout the months and say, "I am actually happy right now. I feel connected. And for this brief second I don't feel bad about that." Or, I would say something along the lines of how I really was frustrated that I may be forcing myself to restructure things when I couldn't even accept that I actually thought they were good for me. Really, I turned to Joan more often than not throughout the semester to really be completely frank and honest because she was the safest bet. We had had some weird attraction to each other when we first met-- I totally had the biggest crush on her for a bit in DC and made it my goal to get to know her more. And then it fizzled, and I got caught up in the GW world with Chad, Will, Lauren, Joe, Alex, and Emily, and I rarely came by the W&M house. She went on with her life there, with Denisse and Tommy and all the people from which I was so active in distancing myself, yet we still remained close regardless of my ventures across town. Then we took a class together (Intro to Anthropology) during the summer, and she basically came over to my apartment every. single. day. to hang out and relax. She witnessed my July of Hell, in which I literally ran out of money, barely had a job, and found that a productive day was getting up the little motivation I had to get out of the house to mail a letter. I actually have a hard time looking back on that month because it's just absolutely awful for me to remember. I was so self-indulgent yet completely, for the first time since high school, without control of my emotional self and spiraled down into a really intense and unrelenting depression. But then came Africa, and I got on a regular sleep schedule and ate interesting things and met new people and went on an incredible safari and read Alice Munro's "The Moons of Jupiter" and discovered Tori Amos' song "Yes, Anastasia" and generally found myself again. And the best part about it was that I was so ecstatic about finally getting myself together. I've never felt so good about picking up the pieces. That's when I realized I was making progress.
Joan and I still have issues over the balance of our relationship. I often am incredibly abrasive, domineering, and needy. I intentionally play mind games sometimes to test the limits and provoke her. I will also incredibly bluntly and quite frankly without any tact demand that she be more open and talk and actually express herself verbally. But at the same time, I also feel comfortable saying that I've rarely ever celebrated, cherished, loved, or believed in someone so strongly as I do her. There's a reason she's living with me next year. There's a reason she and I are writing our honors thesis together. There's a reason that whenever I think of anything remotely interesting she's one of the people I immediately want to share it with.
So, tangent, yes. Back to last semester. I am starting to realize as the days go by how poorly I handled the whole situation with Tom. The night that he met me at a party near the end of January I had my eyes completely set on Sam's friend Justin, who was in town to visit and to get away from the craziness of the Obama campaign and national primaries. After three of my friends tried to hit on him with blatant disregard for any subtlety, I thought my chances were incredibly low, so I gave up and mingled. Which is when I met Tom, really, for the first time. We talked for quite some time, I had a blast, and somehow felt it completely OK to give him a peck on the cheek when I said goodnight-- was it good will? Was it attraction? Was it condescending? I'm afraid it might have been a combination of all three. And then it turns out that I did end up hooking up with Justin, which was amazing and incredible and exciting, and then falling for him completely and utterly foolishly.
The thing about Justin was the fact that I was so quickly forced to reconcile my, at the time, growing desire for a significant relationship with the perceived realization that I could not seem to attract anyone at William and Mary. I felt great when Justin chose me instead of my friends-- I guess it made me feel sexy in a way that I'd never known before at school. But I also felt awful, empty, and aching when I had to acknowledge that Justin was only in town for 48 hours, and after that he'd be gone.
So, it took me those 48 hours to be completely broken, fragile and wholly vulnerable. It took me not being able to move out of my apartment. To only think about him. To only think about the hours that we'd had. To only think of how I was getting further and further from finding anyone at W&M who I thought could see me as a worthy partner.
But, I bounced back so much more quickly than I have ever been able to, so I felt, once again, that I was making progress. I felt more refined, more mature-- more secure in my abilities to reconcile reality with emotions.
Then it came to my attention that Tom was actually very interested in getting to know me more, and so I made the move at the Pirate Dance Party at TDX and ending up spending the night with him, making out forever and generally being a big old grinning mess the next morning while Joan and I attended a cooking class at Williams-Sonoma.
What I've started to realize is that I didn't stick up for myself enough in my relationship with Tom, and I think the main reason was a fear that he may be the one and only chance I get at romantic success at W&M. So, I tried to cater to what he needed and wanted and I lost sight of myself in the relationship. I know, from other sources, that he has had a rocky coming out period, and that his relationship with his family is complex, and I know first hand that he's in a ton of high powered positions around campus. But I never, until the very end, successfully made the case for him to want to prioritize our relationship. I was more than willing to give him space when he needed it. But then when I appeared needy it was because I was indeed being just that-- and therefore having a weak moment of sorts. That, then, gave him the upper hand, I'm afraid, because I don't think he realized the sacrifices I was making almost daily to his overwhelming need to fulfill every single wish of the people around him and instead only saw when I reared my ugly relationship head and requested to spend quality boyfriend time with him. Tom is a gracious guy. He is kind, affectionate, passionate about what he does, he cares about the people around him, and he is also a natural born leader. But the thing is, I'm afraid he also feels obligated to be everything to everyone, and I just don't feel that way. I used to, certainly. But once I stopped being in every club and president of every organization (like I tried to be in high school), I started to realize that I didn't have to appease everyone and that I could take time for myself, and by extension my (non-existant at the time before him) boyfriend.
Blah blah blah. Things got really rocky for us, and then my birthday came and he went camping with TDX and all of my INCREDIBLE friends from DC and SAS and W&M showed me such love and joy that weekend-- to the point that I still feel I don't deserve it-- and he didn't even really say anything meaningful to me, but instead broke up with me and completely ended our relationship without really asking me or talking to me about how he was feeling before he'd decided to completely end it. So, he'd moved on and not told me, while I still was thinking we were, for all intents and purposes, together.
I think that's probably what triggered such a violent April for me-- the fact that I felt as if I had not been notified of his complete and utter dissatisfaction and getting over me and the relationship until way after it had happened. I had no chance to salvage it. I am of the belief that relationships are a lot of work, and if you actually try instead of run away from things, you can surprisingly fix quite a bit. No one and no relationship is ever perfect, but I really genuinely felt that Tom and I had redeeming qualities that far outweighed the cons. Yet, my vision was, apparently, separate from his, and by the time I became aware of this fact he had removed himself and wasn't looking back. I felt abandoned, cast off, and completely unable to do anything. I've never, ever, ever pleaded someone to try again or give it another go. I've never been close to begging for a second chance. Yet, I did. And I was. And I hated myself for being in that position.
It is the combination of doing just that mixed with Tom's mental moving on without ever telling me that made me, very quietly, fall to pieces in April. But, what is sort of interesting about the whole thing, I think, is that I never really totally felt outright anger and the aching that I'd known before. I was never at the extreme of emotions afterwards. But, every day there was a warning sign. I skipped classes I loved. I ate poorly. I would make really awkward and hurtful comments in one liners or cast offs to friends about the relationship. I resented the people who still saw him. I drank a lot more. I slept with people I had absolutely interest in besides getting out of my head for a few moments. I couldn't stop thinking about NYC and idolizing it as a saviour figure.
I think what it comes down to was I was actively avoiding being honest with myself on a daily basis. I am now sure that I was in a state of total denial. I wanted to appear fine and calm, yet I still needed to vent to Katie, Casey, Dan, and Joan about it. But even when I did that I was doing very basic venting-- not really driving at the issues that were getting to me. I stopped trusting them because I wasn't trusting myself to feel what I was feeling. I felt like an outsider to my emotions, and I both wanted to skydive away from all emotions that I could possibly ever have and also be in control of every single one available. The thing is that they weren't available because I wouldn't honestly look at myself in the face and speak what I was thinking at my deepest level about the relationship. And I think it's because at the end of the relationship it's about YOU. It's about you and your worth and your problems and your positives and negatives and childhood and blah blah blah. It's about You. It's the hours that you have to spend not pissed off at HIM but having to hold the hand of your heart and mind.
Oh my God this is such a roundabout and tangential way to talk about Casey and my conversation. I think, though, that it's good to exorcise things from the past, and it's good to realize, when you can, moments that you were totally off your rocker-- even if you can't go back. Even if there is seriously no future. And what I realize is that I think Tom is a great guy, but until he can really come to terms with his schedule and his center, even at an incredibly minor level, he's not going to be able to have a genuine relationship. I think he's afraid to let people in, which is just tough because I'm of the firm opinion that he has so much to give and so much to take in-- he's so passionate about life and people and he's one of the most caring people I've ever met. I really do wish him the best. And I feel honest about saying that.
Tonight, Casey and I confronted our history. By a very tangential route we starting discussing his past crush on me during the end of the semester and how he's totally gotten over it and moved on and such. It was actually very relieving to finally have it out in the open. The only reason, actually, at first that I had an inkling he liked me was because of a livejournal post that came to my attention from someone else. And then within the day I was mildly confronted by Josh and Jamie at the Green Leafe about the whole thing. I really felt blind-sided because I was unaware of his attraction. At that point I considered Casey a good friend-- someone who I had gotten to know that semester and with whom I thoroughly enjoyed exploring a friendship. The first time I met him was at one of Dan's parties. I thought he seemed very intelligent-- he was fairly poised and amiable, but he also was quite taciturn and it seemed that he was also slightly emotionally unavailable. It wasn't one of those connections where you know that that person sees eye-to-eye with you, or that you are just totally connected right away, or that you know you could never have a conversation with that person again. It was promising but also totally unpromising. I couldn't tell if he was putting up with talking to me because it was a party or if that was just who he was.
Time goes by, a few more uneventful meetings, and then I think the switch happened when he started drinking. I saw him twice during one of those weekends-- once at a party at my house where I was completely swamped and barely talking to anyone and just kept making cosmos without end-- and then next at the TDX Invitation Only party. I was, that night, so incredibly frustrated with Tom and so I spent the majority of the night in Aaron's room getting to know people, and it was then that Casey and I, again, had a great time talking and getting to know one another.
So April happens and Tom happens and the breakup happens and Casey and I are becoming closer and closer. I find he's really easy to talk to, but I'm also wary because he rarely ever talks about himself. I start to feel he's actually being judgmental by being such a listener, yet I have really no way of conceptualizing him because I don't understand his emotional reactions. I usually have a fairly keen sense of how people are going to fall in certain conversations or situations, but he completely threw me for a loop. So, I tried to remain open-minded and just let things happen organically so I could get an unaltered idea of who he was. And I felt like I was doing a great job, and I realized I was having a lot of fun with him and that I was glad I'd chosen such a cool person to get to know, even if he was a Freshman, because he was turning out to be a really great friend.
And then the whole actual crush from him thing happened, and I had no idea what to do. If I saw him anymore, would I be able to not be awkward? Did I have to mention something? Should I make a move? Should I not? Did I like him too? Had I been leading him on for a while? Was I sending mixed signals?
I think the answer, for me at least, is that yes I was absolutely sending mixed signals. I was internally devastated by the whole Tom thing and I loved the attention that Casey was giving me, because it was genuine and kind and thoughtful. But, I also knew that I couldn't even think, much less believe, of a relationship with absolutely anyone. I was incapable of that sort of connection, and when the whole thing with Casey happened I felt kicked in the stomach-- as if not being able to get over Tom wasn't enough-- now I had to handle being the dick in a situation where I had potentially led someone on and was being totally selfish and self involved and whiny.
The truth of the matter is I never got a chance to really evaluate how I felt about him. I was confronted with the whole thing, and tried to take a little bit of time to come to terms with the Tom situation, and within that very short period I'd read that Casey had chosen to move on and forget the whole thing and exorcise it from himself. And then finals came, and papers, and he wouldn't ever talk to me about it, so I once again felt like a stranger to my own emotions.
The thing I thought I'd realized about Casey is that he didn't really expose himself as emotionally vulnerable in the romantic arena, but I had no idea why. The frustrating thing was I wanted to talk about it. I don't believe in deadlines or forced closure and I'm fucking awful at being able to move on. So that fact, or rather perceived fact by me, of his utter ability to move on completely without fail and without any problem to me seemed unnatural and off-putting. But, I tried not to make a big deal about the whole thing and instead let things dissipate, because it was obviously his choice and since we hadn't actually talked about it I didn't want to make things awkward and bring the elephant out of the room but still keep it in plain view.
We've talking fairly consistently over the summer-- chatting on AIM and catching up and just generally being what friends are. And I'm very grateful for that. I feel like I am closer to him than before, so that's progress. I still feel like he doesn't really trust me, or maybe he just doesn't feel comfortable around me. I admit that I sometimes flat out don't understand him whatsoever, and that's really odd for me.
I am really pleased we had the conversation we had tonight, but it sort of made me sad because it made me realize that I, in some weird way, was slightly upset that I, like the end of the Tom relationship, had no chance to ever really speak up for my side. I know that that's assuming that I had the right to, but since so many of my close friends knew about it and the whole thing was negotiated through a third party, I felt like I maybe should have had to chance to actually live with it for a moment, rather than have everything decided and wrapped up yet still wholly in front of my face.
Gah. I've written way too much. It's now almost 6, and I most certainly am going to stay up and forget about the idea of getting any sleep before work. I still have some left over coffee grounds in the freezer, plenty of iced green tea, an amazing book and some emails to catch up on. I think I should probably stop reminiscing and exorcising and musing and such. I've already done enough damage.
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