antiversaries: november 11 edition
one year ago today i was out at brunch with mickey and nina. i don't remember where we ate, maybe tom's? i think tom's. we were talking about relationships, about process, about the always-terrifying-often-valuable notion of "taking a break." it must have been a weekend, right? or no, i didn't have a job yet, so i guess it could have been any old day. oh, there we go. it was a tuesday. we were walking around grand army plaza, sitting on benches. talking about the couples therapists i'd been talking to, and how to deal with severe depression in relationships. how i could give him space for it, without interpreting it as rejection. all that pointless conversation.
we walked toward the stupid co-op for mickey's shift, and then ian called me. he was a couple weeks overdue for our "weekly" call. the one that only happened once. i was talking and didn't see that he'd called right away. when i realized i'd missed his call, i immediately called him back without listening to his message. i was, for about 15 seconds, SO SO SO excited. i was just totally swelled up with love and optimism and ideas.
when he answered the phone, i knew immediately that he was breaking up with me. literally from when he said "hi, we have to talk." like, the fucking dumbest thing you could possibly say when you're in a committed relationship, one person has a nervous breakdown and flies home to re-evaluate their life: "we have to talk." you don't say. i immediately said "if you've already decided to leave, then don't fucking call it a 'conversation.'" fucking unilateral bullshit.
the "conversation" we had is pretty blurry in my memory. for someone who lacks visual perception skills and usually recalls words verbatim, it really says something that my clearest memories of that conversation are all park slope scenes. walking up union, then i think i took 7th ave, and hitting grand army plaza while screaming at the top of my lungs. i don't remember if i was crying, but i remember the temperature - nice, if a little brisk. the kind of fall day i love. in my memory, my eyes were kind of stuck open.
i remember going inside my house and into the empty bedroom, that we were going to make into our new bedroom, and looking out at grand army plaza. i had a weird memory/future glitch, thinking about the future i'd imagined. memories of fantasies, now totally fucked.
i know he didn't say much. there just wasn't a lot of content. i remember screaming "if we believed in marriage, we'd be married, and then you wouldn't leave because of your sick sense of obligation!" all he could offer me by way of explanation was "i'm not in love with you anymore." the irony of this was impossible to overlook, as most of our fighting had centered around my suspicion that he wasn't in love with me, and his frustration at me for thinking that. after all, he was SO depressed. how is someone that depressed supposed to express love. and plus, i'm just an emotional connection machine, and normal people can't be expected to want closeness like i do.
in any event. i remember screaming "you're a fucking monster," knocking over the bookcases in my hall, and being generally insane for months after. i know i hung up on his white dude silence, and then, embarrassingly and typically, I called him back. how could i not? it was probably the last time we'd ever speak, and i certainly hadn't said everything i needed to say. he answered, to his credit i suppose, and i yelled "so how exactly do you plan to clean up the massive fucking mess you've left me with?" funny, i don't remember his response. it was futile, and i knew it. sometimes, once they're gone, they're just gone.
i also got a call that night from my now-boss, offering me a job here, starting immediately. i said "could i start the day after tomorrow instead?" fortunately she agreed. that first night a million people came for shiva. there was pizza. i had a giant towel that i carried around with me for the first week, which i dubbed "my tissue." i couldn't track conversation very well, but probably would have offed myself without the company. thank god for company and food. i was, and still am, so fucking confused.
i hate this day. everything hurts.
we walked toward the stupid co-op for mickey's shift, and then ian called me. he was a couple weeks overdue for our "weekly" call. the one that only happened once. i was talking and didn't see that he'd called right away. when i realized i'd missed his call, i immediately called him back without listening to his message. i was, for about 15 seconds, SO SO SO excited. i was just totally swelled up with love and optimism and ideas.
when he answered the phone, i knew immediately that he was breaking up with me. literally from when he said "hi, we have to talk." like, the fucking dumbest thing you could possibly say when you're in a committed relationship, one person has a nervous breakdown and flies home to re-evaluate their life: "we have to talk." you don't say. i immediately said "if you've already decided to leave, then don't fucking call it a 'conversation.'" fucking unilateral bullshit.
the "conversation" we had is pretty blurry in my memory. for someone who lacks visual perception skills and usually recalls words verbatim, it really says something that my clearest memories of that conversation are all park slope scenes. walking up union, then i think i took 7th ave, and hitting grand army plaza while screaming at the top of my lungs. i don't remember if i was crying, but i remember the temperature - nice, if a little brisk. the kind of fall day i love. in my memory, my eyes were kind of stuck open.
i remember going inside my house and into the empty bedroom, that we were going to make into our new bedroom, and looking out at grand army plaza. i had a weird memory/future glitch, thinking about the future i'd imagined. memories of fantasies, now totally fucked.
i know he didn't say much. there just wasn't a lot of content. i remember screaming "if we believed in marriage, we'd be married, and then you wouldn't leave because of your sick sense of obligation!" all he could offer me by way of explanation was "i'm not in love with you anymore." the irony of this was impossible to overlook, as most of our fighting had centered around my suspicion that he wasn't in love with me, and his frustration at me for thinking that. after all, he was SO depressed. how is someone that depressed supposed to express love. and plus, i'm just an emotional connection machine, and normal people can't be expected to want closeness like i do.
in any event. i remember screaming "you're a fucking monster," knocking over the bookcases in my hall, and being generally insane for months after. i know i hung up on his white dude silence, and then, embarrassingly and typically, I called him back. how could i not? it was probably the last time we'd ever speak, and i certainly hadn't said everything i needed to say. he answered, to his credit i suppose, and i yelled "so how exactly do you plan to clean up the massive fucking mess you've left me with?" funny, i don't remember his response. it was futile, and i knew it. sometimes, once they're gone, they're just gone.
i also got a call that night from my now-boss, offering me a job here, starting immediately. i said "could i start the day after tomorrow instead?" fortunately she agreed. that first night a million people came for shiva. there was pizza. i had a giant towel that i carried around with me for the first week, which i dubbed "my tissue." i couldn't track conversation very well, but probably would have offed myself without the company. thank god for company and food. i was, and still am, so fucking confused.
i hate this day. everything hurts.