anger

It took me a long time, but I’ve finally reached my anger phase of the grieving process over the Aaron situation. I’m not sure where the tipping point was exactly. All I know is that in the recent days the anger has bubbled over more than once.

Maybe it’s because in the last few weeks, I’ve had to explain the situation so many times. My closest friends have been in the loop every step of the way. But my more casual acquaintances are just getting up to speed. And every time I’ve heard the words coming out of my mouth, the more angry I’ve become.

How yes, we were both dating someone when we met it just didn’t matter to either of us. Then she got pregnant. That she knows about me, but not really. How much time she’s spending with him. How she’s travelling with him on the beginning of his tour.

And then this weekend he moved out of his apartment. Out of our apartment. The apartment that I helped furnish and make into a home.

And now he’s on his way. And he’s having to deal with a long drive with a baby and a cat that does not want to be confined in a carrier and a travelling companion that is, according to his description, not the brightest person around. Along the way they’re staying with various family members of hers. He’s having to deal with redneck cousins who love Fox News and want to draw him into race discussions. He’s starting to worry about socializing his cat with his mother. The woman who will be caring for his precious pet for the next year.

I know that he’s miserable right now. But to be honest, I have very little sympathy for all of that. I feel like he made his bed, he should lie in it. Or maybe he didn’t make the bed, but he sure let someone tie him to it. She’s got him. Trapped. She’s set up quite the little den of domesticity around him. And he’s just rolled over for it.

And it pisses me off to no end.

Every girl and gay man I know say I should just kick his ass to the curb. The handful of straight men in my life are all saying to give him a break for just a little while longer.

To be perfectly honest I know that I will. Continue to give him a break for a while. I feel like there’s still stuff we won’t know until he gets on the road and she’s returned to TX. But that’s a month away still. And between now and then, I won’t get to talk to him much if tradition holds.

And that’s OK. Because right now what I need is not to talk to him. What I need is to just be angry.

Reframing

It was such a brief conversation. No more than 10 minutes as we both walked the aisles of the grocery store. He was buying juice and diapers. I was buying basil and beer. The comments were almost tossed off. Asides to a larger conversation.

“You know I travel with a crew now.”

“She’s OK if we play, we just can’t fuck.”

I stopped dead in my tracks. In the cooler section. The 6 pack of apricot ale I’d just selected all of a sudden very heavy in my hand.

“Wait, what? We can’t fuck? Have you told her how you feel about me? How you’ve said you’ve felt?”

“Well baby, it’s not like we traded essays.”

And then he had to go. I could hear the baby starting to cry. I bit the inside of my cheek and willed my own tears to stay put. Crying in Safeway was not on my to do list that evening. But once I hit the parking lot I couldn’t hold them back. Somehow in the space of that conversation all of the pieces finally fell into place.

How he came here in January he didn’t tell her, because he didn’t want to hurt her feelings. How he wouldn’t give her a straight answer when she found evidence of my last visit in his apartment. How he’ll step into the next room to take a call from her when he and I are together but my calls to him when she is there always roll to voice mail.

The truth is, that back in September, when she got pregnant and he told me she needed to know about me. He wasn’t entirely honest. He confessed his physical infidelity. He did not confess his feelings. And that makes all the difference.

We’ve had this discussion before. He always retreats to a position of me not wanting to share him. But that’s not the case. There has been plenty of extracurricular fucking around for both of us. I don’t care at all about that. What I care about is that there is a person in his life, who he readily admits there is a minimal relationship with, that still has this hold over him.

Even though, by his words, she’s not the smartest person. She has no drive. The sex isn’t good. She wants him to change any number of things about himself. That a five day vacation with her is four days too many. A woman who went off birth control without telling him and trapped him into having a child.

This is the person for whom you will make all kinds of concessions to spare her feelings?

This is the person you continually choose over me?

When I am the one you once said you wanted to spend a life time with. That made you think of marriage and children for the first time ever. The one you said finally gave you the freedom to be who you are. Who embraced your sexuality and made you feel normal.

Just because I’m the one with whom you can be open and honest and not filter anything, my feelings somehow don’t count? Because I’ll understand? I’m not OK with that.

And I’ve spent the majority of our relationship giving him the space he needed to deal with his situation. I think I’ve been more than understanding. All I have ever, ever wanted, from him or from anybody, is to be met in the middle. To know that he wants me around. I need people in my life who will fight.

And he’s lost his fight. He’s resigning himself to a life that he does not want.

I’ve spent the last several days crying. And sitting in the dark listening to the most melancholy jazz I own. Drinking. And fucking men I care nothing about just to distract myself a little.

I took his pictures down. Most of them.I’ve quietly told my closest friends. His photo will stay on my desk at work for a while. I need to take my time with that one. Even when I take it down he’ll be everywhere. On the cover of so many of our publications. Quite literally larger than life on a banner that hangs at my theater. And his head shot remains atop my piano.

I’m reframing our relationship. There will be no declarative email. No impassioned speech. I’m just letting him go. I’m no longer thinking of him as my primary partner. As my boyfriend Aaron. He’s just my friend. With whom there is a romantic past. And although the door is still open for a romantic future, he needs to be the one to walk through it. With purpose.

I’ll still talk to him when he calls. But no more calling him baby. No more “I love you.” No more random text messages that he doesn’t respond to anyway.

My needs are really very simple. I just need to know that I’m loved and that you want to be in my life. Remind me often if you have to. But assure me of that and there’s nothing I won’t do. There’s no end to my patience. Right now he just can’t give me that. And I deserve nothing less.

it’s a girl

Aaron’s daughter was born on Thursday. She was delivered by c-section. She weighed 8 lbs, 10 oz, and was 21 inches long. Her name is long and beautiful. He picked her first name, Baby Mamma picked the middle name, she has both of their last names.

Her middle name is the same as my first name.

Something that made absolutely everyone I know raise their eyebrows and ask, “was that on purpose?”

He’d told me the name they were thinking about when I saw him last. We were sitting outside at our margarita bar. I commented on how that particular part of the name was a great choice. But that was as much as it was discussed. He wasn’t indicating that they were set on the name, so I figured I would just wait and see what was actually put down on the birth certificate.

But then it was. And my curiosity got the best of me. I had to ask. Had it struck him as odd at all that he was naming his child after his girlfriend? The one that the mother of his child only knows a little about and is wholly uncomfortable with? Had he thought about the implications at all?

He just shrugged it off. Teased me a little about my wondering if the baby had been named for me. I was quick to point out that I would never presume that the baby was being named in my honor, but just that it struck me as odd. Then he said that it was a name that she had wanted. That if she’d had her way it would have been the baby’s first name and they would only have used her last name.

Then he said that he doesn’t really think of it as my name. And true, I use the shortened version professionally and otherwise, but really? There’s no association for you at all? So I’m almost sorry I asked.

At any rate, the baby is here. She is here. And it’s really real now. He’ll be in Houston on Monday and he’ll get to hold her for the first time. I’ve asked him to send me a picture.

This is just something I’ll have to compartmentalize.

breaking point

I knew before I ever set foot on a plane to fly out to Minneapolis, that this trip would be about saying goodbye to Aaron. My head has been arguing all sides of the situation for weeks. Rationalizing. I’ve got so many half written journal entries. My heart has known. I just didn’t want to believe it.

There’s always an adjustment period when  you’ve been apart. But this trip has been harder. He’s on a two show schedule so our time is limited. When we are together, he’s exhausted from rehearsals. I’ve been sick. We haven’t had sex and we’ve barely kissed for fear of him picking up my cold.

Last night we cooked dinner together. We sat in a darkened living room and shared a bottle of wine. We talked and talked and talked. When we were cleaning up the kitchen was when everything splintered.

I don’t even know  how it came up. Somehow we found ourselves talking about our future. How trips to see each other would start to be fewer and farther between. Especially this year. With the baby and the tour.

“But we’re OK right? I mean. We’re still us, right?” I asked.

“Yeah. We’re still us. I just don’t know what’s going to happen.”

I turned away from him then. Tears sliding down my cheeks. I reached for my glass and gulped the last of my wine. I’ve never been able to hide from him when I cry. He came to me. Standing behind me. He turned my head and kissed me sweetly, on the lips.

“You’re not sick. Let’s go take our clothes off.”

I tried to protest. There were dishes still to be done. He told me they could wait. He dimmed the bedroom lights and found the jazz station on the radio while I readied for bed.

We each undressed and sat on the bed. He leaned in and kissed me. The first deep, purposeful kiss in months. But I couldn’t enjoy it. My heart felt like it was going to burst. The tears started once again.

He laid me down on the bed and just held me. I told him I knew I’d come to say goodbye. He told me he could tell as soon as I’d met him at the airport. We talked about the distance. About the baby. About a conversation we each remembered differently. I asked if I should change my flight and return early. He said I should stay if I felt like I could. I apologized for not being good enough. He told me I was enough.

I told him I thought I had finally found a person who would love me forever. He clutched me tightly to him and said that he would. That he would love me until the end of time.

“Then don’t go,” I said. “Then don’t leave me.”

He didn’t respond.

I gave over to the crying at that point. Open mouthed sobbing that racked my whole body. The more I would cry and try to squirm away, the tighter he would hold me. He never told me it would be OK. He never tried to soothe me. He just held me there and let the tears run their course.

I cried until I had nothing left. Until I felt dead inside.

When he could tell I’d stopped he shifted so we could get under the covers. I told him I was thinking about going downstairs. Part of me wanted to come straight to this blog and pour out everything. Part of me wanted to just run. To get air.

“Let me hold you,” he said.

And this is the perfect metaphor for our relationship. I’m always trying to run when I’m hurt. Always trying to hide it from him and deal with it on my own. And he’s always there. To grab my hand and force me to stay in one place and let someone take care of me.

So I crawled under the covers. And lay my head on his chest. And found new, silent tears. I don’t remember falling asleep.

When I awoke this morning he was in bed. Sitting up, running through his lines for the day’s rehearsal. He saw that I was awake and leaned over to kiss me.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “For everything.”

He went back to running lines. I just lay there. I couldn’t make myself move. He would reach over and run his hand across my shoulder, arm, hip. We had pleasant conversation about our evening plans. His goodbye kiss was tender.

There was a point, last night, when I asked him if this was it. If we were really done. What he told me was that there were no answers in one night. That there were no contracts to write.

So is this really it? I don’t know. I still think that what we have is worth fighting for. But the reality of the situation is that the only time I’m going to see him in the next 14 months is when his show tours into Sacramento. And there’s the whole baby issue still to work out.

My hope is that somehow we can remain friends. Or that this can somehow evolve into something different that still gives us each what we need. Or that maybe, one day, our timing will finally be right.

But for now I know I have to enjoy what I can from this next week, knowing full well that it may very well be our last days together.

green green grass

Let me just start this post by saying that it is fueled by Guinness, too much existential conversation, and an iTunes playlist entitled “sad and sappy”.

We were in our favorite dive bar. Conveniently located near work. Drinks stretched longer than I thought they would. My friends were toasting me. Honoring my recent professional successes. Which was wonderful and great, but is also a little weird. I was just doing my job. I’m happy that I do my job well, but I hardly need the gifts and many rounds of drinks that have been sent my way.

It was fun and light when our whole little group was there. When it was just the two of us is when things got heavy.

My friend is getting married. Her fiance just had a birthday party. She turned to me and we started talking about relationships. About creative projects and drive. She’s no longer playing in a band and misses performing. She’s missing having her creative outlet. She’s a writer and has a graphic novel that lacks only a chapter and a half to be complete.

She can’t find the focus to finish. She loves having someone to come home to every day. Someone she genuinely wants to hang out with all the time. And she doesn’t have to spend that time justifying her existence, or performing, or being “on.” She can just be. But she’s finding it all too easy to slip into complacency. Watching too much TV. Too much routine all the way around.

She said she feels old. She’s a couple of years older than me and one of the most youthful people I know. She’s always talking about things she and the fiance do. Outings to see bands, day trips on his motorcycle, parties, etc. She wanted my advice, as a formerly married lady, on how to avoid the rut.

I’m the last person to ask for advice on relationships. I wouldn’t know a healthy one if it smacked me in the face. And then she started talking about how jealous she was. Of me. Listening to me talk about my non-profit to be. She misses having something in her life that she’s not only passionate about, but that she’s actually doing.

I had to stop her in her tracks. Because I feel like I’m half assing everything in my life right now. Yes, I’m fresh off some pretty major work success. But while I was pulling that stuff off, there was a whole lot falling to the wayside that I’m now trying to pick back up. And I’m in the race toward the beginning of the season. There’s still way too much on my plate and I’m burnt the fuck out on it all.

And my non-profit to be? My partner in crime is currently vacationing in Italy. I’m a one woman shop. Doing all the artwork requests, website maintenance, and general admin are killing me. Trying to coordinate local events on top of it? Not happening. I have to cancel an event that was scheduled for this weekend because I just can’t do everything. I love the work, but it’s a pretty big undertaking.

The only thing I want to do is play with my blog. The other blog. The one filled with sex and perversion.

I set my beer down and looked her dead in the eye.

“If it wasn’t the non-profit it would be a chorus. I have a standing offer right now to sing someplace but I’m just not. And if it wasn’t the chorus it would be something else. Because I need to fill my life with projects so that I don’t have time to think about how fucked up my personal life is.”

And it’s the truth. I’ve lost my best friend and the loneliness from that is starting to really set in. I have lots of friends, it’s true, but they all seem to be separated somehow. The ones that knew me before, the ones that know my alter ego, the ones that know me from work, on and on and on. And while I’m incredibly close with many of them, I don’t have that one person I know will always be there. My primary partner is having a baby with someone. I’ll go see him in a couple of weeks and then after that who knows when we’ll see each other again. The baby mama will be there all summer and then he leaves to go on a national tour until June of 2010. I’ve essentially agreed to be someone’s mistress, albeit long distance, but plans are in the works for a trip this summer. And there’s the string of filler companions. The ones that scratch an itch in a moment, but offer me little in the way of substance.

So there we were. The two of us. Staring into our half empty beer glasses. Each wishing we had what the other has. Or parts of it anyway. Each wanting to comfort but with no idea of what to say. So we started talking about how the only way to make God laugh is to come up with a plan. How maybe we just need to find peace with not knowing what the hell is going to happen. How just being truthful and honest is all that matters.

Then she laughed and said, “I’m in a dive bar drinking Guiness on a Monday, I have no money in my bank account, and don’t know what the hell I’m doing. Maybe you shouldn’t listen to me.”

“Babe, I’m right there with you. Drink for drink and dollar for dollar.”

So we said we loved each other and that we were grateful to be in our lives. And we hugged long and hard in the parking lot. I cried the whole way home.