My attempt to start blogging again...
I’ve been neglecting my poor LJ completely while blogging in my library blog since last January. But personal reflection is a healthy thing, and now that Sara has moved away, I’m going to need a space to personally reflect, so I’m hoping to be back here. We’ll see.
So my personal reflection now is a result of two things happening this week, while in Florida. My hope had been to finally gain the physical attentions of a certain Cocoa Beach musician who I’ve been mad for since I saw him play The Hotel Cafe 4.5 years ago. But he’s still doing the on and off with the same girl who he was agonized and on a break with over a few years ago when we did hook up. But I did have a delightful time seeing him play and hanging out with him, as I always do. And he adores me. He just...is in a thing. Which I can respect, as long as he’s comfortable drinking beers with me and platonically hugging me goodbye in parking lots. And also because I got my wanted male attention at the end of the week when I headed up to Gainesville to visit a guy who was in a social circle I used to be in...
Because that’s my problem I’m dealing with right now. Boys who won’t drink beers with me and hug me goodnight in parking lots because they are attracted to me. And the girls who tell them that they can’t drink beers with me.
I can’t stand it when boys can’t be alone with me or have one-on-one conversations with me because either they can’t trust themselves or someone will yell at them if they do. (Not the mention the girls who won’t be my friend for those reasons.) It’s not my fault that I get attention. It just IS. I’m sure I’ve bitched about this before, but I just found out the reason I thought someone disliked me for years, so it’s a new complaint.
So back when I was in a clingy group of codependant friends...wait, let me be more specific: the group where everyone was catty behind each other’s backs when the person wasn’t there. Wait, no, let me be more specific: the group like this in Chicago. Crap! Um, more specific: The one that involved a college friend, her high school friend (the node of the “group”), this node girl’s gayhusband, this node girl’s college friend, and the college friend’s husband. Who I thought hated me.
He didn’t. And I’ve known that for a year and a half now. They moved down to Florida, and when they got divorced, right before I was ousted from the group, it was decreed that we must all unfriend him from fb. I didn’t, since I found his links and conversations there fascinating. And he would actually engage with me intellectually on fb, something he’d never done with me in person. So when we stayed friends and everyone ended up unfriending me a few weeks later, I cracked some jokes about all the nuts falling from the tree and us being the leaves...and we were fine. But I never knew why he seemed to have hated me when we lived in Chicago together.
He had been discouraged from talking to me since his wife thought he thought I was attractive. Awesomesocks. It’s not like she forbade it, but he was always conscious that if he were to have a conversation with me directly, he’d have to deal with her jealousy later, so it was never worth it to him, since they already had so many problems.
Well when Bethany last minute had to leave town a day before I was to fly back, my tentative plans with him became plans to come up to Gainesville and sleep on his futon for my final night. Now, he’d been in a relationship from right after his marriage that I thought he was still in, which I assumed he still was. I got up there and he wasn’t. It was incredibly therapeutic to hear all the group drama from his outsider POV and from my...well...I wasn’t an outsider, but I was never an insider...POV. And it was awesome to discuss educational theory and med school (he’s in med school now), and therefore go into my medical problems with someone who found them fascinating...and okay, yes, his wife wasn’t wrong about the attraction, since we of course went to bed together at the end of the night, since we were both available...but the real revelation was why he seemed to avoid me then.
Which is funny, since a few nights before Bethany and I had a conversation about how to best preserve monogamy vows. Using the Sex at Dawn author Chris Ryan’s metaphor about how monogamy is sexual vegetarianism, I believe that if monogamy is right for you, it shouldn’t be something you have to strategize for. Not eating meat feels natural to me. So in my mind, if you are a natural monogamist, it should feel natural. I’m not saying it’s 100% easy, but you shouldn’t plan your life around preventing cheating. Daniel and I cuddled in my motel room last July looking at pictures of his kids on my computer, and nothing happened. Hell, Daniel and I went out drinking and dancing by ourselves and once went camping back when he was married to Charissa, and nothing happened. Nothing even almost happened. It was simply off the table. That is because Daniel is a natural monogamist, and I can respect that.
But then there was this newly married boy who I met when I first came to Chicago who literally wouldn’t go to a party without his wife. We would be on IM 4 blocks from each other and I’d be about to walk Cedric around the neighborhood, and he couldn’t trust himself to go with me. And one drunk night he ended up inviting himself over. And I argue that even before he started cheating with me, what he was doing wasn’t really monogamy. It was setting up his own cockblocks: technical monogamy only. His wife had a right to be jealous even before he cheated. Because he was.
Bethany argued that the tv show Temptation Island is the opposite of how a marriage stays monogamous. She says she would never spend time with someone she finds attractive one-on-one. A little of her theories come from the fact that she’s never dated anyone other than her husband, so she has no experience spending time with someone she used to have sex with but doesn’t any longer. And no matter how many times I argued that this theory SUCKS for me and sucks for the whole world of people, she wouldn’t see it. She saw preventing temptation as the most important ideal. I see overcoming temptation as more beautiful. (If you’re into monogamy, which I’m not.) And I don’t mean going out with some woman who is throwing herself at you. I don’t throw myself at men who don’t want to cheat. (And when I’m dealing with a cheater, it’s more than he’s throwing himself at me...) But to have a guy not be able to walk a dog with you when you’re friends because he’s afraid he will cheat...that sucks for everyone involved.
And I realize I’m talking about two situations here. The boy in Gainesville was never going to cheat on his wife with me. But he couldn’t be my friend because of her jealousy. This sucks, since he was good at monogamy, and still didn’t get to be my friend. And it also sucks when a guy who is worried about his monogamy doesn’t get to be my friend. Because I get along with boys better than typical girls, due to the fact that I suck at girl-rules. (Because let’s be honest, even if I was still in that group, I still would have slept with him last night. And girl-rules say not to sleep with someone’s ex. I suck at girl-rules.)
And I know that it’s easier for Cancers like Daniel and Damion to stay sexually vegetarian when out with me than for a certain Aries musician who won’t have a drink with me. But I’ve seen starsigns who don’t have it as easy get drunk alone with me and stand up to their impulses, even when I’ve been drinking and flirt a little too much. And I’m tired of losing friends because they get girlfriends and BOTH factors come into play. (“Oh noes, I can’t be alone with Emma anymore!” “You better not be friends with Emma anymore!”) It’s hard enough for me to find sane brilliant people who get me. But having them avoid me or stop being friends with me because of their own struggles with temptation or silly jealousies...just sucks.
Because the horrible ex was wrong about a lot, but he got it right when he said that what was wrong with my world is that I just want everything to be simple, and I can’t understand why everyone insists on making things so complicated.
But it was nice to actually get to know the Gainesville boy. I put a lot of time into some lost friendships at that point in my life. It’s at least nice to retain him. And now that we’ve had sex, there won’t be that unspoken undercurrent. Now he can either have sex with me or not the next time we see each other. Unless he gets a girlfriend who forbids him to talk to me again...
And as for Bethany’s views, what I’m getting out of that is that I’m probably never going to be one-on-one friends with her husband, since I know he notices me. Which is really too bad. He’s a cool person, and I was sad he was out of town all week. But I’ll always have to know him through a filter, since I love her enough to do that.
ETA: I went to a friend’s birthday party tonight, and he asked me if he was my only straight male friend who I’ve never had any sort of thing with. I pointed out that the first night he met me, he was hitting on me like crazy, but then he realized that I was far too much for him to handle, and backed off and never tried again. But it got me wondering how many I have. I have some wonderful old XF friends (hello!) who relate to me totally as a nonsexual human being. I have my friend Eric, who is married to a friend of mine. I don’t think he notices me. I have my mask mentor. I have some a library school friend, but I don’t know if he’s just hitting on me in very socially awkward ways that I don’t notice. I think that’s why I value the friendship with said birthday-having friend so dearly. As much as I love being me and all that goes along with it, sometimes it’s nice to be valued just as a human being.
So my personal reflection now is a result of two things happening this week, while in Florida. My hope had been to finally gain the physical attentions of a certain Cocoa Beach musician who I’ve been mad for since I saw him play The Hotel Cafe 4.5 years ago. But he’s still doing the on and off with the same girl who he was agonized and on a break with over a few years ago when we did hook up. But I did have a delightful time seeing him play and hanging out with him, as I always do. And he adores me. He just...is in a thing. Which I can respect, as long as he’s comfortable drinking beers with me and platonically hugging me goodbye in parking lots. And also because I got my wanted male attention at the end of the week when I headed up to Gainesville to visit a guy who was in a social circle I used to be in...
Because that’s my problem I’m dealing with right now. Boys who won’t drink beers with me and hug me goodnight in parking lots because they are attracted to me. And the girls who tell them that they can’t drink beers with me.
I can’t stand it when boys can’t be alone with me or have one-on-one conversations with me because either they can’t trust themselves or someone will yell at them if they do. (Not the mention the girls who won’t be my friend for those reasons.) It’s not my fault that I get attention. It just IS. I’m sure I’ve bitched about this before, but I just found out the reason I thought someone disliked me for years, so it’s a new complaint.
So back when I was in a clingy group of codependant friends...wait, let me be more specific: the group where everyone was catty behind each other’s backs when the person wasn’t there. Wait, no, let me be more specific: the group like this in Chicago. Crap! Um, more specific: The one that involved a college friend, her high school friend (the node of the “group”), this node girl’s gayhusband, this node girl’s college friend, and the college friend’s husband. Who I thought hated me.
He didn’t. And I’ve known that for a year and a half now. They moved down to Florida, and when they got divorced, right before I was ousted from the group, it was decreed that we must all unfriend him from fb. I didn’t, since I found his links and conversations there fascinating. And he would actually engage with me intellectually on fb, something he’d never done with me in person. So when we stayed friends and everyone ended up unfriending me a few weeks later, I cracked some jokes about all the nuts falling from the tree and us being the leaves...and we were fine. But I never knew why he seemed to have hated me when we lived in Chicago together.
He had been discouraged from talking to me since his wife thought he thought I was attractive. Awesomesocks. It’s not like she forbade it, but he was always conscious that if he were to have a conversation with me directly, he’d have to deal with her jealousy later, so it was never worth it to him, since they already had so many problems.
Well when Bethany last minute had to leave town a day before I was to fly back, my tentative plans with him became plans to come up to Gainesville and sleep on his futon for my final night. Now, he’d been in a relationship from right after his marriage that I thought he was still in, which I assumed he still was. I got up there and he wasn’t. It was incredibly therapeutic to hear all the group drama from his outsider POV and from my...well...I wasn’t an outsider, but I was never an insider...POV. And it was awesome to discuss educational theory and med school (he’s in med school now), and therefore go into my medical problems with someone who found them fascinating...and okay, yes, his wife wasn’t wrong about the attraction, since we of course went to bed together at the end of the night, since we were both available...but the real revelation was why he seemed to avoid me then.
Which is funny, since a few nights before Bethany and I had a conversation about how to best preserve monogamy vows. Using the Sex at Dawn author Chris Ryan’s metaphor about how monogamy is sexual vegetarianism, I believe that if monogamy is right for you, it shouldn’t be something you have to strategize for. Not eating meat feels natural to me. So in my mind, if you are a natural monogamist, it should feel natural. I’m not saying it’s 100% easy, but you shouldn’t plan your life around preventing cheating. Daniel and I cuddled in my motel room last July looking at pictures of his kids on my computer, and nothing happened. Hell, Daniel and I went out drinking and dancing by ourselves and once went camping back when he was married to Charissa, and nothing happened. Nothing even almost happened. It was simply off the table. That is because Daniel is a natural monogamist, and I can respect that.
But then there was this newly married boy who I met when I first came to Chicago who literally wouldn’t go to a party without his wife. We would be on IM 4 blocks from each other and I’d be about to walk Cedric around the neighborhood, and he couldn’t trust himself to go with me. And one drunk night he ended up inviting himself over. And I argue that even before he started cheating with me, what he was doing wasn’t really monogamy. It was setting up his own cockblocks: technical monogamy only. His wife had a right to be jealous even before he cheated. Because he was.
Bethany argued that the tv show Temptation Island is the opposite of how a marriage stays monogamous. She says she would never spend time with someone she finds attractive one-on-one. A little of her theories come from the fact that she’s never dated anyone other than her husband, so she has no experience spending time with someone she used to have sex with but doesn’t any longer. And no matter how many times I argued that this theory SUCKS for me and sucks for the whole world of people, she wouldn’t see it. She saw preventing temptation as the most important ideal. I see overcoming temptation as more beautiful. (If you’re into monogamy, which I’m not.) And I don’t mean going out with some woman who is throwing herself at you. I don’t throw myself at men who don’t want to cheat. (And when I’m dealing with a cheater, it’s more than he’s throwing himself at me...) But to have a guy not be able to walk a dog with you when you’re friends because he’s afraid he will cheat...that sucks for everyone involved.
And I realize I’m talking about two situations here. The boy in Gainesville was never going to cheat on his wife with me. But he couldn’t be my friend because of her jealousy. This sucks, since he was good at monogamy, and still didn’t get to be my friend. And it also sucks when a guy who is worried about his monogamy doesn’t get to be my friend. Because I get along with boys better than typical girls, due to the fact that I suck at girl-rules. (Because let’s be honest, even if I was still in that group, I still would have slept with him last night. And girl-rules say not to sleep with someone’s ex. I suck at girl-rules.)
And I know that it’s easier for Cancers like Daniel and Damion to stay sexually vegetarian when out with me than for a certain Aries musician who won’t have a drink with me. But I’ve seen starsigns who don’t have it as easy get drunk alone with me and stand up to their impulses, even when I’ve been drinking and flirt a little too much. And I’m tired of losing friends because they get girlfriends and BOTH factors come into play. (“Oh noes, I can’t be alone with Emma anymore!” “You better not be friends with Emma anymore!”) It’s hard enough for me to find sane brilliant people who get me. But having them avoid me or stop being friends with me because of their own struggles with temptation or silly jealousies...just sucks.
Because the horrible ex was wrong about a lot, but he got it right when he said that what was wrong with my world is that I just want everything to be simple, and I can’t understand why everyone insists on making things so complicated.
But it was nice to actually get to know the Gainesville boy. I put a lot of time into some lost friendships at that point in my life. It’s at least nice to retain him. And now that we’ve had sex, there won’t be that unspoken undercurrent. Now he can either have sex with me or not the next time we see each other. Unless he gets a girlfriend who forbids him to talk to me again...
And as for Bethany’s views, what I’m getting out of that is that I’m probably never going to be one-on-one friends with her husband, since I know he notices me. Which is really too bad. He’s a cool person, and I was sad he was out of town all week. But I’ll always have to know him through a filter, since I love her enough to do that.
ETA: I went to a friend’s birthday party tonight, and he asked me if he was my only straight male friend who I’ve never had any sort of thing with. I pointed out that the first night he met me, he was hitting on me like crazy, but then he realized that I was far too much for him to handle, and backed off and never tried again. But it got me wondering how many I have. I have some wonderful old XF friends (hello!) who relate to me totally as a nonsexual human being. I have my friend Eric, who is married to a friend of mine. I don’t think he notices me. I have my mask mentor. I have some a library school friend, but I don’t know if he’s just hitting on me in very socially awkward ways that I don’t notice. I think that’s why I value the friendship with said birthday-having friend so dearly. As much as I love being me and all that goes along with it, sometimes it’s nice to be valued just as a human being.