That Stuff I was Processing Last Post
I applied for a new job here in town. I didn't tell many people--my boss, my brother and his girlfriend, and two or three friends. One of my staff people figured it out because a mutual friend applied for the same job, which I didn't realize. I had an interview on Monday morning. I prepared for it by dancing for 15 hours (not consecutively) over the weekend, going to see Bill Maher, and spending Sunday night at a friend's house. Somewhat miraculously, my limp was gone by the time of the interview, and I didn't feel tired (possibly because I was nervous). It felt like it went well, though I'm never really sure of these things, and I probably should have given more examples. The mutual friend got a call-back Thursday. I haven't heard anything, and they said we'd hear by the end of the week, so I guess that's that. At least I've figured out what I want and went for it. Don't know if I'll be applying for anything else again soon, but I'm thankful that I have the luxury of not needing to.
Meanwhile, I'm dating again :) Not many people know about that, either (I appear to be living life secretly these days; not sure what that means). And just because I feel like it, have the time to post, and haven't written about him before, I'm going to give a little back story.
(I can never decide if I want to use full names on here; does anyone else think about this? I'll call him A for now.) A works in my building, though for a different organization. He started about a month after I did. We'd started flirting a long time ago, and this is one of the few relationships where I tracked its escalation and was very intentional about trying to make things escalate. It worked. He got my number, and eventually we made plans to do something after work. I wasn't sure it was a date that first time, but he kissed me on the second or third evening out, so that was a pretty good signal.
Things probably would have gone well, except...remember that mopey post back in June about a guy I'd gone on four dates with? That was D. I met him right after A got my phone number, but before we'd actually hung out. I think I went on three dates with D before A and I went out, which means D and I weren't talking when I went on my first few dates with A. Then D and I saw each other two more times in one day--coffee in the morning and a date that night--and I told him that I'd been out with A. He really didn't like that. It's part of what made him decide he didn't think I was the right girl for him; he interpreted it to mean that I'm really fast and like lots of guys, whereas he only wants one girl. Anyway, that was kind of a mess, and as my previous post explained, we never talked again.
A and I continued dating, and eventually started saying "boyfriend" and "girlfriend" without having really asked each other about it. I liked him, and it was fun. At the same time, I was still recovering from the craziness that was my relationship with D. Keep in mind, I hadn't dated much before either of these relationships, so the very fact that I was dating freaked me out. Kissing freaked me out. Being called "sweetie" freaked me out. I was, as you can imagine, generally a bit of a wreck inside, but trying to play it cool outside. I reiterated several times to A that I didn't want us to be serious; I didn't even really know what I meant by that at the time, I just knew that things seemed to be moving along well and quickly and it was, well, freaking me out. He was always fine with that; we established that it was ok for either of us to date other people, that we weren't serious, and we continued.
Except that I was still hung up by certain things that had happened with D. Primarily by his parting comments about how I clearly move quickly with men; it made me feel like he was calling me a whore. Admittedly, the comment probably struck me much harder because of how a male friend had treated me in college, and the fact that I blamed myself for "letting it happen." (I think D could see by my facial expression that he had verbally slapped me in the face, which seemed to confuse him a little and he tried to backtrack somewhat, but by then the damage was done.) So I couldn't really comfortably move forward with A, because I really just wasn't in a place to be in a relationship; yet, I was.
I tried to explain some of this to A, but he didn't really get it. He flat out said he didn't understand how someone saying something like that could cause me to feel that way for so long (keep in mind, I was still sorting through these emotions weeks afterward). While communication is one of my strengths in a professional setting, in my personal life, it can be a major weakness. I didn't really articulate my feelings all that well, in part because I was embarrassed by them, and in part because I was afraid they might damage my relationship with A. Gradually, I began to feel more and more stressed by our relationship; while I really enjoyed seeing him and valued our time together, I felt like I was somehow lying to him or misleading him. I suppose, in a sense, I was, because I wasn't sharing the full story of what happened with D or how I was feeling about it. The same night that I explained some of my feelings on it, I later told A that I still didn't want us to be that serious. I don't remember all of what I said, but I remember that it came out incredibly awkwardly and not at all how I wanted it to. I wasn't sure if I had expressed myself clearly at all. I know part of what I said was that I still didn't want to be really serious or exclusive. A said we should think about it, or something like that, and left. I felt really confused, worried, anxious--and somehow relieved. I had finally told him. I didn't really tell him exactly what I meant to tell him, but I had told him something, and that seemed like an improvement.
I texted A that weekend to see if he wanted to hang out, and he seemed evasive--said he couldn't then, but sometime, sure. One day I stopped by his desk and tried to talk, and it felt really awkward and we didn't say anything, so I just left. He was supposed to come with me on a trip, so I reminded him that I had his ticket, and he said some bills had come up unexpectedly so if I could find someone else, that would be better. I interpreted all of this to mean that he was hurt or upset with me and didn't want to talk to me, so I tried to give him space.
The first time he said an unsolicited, non-work-related sentence to me, it made my day; I honestly had a dream that night about us becoming friends again. Not about us being friends, but about the act of us becoming friends again. Every signal that maybe he would talk to me again was exciting, but I tried to restrain myself to only move at his pace. We began to have short conversations. I had another dream about becoming friends again. Just as I had watched our relationship grow step by step the first time, I watched it grow again. Finally, a few weeks ago, I had nothing to do on a Saturday night but wanted to go out, so I was about to go to a bar by myself for the first time to see how it went. Just as I was figuring out where to go that would be safe, he texted me. It was the first time he'd initiated a text conversation in about three months.
It wasn't for happy reasons. Someone had broken into his apartment and robbed him while he was at work two days before he was moving out of that apartment. I felt a little guilty, because while this was awful news and I felt bad for him, I was also extremely happy to know I was on the list of people he would contact with bad news. I told him I was about to go out and asked if he wanted to come, even though he doesn't drink. We ended up going to a restaurant and I bought him dinner (I told him he'd have enough things to pay for in replacing his stuff). Then we took a walk and talked for a while.
The next weekend, my furnace broke, and I used that as an excuse to text him, asking if he wanted to accompany me somewhere warm. He agreed, and we went to Steak 'N Shake for a hot chocolate. That evening seemed to solidify that we're both still interested in each other. This past weekend, we went to see Bill Maher (a comedian who shares A's liberal political views and anti-religious sentiments), and on the way back, I asked him how he sees our relationship. During this conversation, I discovered that what he thought I said that night was that I wanted a break from him, so the reason he basically stopped talking to me was to give me space. Just like I stopped talking to him to give him space. It was incredibly frustrating to learn that those three months of missing him were basically the result of my inability to communicate clearly. It seems neither of us had really ever wanted to stop talking, we just did for the other person's sake.
At this point, we're both a little gun-shy about the idea of "going out" and being boyfriend/girlfriend again. I told him I'm afraid of messing up and losing him as a friend; he seemed amused that I was afraid of messing up, but pointed out that he would need space to transition into just being friends if that's what we decide to do. Which I would understand and probably agree with. So everything is still kind of open-ended. I consider us to be dating, because saying "just friends" doesn't really seem to cover it. I feel a lot better than I did a few months ago, though. Part of me worries that it's just an "absence makes the heart grow fonder" thing; that I'm essentially exaggerating how much I like him because I'm happy to be back together. A lot of me thinks I'm just in a better space now for having a relationship, so while it's probably good that we not just jump into things too quickly, I probably will be more comfortable with moving faster now. In a weird twist, I now worry that, where I had previously wanted to go so slowly, I'm now going to push too quickly.
Whatever happens, I can definitely say this has been a rough, exciting, confusing year in terms of relationships. Hopefully I'll be better at communicating by the end of it, and if nothing else, I'll have some great memories of time spent with some pretty great people.
Meanwhile, I'm dating again :) Not many people know about that, either (I appear to be living life secretly these days; not sure what that means). And just because I feel like it, have the time to post, and haven't written about him before, I'm going to give a little back story.
(I can never decide if I want to use full names on here; does anyone else think about this? I'll call him A for now.) A works in my building, though for a different organization. He started about a month after I did. We'd started flirting a long time ago, and this is one of the few relationships where I tracked its escalation and was very intentional about trying to make things escalate. It worked. He got my number, and eventually we made plans to do something after work. I wasn't sure it was a date that first time, but he kissed me on the second or third evening out, so that was a pretty good signal.
Things probably would have gone well, except...remember that mopey post back in June about a guy I'd gone on four dates with? That was D. I met him right after A got my phone number, but before we'd actually hung out. I think I went on three dates with D before A and I went out, which means D and I weren't talking when I went on my first few dates with A. Then D and I saw each other two more times in one day--coffee in the morning and a date that night--and I told him that I'd been out with A. He really didn't like that. It's part of what made him decide he didn't think I was the right girl for him; he interpreted it to mean that I'm really fast and like lots of guys, whereas he only wants one girl. Anyway, that was kind of a mess, and as my previous post explained, we never talked again.
A and I continued dating, and eventually started saying "boyfriend" and "girlfriend" without having really asked each other about it. I liked him, and it was fun. At the same time, I was still recovering from the craziness that was my relationship with D. Keep in mind, I hadn't dated much before either of these relationships, so the very fact that I was dating freaked me out. Kissing freaked me out. Being called "sweetie" freaked me out. I was, as you can imagine, generally a bit of a wreck inside, but trying to play it cool outside. I reiterated several times to A that I didn't want us to be serious; I didn't even really know what I meant by that at the time, I just knew that things seemed to be moving along well and quickly and it was, well, freaking me out. He was always fine with that; we established that it was ok for either of us to date other people, that we weren't serious, and we continued.
Except that I was still hung up by certain things that had happened with D. Primarily by his parting comments about how I clearly move quickly with men; it made me feel like he was calling me a whore. Admittedly, the comment probably struck me much harder because of how a male friend had treated me in college, and the fact that I blamed myself for "letting it happen." (I think D could see by my facial expression that he had verbally slapped me in the face, which seemed to confuse him a little and he tried to backtrack somewhat, but by then the damage was done.) So I couldn't really comfortably move forward with A, because I really just wasn't in a place to be in a relationship; yet, I was.
I tried to explain some of this to A, but he didn't really get it. He flat out said he didn't understand how someone saying something like that could cause me to feel that way for so long (keep in mind, I was still sorting through these emotions weeks afterward). While communication is one of my strengths in a professional setting, in my personal life, it can be a major weakness. I didn't really articulate my feelings all that well, in part because I was embarrassed by them, and in part because I was afraid they might damage my relationship with A. Gradually, I began to feel more and more stressed by our relationship; while I really enjoyed seeing him and valued our time together, I felt like I was somehow lying to him or misleading him. I suppose, in a sense, I was, because I wasn't sharing the full story of what happened with D or how I was feeling about it. The same night that I explained some of my feelings on it, I later told A that I still didn't want us to be that serious. I don't remember all of what I said, but I remember that it came out incredibly awkwardly and not at all how I wanted it to. I wasn't sure if I had expressed myself clearly at all. I know part of what I said was that I still didn't want to be really serious or exclusive. A said we should think about it, or something like that, and left. I felt really confused, worried, anxious--and somehow relieved. I had finally told him. I didn't really tell him exactly what I meant to tell him, but I had told him something, and that seemed like an improvement.
I texted A that weekend to see if he wanted to hang out, and he seemed evasive--said he couldn't then, but sometime, sure. One day I stopped by his desk and tried to talk, and it felt really awkward and we didn't say anything, so I just left. He was supposed to come with me on a trip, so I reminded him that I had his ticket, and he said some bills had come up unexpectedly so if I could find someone else, that would be better. I interpreted all of this to mean that he was hurt or upset with me and didn't want to talk to me, so I tried to give him space.
The first time he said an unsolicited, non-work-related sentence to me, it made my day; I honestly had a dream that night about us becoming friends again. Not about us being friends, but about the act of us becoming friends again. Every signal that maybe he would talk to me again was exciting, but I tried to restrain myself to only move at his pace. We began to have short conversations. I had another dream about becoming friends again. Just as I had watched our relationship grow step by step the first time, I watched it grow again. Finally, a few weeks ago, I had nothing to do on a Saturday night but wanted to go out, so I was about to go to a bar by myself for the first time to see how it went. Just as I was figuring out where to go that would be safe, he texted me. It was the first time he'd initiated a text conversation in about three months.
It wasn't for happy reasons. Someone had broken into his apartment and robbed him while he was at work two days before he was moving out of that apartment. I felt a little guilty, because while this was awful news and I felt bad for him, I was also extremely happy to know I was on the list of people he would contact with bad news. I told him I was about to go out and asked if he wanted to come, even though he doesn't drink. We ended up going to a restaurant and I bought him dinner (I told him he'd have enough things to pay for in replacing his stuff). Then we took a walk and talked for a while.
The next weekend, my furnace broke, and I used that as an excuse to text him, asking if he wanted to accompany me somewhere warm. He agreed, and we went to Steak 'N Shake for a hot chocolate. That evening seemed to solidify that we're both still interested in each other. This past weekend, we went to see Bill Maher (a comedian who shares A's liberal political views and anti-religious sentiments), and on the way back, I asked him how he sees our relationship. During this conversation, I discovered that what he thought I said that night was that I wanted a break from him, so the reason he basically stopped talking to me was to give me space. Just like I stopped talking to him to give him space. It was incredibly frustrating to learn that those three months of missing him were basically the result of my inability to communicate clearly. It seems neither of us had really ever wanted to stop talking, we just did for the other person's sake.
At this point, we're both a little gun-shy about the idea of "going out" and being boyfriend/girlfriend again. I told him I'm afraid of messing up and losing him as a friend; he seemed amused that I was afraid of messing up, but pointed out that he would need space to transition into just being friends if that's what we decide to do. Which I would understand and probably agree with. So everything is still kind of open-ended. I consider us to be dating, because saying "just friends" doesn't really seem to cover it. I feel a lot better than I did a few months ago, though. Part of me worries that it's just an "absence makes the heart grow fonder" thing; that I'm essentially exaggerating how much I like him because I'm happy to be back together. A lot of me thinks I'm just in a better space now for having a relationship, so while it's probably good that we not just jump into things too quickly, I probably will be more comfortable with moving faster now. In a weird twist, I now worry that, where I had previously wanted to go so slowly, I'm now going to push too quickly.
Whatever happens, I can definitely say this has been a rough, exciting, confusing year in terms of relationships. Hopefully I'll be better at communicating by the end of it, and if nothing else, I'll have some great memories of time spent with some pretty great people.