Patterns Lost in Translation
Patterns are what I repeat until I learn from them, they are what I try to break in order to grow and change. And yet I keep repeating some of them because obviously I am not learning what I am supposed to be learning. Or maybe some of those patterns are what I am here to do. It was a question put to me this morning, "Maybe that is what you are here to do?" Maybe. It seems like it so far, certainly.
Lost in Translation is a movie I love and here is why: I was that girl. Not as good looking, surely, but then who is besides Scarlett Johannsen? Am I right? Anyway, back to my point, I spent my 20s dating men in the their 40s, many of them newly divorced and/or in unhappy marriages (The Other Woman is also a title I have held) and men in midlife crisis are at the same emotional state as women in their 20s, both are newly set out in a world suddenly changed and unfamiliar, looking for something to anchor them, inspire them, seeking signposts for 'what next'.
So ok. This magnetization I display for attracting these men may be a symptom of my own fear of commitment. I am not the sort of girl men marry. (J had his own issues and marrying me was what he thought he was supposed to do, I went along with that, more fool I, and almost fucked up that friendship beyond repair, but that is another story) I am the sort of girl that men have affairs with. I am the sort of girl that is a friend with benefits. I am the sort of girl that is happy to hear all about your new relationship and can still fuck your brains out fifteen minutes later.
Perhaps because I learned early in life that I am not going to get who and what I want and I learned that I can (and have) lived without the person(s) I love, I expect that to happen. Perhaps my expectation creates only those situations.
But I hafta tell ya, I really thought I was ready to change that. I thought that finding myself resetting my life back to single and stable and living close to my job and recreating circumstances that made me happy was also resetting my expectations, not repeating the past ad infinitum.
But I am not stable. I have bills I can't pay and a car that is falling apart. I am not single, in that I am not looking for a date, I am still falling in love with men who live in other time zones. And my expectations are not changing, I expect to always be the friend with benefits, the understanding one, the listening one, the girl I always was, as far back as high school. I was too repressed in high school to have sex, so I dated a gay guy so far in the closet that when he discovered his sexuality in his early 20s and called me to tell me and I said 'duh, I knew that' he was surprised. Poor bastard. I knew then that I wouldn't have what or who I wanted, and still we named our children and planned our life, all the while I knew I wasn't what he wanted.
So I did this to myself. I set this pattern in motion. I have to reset it.
I just haven't figured out how.
So until I do, I will enjoy the benefits of my friendship with TreeBear and whoever comes after that. Just because I would like to imagine that I might be what he is looking for does not mean I am. I will be content with our friendship, with benefits, and know that, as with all my midlife crisis men, we will remain friends and maybe lovers but I am only temporary in their lives.
Perhaps peace is finding contentment no matter the situation.
Lost in Translation is a movie I love and here is why: I was that girl. Not as good looking, surely, but then who is besides Scarlett Johannsen? Am I right? Anyway, back to my point, I spent my 20s dating men in the their 40s, many of them newly divorced and/or in unhappy marriages (The Other Woman is also a title I have held) and men in midlife crisis are at the same emotional state as women in their 20s, both are newly set out in a world suddenly changed and unfamiliar, looking for something to anchor them, inspire them, seeking signposts for 'what next'.
So ok. This magnetization I display for attracting these men may be a symptom of my own fear of commitment. I am not the sort of girl men marry. (J had his own issues and marrying me was what he thought he was supposed to do, I went along with that, more fool I, and almost fucked up that friendship beyond repair, but that is another story) I am the sort of girl that men have affairs with. I am the sort of girl that is a friend with benefits. I am the sort of girl that is happy to hear all about your new relationship and can still fuck your brains out fifteen minutes later.
Perhaps because I learned early in life that I am not going to get who and what I want and I learned that I can (and have) lived without the person(s) I love, I expect that to happen. Perhaps my expectation creates only those situations.
But I hafta tell ya, I really thought I was ready to change that. I thought that finding myself resetting my life back to single and stable and living close to my job and recreating circumstances that made me happy was also resetting my expectations, not repeating the past ad infinitum.
But I am not stable. I have bills I can't pay and a car that is falling apart. I am not single, in that I am not looking for a date, I am still falling in love with men who live in other time zones. And my expectations are not changing, I expect to always be the friend with benefits, the understanding one, the listening one, the girl I always was, as far back as high school. I was too repressed in high school to have sex, so I dated a gay guy so far in the closet that when he discovered his sexuality in his early 20s and called me to tell me and I said 'duh, I knew that' he was surprised. Poor bastard. I knew then that I wouldn't have what or who I wanted, and still we named our children and planned our life, all the while I knew I wasn't what he wanted.
So I did this to myself. I set this pattern in motion. I have to reset it.
I just haven't figured out how.
So until I do, I will enjoy the benefits of my friendship with TreeBear and whoever comes after that. Just because I would like to imagine that I might be what he is looking for does not mean I am. I will be content with our friendship, with benefits, and know that, as with all my midlife crisis men, we will remain friends and maybe lovers but I am only temporary in their lives.
Perhaps peace is finding contentment no matter the situation.