Tilting At Windmills
I really have to stop smoking these cigarettes. I don't do anything by halves. Why is it so impossible for me to do anything in moderation? A seeming lifetime ago a therapist named Jeff announced this would be my saving grace. He about-turned me and said: "All we have to do is unself-destruct you with the same passion in this direction."
Sonuvabitch made it sound easy.
Horse!Sam and I just spent a couple of days down at Wellsy's place. We saddled up yesterday and headed out for a couple of hours meandering around the backstreets of her rural neighborhood. Sam hadn't been on the roads in a year or so, and consequently was in fine thoroughbred form. He jig-trotted the entire way and spooked dramatically at every available wonder, both natural and manmade. By the time we got back he was foam from ear to flank, but the excitement was of the happy variety, so it was hard to get too fussed at him. Several large trucks whizzed by without the courtesy of touching their brakes, and I miraculously avoided ending up with a mouthful of gravel on the roadside. They don't call me "Stickypants" at the riding club for nothin'. So all in all, a good day's ride. And Sam got to go somewhere other than an instructor's clinic, where someone just stands in the middle of the arena and shouts: "EXTEND. FLEX. LENGTHEN. No, you're overbent! He's hiding behind the bit. No, no, no, NO!"
*facepalm*
I'm still thinking a lot about TIG. It's stupidly hard not to. I have so much shame about how difficult it's been for me to let him go. I know part of this is because I'm just a bit of an all-round wreck at the moment, but in general, I'm a strong, independent woman who takes crap from no corner. How did I let this mess happen? How do I make sure it doesn't happen again? In the interests of unpacking my head, I made a list last night of all the things he accused me of. I'm going to put it here because, embarrassing as it is that I didn't punch him in the face and walk out sooner, it's really important that I own this and remember how easy it is for smart people to do really dumb things.
- Lying about my work roster
- Lying about incidents at work which made me late.
- Lying about my sexual history
- Lying about the origin of texts/calls/emails/online messages
- Repeatedly sleeping with FIS (um, I wish?)
- Maintaining an ongoing soooper sekrit drug habit
- Entertaining (undisclosed number of) men and overdosing on said drugs (aka My Excruciating UTI from too much sex with HIM & subsequent Kidney Infection)
- Getting up in the middle of the night to take drugs and then go back to bed (WTF? Point of that being?)
- Sleeping with Wellsy (Let it never be said that I discriminate based on gender)
- Sleeping with J-gal (See above)
- Contemplating incest with my brother (closet SPN fic reader, much?)
- Maliciously being in Sydney one weekend (Yeah, I don't even know. *rubs temples* Apparently someone looked like me at the airport? And they were pointing in a Sydneyish direction? Mystery for the ages.)
- Being in possession of an unexplained half-used box of condoms. (Those missing six were the six we used, asshat. The only six we used, because we are both fucking morons. IT WAS THE SAME BOX ALL ALONG, JACKASS.)
- Hiding Things in my shed (Okay, that one was true. Two beanbags. The cat pissed on them a year ago. *is lazy* I don't know what TIG thought was in there. Human heads, maybe? Drug laboratory? My self-respect?)
The level of distrust is just mindboggling to me. And to give me a little still undeserved credit, I didn't find out about some of these suspicions until the end. Did he think I was doing ALL of these things? Or just one or two? And why, oh why, did I give him the leeway I did on those accusations he openly made? Was it because I was simply determined to be seen for who I really was before we ended things? Or because I still believe in my heart, after all these years of sobriety, I deserve blanket suspicion from the people who enter my life? I don't know. I don't know why I still care about him when he could think those things of me. I don't know how he could still care about ME, if he truly believed I did ANY of that stuff. But it's clear in a lot of ways I can't dwell on right now that he did care, very much indeed. Maybe I see how he's derailed every potential relationship in his life and I recognise those things as the symptoms of the pathology they indicate. Maybe I just want him to see it too, and be free of that.
Whatever the reason, it's a moot point and I really need to get over it. I can't have someone like that in my life. And he's gone. He's not going to have any great epiphany. It's not going to burst upon him like some tidal moment of clarity. He screwed this up and he's probably already well on his way to screwing up the next thing, and the next, and the next. And he'll keep doing that until it makes him miserable enough not to. I'll be old and grey and not care an iota by then. And he'll almost certainly go to his grave believing he was right about me.
And I? I have to simply let him. I have to be okay with that. I don't know why that's so goddamn hard, but it is.
Anyway. If nothing else, the whole debacle has made me look long and hard at the flimsy excuse I call my self-esteem.
The rest of today I'm devoting to a re-read of The Lee. And tonight I'm going to see if I can put some words on this screen here for Chapter Ten. I might be back later with a little bargraph and a word count or something.
A girl can dream.
Sonuvabitch made it sound easy.
Horse!Sam and I just spent a couple of days down at Wellsy's place. We saddled up yesterday and headed out for a couple of hours meandering around the backstreets of her rural neighborhood. Sam hadn't been on the roads in a year or so, and consequently was in fine thoroughbred form. He jig-trotted the entire way and spooked dramatically at every available wonder, both natural and manmade. By the time we got back he was foam from ear to flank, but the excitement was of the happy variety, so it was hard to get too fussed at him. Several large trucks whizzed by without the courtesy of touching their brakes, and I miraculously avoided ending up with a mouthful of gravel on the roadside. They don't call me "Stickypants" at the riding club for nothin'. So all in all, a good day's ride. And Sam got to go somewhere other than an instructor's clinic, where someone just stands in the middle of the arena and shouts: "EXTEND. FLEX. LENGTHEN. No, you're overbent! He's hiding behind the bit. No, no, no, NO!"
*facepalm*
I'm still thinking a lot about TIG. It's stupidly hard not to. I have so much shame about how difficult it's been for me to let him go. I know part of this is because I'm just a bit of an all-round wreck at the moment, but in general, I'm a strong, independent woman who takes crap from no corner. How did I let this mess happen? How do I make sure it doesn't happen again? In the interests of unpacking my head, I made a list last night of all the things he accused me of. I'm going to put it here because, embarrassing as it is that I didn't punch him in the face and walk out sooner, it's really important that I own this and remember how easy it is for smart people to do really dumb things.
- Lying about my work roster
- Lying about incidents at work which made me late.
- Lying about my sexual history
- Lying about the origin of texts/calls/emails/online messages
- Repeatedly sleeping with FIS (um, I wish?)
- Maintaining an ongoing soooper sekrit drug habit
- Entertaining (undisclosed number of) men and overdosing on said drugs (aka My Excruciating UTI from too much sex with HIM & subsequent Kidney Infection)
- Getting up in the middle of the night to take drugs and then go back to bed (WTF? Point of that being?)
- Sleeping with Wellsy (Let it never be said that I discriminate based on gender)
- Sleeping with J-gal (See above)
- Contemplating incest with my brother (closet SPN fic reader, much?)
- Maliciously being in Sydney one weekend (Yeah, I don't even know. *rubs temples* Apparently someone looked like me at the airport? And they were pointing in a Sydneyish direction? Mystery for the ages.)
- Being in possession of an unexplained half-used box of condoms. (Those missing six were the six we used, asshat. The only six we used, because we are both fucking morons. IT WAS THE SAME BOX ALL ALONG, JACKASS.)
- Hiding Things in my shed (Okay, that one was true. Two beanbags. The cat pissed on them a year ago. *is lazy* I don't know what TIG thought was in there. Human heads, maybe? Drug laboratory? My self-respect?)
The level of distrust is just mindboggling to me. And to give me a little still undeserved credit, I didn't find out about some of these suspicions until the end. Did he think I was doing ALL of these things? Or just one or two? And why, oh why, did I give him the leeway I did on those accusations he openly made? Was it because I was simply determined to be seen for who I really was before we ended things? Or because I still believe in my heart, after all these years of sobriety, I deserve blanket suspicion from the people who enter my life? I don't know. I don't know why I still care about him when he could think those things of me. I don't know how he could still care about ME, if he truly believed I did ANY of that stuff. But it's clear in a lot of ways I can't dwell on right now that he did care, very much indeed. Maybe I see how he's derailed every potential relationship in his life and I recognise those things as the symptoms of the pathology they indicate. Maybe I just want him to see it too, and be free of that.
Whatever the reason, it's a moot point and I really need to get over it. I can't have someone like that in my life. And he's gone. He's not going to have any great epiphany. It's not going to burst upon him like some tidal moment of clarity. He screwed this up and he's probably already well on his way to screwing up the next thing, and the next, and the next. And he'll keep doing that until it makes him miserable enough not to. I'll be old and grey and not care an iota by then. And he'll almost certainly go to his grave believing he was right about me.
And I? I have to simply let him. I have to be okay with that. I don't know why that's so goddamn hard, but it is.
Anyway. If nothing else, the whole debacle has made me look long and hard at the flimsy excuse I call my self-esteem.
The rest of today I'm devoting to a re-read of The Lee. And tonight I'm going to see if I can put some words on this screen here for Chapter Ten. I might be back later with a little bargraph and a word count or something.
A girl can dream.