(no subject)
When it finally happened, I wasn't surprised Jordan ended it. She might have dreaded it as much as I did. We were talking in the casual and tellingly polite way we had been since she'd left - punctuated with pauses. It had been two weeks since she left and we'd decided when she did that she needed to choose in that time.
She asked if she could call me the next day and I seized up and was silent. She asked me what was wrong and I told her I was nervous. Then she told me she didn't think she could live with me. In a deeply awkward reflection of the first time she told me she loved me, I didn't hear her. As she repeated herself her voice broke and she started to cry.
During the two weeks my thoughts never explored how I would feel if she chose to be with me. I'd remind myself it might turn out that way in an effort to cheer myself up, but it was as forced and fanciful as imagining what to do with a million dollars. I thought of everything I might have done differently and I thought of holding her. I thought about an argument we'd had about having children.
But when she said it, I felt a mixture of emotions my body had never concocted before. I'm not good at absorbing the full weight of a situation as it happens and I was surprised by the depth I felt relieved and sympathetic. I wanted to tell her I was sorry, though I can't recall if I actually did. I felt hurt, lost, rejected, and lots of other tedious synonyms for sad, but only the dull pains I'd already been burying and easing with nightly ILYs; nothing quite as sharp as I'd expected.
Though the thoughts suggested themselves, I didn't try to bargain or ask for explanations. She asked me what would happen next and I venomously told her she would probably move to San Francisco. This wasn't the first hurtful thing I'd ever said to her, but it felt particularly awful to say. (I was also worried she might try to end it with both Ben and me, so I was also looking for reassurance that she was leaving me for him, not because of me strictly. Insecure even about the manner in which I'm dumped!) So I determined to salvage what I could of her feelings. I asked her not to apologize and told her I didn't regret any of the time we spent together. I told her I loved her. I genuinely wanted her to feel, not that she'd made the right decision (Hope springs eternal in the human breast...), but that she was right to have made the decision and that we could all be free of it and move on. And that I was grateful for the time we'd spent together.
I've gotten better at not regretting making plans that fall through because so often it's the making that is more comforting. But I couldn't honestly tell her then, nor now, whether I thought we should speak again. I had thought a lot about it. Could I learnt to just be her friend? I felt then (and still) that I could not. Would I always be hoping to get her back and just be prolonging the pain? Or would it hurt more to completely cut myself off from someone I felt so intensely about? She asked me if I would call her, and I told her if she called me I would talk to her.
After we said goodbye and I started to internalize what was said, I timorously sent her a text telling her that while it hurt, I was also relieved and that I hoped she was, too. I also wanted reinforce that I would be willing to talk if she thought it would help her. I saw how she could finally be in love without so much regret hanging over it and, under many other emotions, was a little bit happy for her. She responded very kindly.
Now the relief has worn thin while I miss her more and more, and I haven't heard from her. I desperately want to, but at least partly to keep some little hope of her coming back.
When she went to visit Ben most recently, I tried to break-up with her, but I wound up being very willing to be convinced to see the rest of our planned visiting through and hurt her feelings for little reason. It may all seem like wasted effort now, but I was happy to see her again and I would have regretted not doing everything to try and keep her.
We made bonds over shared interests, tastes, opinions, experiences; having fights and getting over them; and getting into each other's homes and lives. She let me forget about Ben most of the time, but I decided the impression I got was that they didn't have as many of these little connections, just because Jordan and I eventually spent more time together. But I think they really only contributed to comfort, and while that's not all we shared, the fact that Ben was still in the picture after so long implied to me they had something more.
Most of the time we were together I stayed humble, at least to myself. I was just supposed to be someone to pass the time with and managed to get the love and affection of one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen. When I first told her I loved her, she thought that it would probably be best if we stopped seeing each other so I didn't get hurt. I told her and myself that since I was in love with her it would hurt anyway and I'd rather be with her while I could. She didn't expect to get hurt, too.
But I also fucked up a lot. During one of our best fights, she told me that Ben was planning on moving back to Taiwan for her and she told him not to because of me. I was mean sometimes, but that and many other poignant points returned me to humility and eventually made me better at relationships. Ironically, when we first got together and I was talking about having been in an open relationship, she told me she didn't think it was possible to be in love with two people at the same time. And now I don't feel like I could have been in love with someone else while I was with her.
From time to time we'd had some severe communication problems. I fell in love with her really quickly and always assumed that, even as we got so close, that I loved her more. I thought I remembered saying something like that to Jordan in the sort of renaissance of our relationship (before we left Taiwan we had a stretch of several serene months after quite a lot of off-and-on fighting) and she seemed offended. But then when she was here I said something that implied she loved me as much as I her, remembering the earlier conversation, and she seemed to ponder the concept as though she had always assumed I loved her more. Now neither conversation is clear in my head.
There is a lot I don't know about her because she never wanted to burden me with her woes, particularly about Ben. So I was often left to wonder and worry, but it made me happy to comfort her anyway. When she was sad, she would get distant, but had a way of doing something perfectly sweet just as I decided I should leave her alone. I had a crush on her every day.
She asked if she could call me the next day and I seized up and was silent. She asked me what was wrong and I told her I was nervous. Then she told me she didn't think she could live with me. In a deeply awkward reflection of the first time she told me she loved me, I didn't hear her. As she repeated herself her voice broke and she started to cry.
During the two weeks my thoughts never explored how I would feel if she chose to be with me. I'd remind myself it might turn out that way in an effort to cheer myself up, but it was as forced and fanciful as imagining what to do with a million dollars. I thought of everything I might have done differently and I thought of holding her. I thought about an argument we'd had about having children.
But when she said it, I felt a mixture of emotions my body had never concocted before. I'm not good at absorbing the full weight of a situation as it happens and I was surprised by the depth I felt relieved and sympathetic. I wanted to tell her I was sorry, though I can't recall if I actually did. I felt hurt, lost, rejected, and lots of other tedious synonyms for sad, but only the dull pains I'd already been burying and easing with nightly ILYs; nothing quite as sharp as I'd expected.
Though the thoughts suggested themselves, I didn't try to bargain or ask for explanations. She asked me what would happen next and I venomously told her she would probably move to San Francisco. This wasn't the first hurtful thing I'd ever said to her, but it felt particularly awful to say. (I was also worried she might try to end it with both Ben and me, so I was also looking for reassurance that she was leaving me for him, not because of me strictly. Insecure even about the manner in which I'm dumped!) So I determined to salvage what I could of her feelings. I asked her not to apologize and told her I didn't regret any of the time we spent together. I told her I loved her. I genuinely wanted her to feel, not that she'd made the right decision (Hope springs eternal in the human breast...), but that she was right to have made the decision and that we could all be free of it and move on. And that I was grateful for the time we'd spent together.
I've gotten better at not regretting making plans that fall through because so often it's the making that is more comforting. But I couldn't honestly tell her then, nor now, whether I thought we should speak again. I had thought a lot about it. Could I learnt to just be her friend? I felt then (and still) that I could not. Would I always be hoping to get her back and just be prolonging the pain? Or would it hurt more to completely cut myself off from someone I felt so intensely about? She asked me if I would call her, and I told her if she called me I would talk to her.
After we said goodbye and I started to internalize what was said, I timorously sent her a text telling her that while it hurt, I was also relieved and that I hoped she was, too. I also wanted reinforce that I would be willing to talk if she thought it would help her. I saw how she could finally be in love without so much regret hanging over it and, under many other emotions, was a little bit happy for her. She responded very kindly.
Now the relief has worn thin while I miss her more and more, and I haven't heard from her. I desperately want to, but at least partly to keep some little hope of her coming back.
When she went to visit Ben most recently, I tried to break-up with her, but I wound up being very willing to be convinced to see the rest of our planned visiting through and hurt her feelings for little reason. It may all seem like wasted effort now, but I was happy to see her again and I would have regretted not doing everything to try and keep her.
We made bonds over shared interests, tastes, opinions, experiences; having fights and getting over them; and getting into each other's homes and lives. She let me forget about Ben most of the time, but I decided the impression I got was that they didn't have as many of these little connections, just because Jordan and I eventually spent more time together. But I think they really only contributed to comfort, and while that's not all we shared, the fact that Ben was still in the picture after so long implied to me they had something more.
Most of the time we were together I stayed humble, at least to myself. I was just supposed to be someone to pass the time with and managed to get the love and affection of one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen. When I first told her I loved her, she thought that it would probably be best if we stopped seeing each other so I didn't get hurt. I told her and myself that since I was in love with her it would hurt anyway and I'd rather be with her while I could. She didn't expect to get hurt, too.
But I also fucked up a lot. During one of our best fights, she told me that Ben was planning on moving back to Taiwan for her and she told him not to because of me. I was mean sometimes, but that and many other poignant points returned me to humility and eventually made me better at relationships. Ironically, when we first got together and I was talking about having been in an open relationship, she told me she didn't think it was possible to be in love with two people at the same time. And now I don't feel like I could have been in love with someone else while I was with her.
From time to time we'd had some severe communication problems. I fell in love with her really quickly and always assumed that, even as we got so close, that I loved her more. I thought I remembered saying something like that to Jordan in the sort of renaissance of our relationship (before we left Taiwan we had a stretch of several serene months after quite a lot of off-and-on fighting) and she seemed offended. But then when she was here I said something that implied she loved me as much as I her, remembering the earlier conversation, and she seemed to ponder the concept as though she had always assumed I loved her more. Now neither conversation is clear in my head.
There is a lot I don't know about her because she never wanted to burden me with her woes, particularly about Ben. So I was often left to wonder and worry, but it made me happy to comfort her anyway. When she was sad, she would get distant, but had a way of doing something perfectly sweet just as I decided I should leave her alone. I had a crush on her every day.