Hubba Hubba!

Dearest J.,

I got the strangest hit to the biddy biddy blog the other night. Someone surfed in by way of the keyword search “bally spandex pentagon row”. Rather odd combo methinks. The search hit a letter written to MMRFRO back at the beginning of February in regard to one of the rather odd behaviors he exhibited when we were out in public together during the time he was speaking with me and gracing me with his presence, on occasion. Funny thing about the hit, the IP address is a local one. So it appears there may be a neighbor reading/hitting the b.b. blog. Wonder where he or she might live? Maybe they’ll send up a flare or a smoke signal or sumthin’. The least I should do is wave and say “Hi” don’t cha think?

So, “Heeeey, neighbor!” <TGL waves>

Anyway. Back to the letter written to MMRFRO back in February. In the letter, I mentioned that I’d been writing to and receiving several lengthy and amazing emails from a gentleman who I’d met on Craigslist. It’s funny as the situation with him ended up being the stereotypical, one of those things. However, I got to see something very valuable about myself through the experience as he mirrored back some behaviors of minebehaviors which quite frankly were rather less that attractive to witness.

The morning following our one date he sent me a very sweet email thanking me for the great evening and expressed a desire that we might see each other again. I returned with a quick reply that I enjoyed the date as well and looked forward to getting together again when both our schedules allowed. When I checked my email later in the day, he’d responded before going to work. Given that I had a great deal to do that day, I didn’t respond right away. One thing lead to another resulting in an extremely busy day and I didn’t get a chance to respond to his second email before flopping into bed early that evening for being exhausted.

The next evening he called me after work with his first words being, “You didn’t get back me yesterday.” To which I replied, “Yes, it was a long day I went to bed early for being exhausted.

“Oh you don’t need to explain,” he offered in an attempt to apologize.

“No, I do.” I said, “As I’d like for you to understand why I didn’t get back to you last night.” And I went on to explain that I’d spent most of the day doing the weekly chores. Plus I’d spent an hour or two shoveling snow out in front of the condo complex so the trash truck could get into the property and collect the trash that was piling up due to the several feet of snow.

“I’m sorry. I tend to read into things.” he attempted to explain rather nervously.

“No worries,” I replied, “I tend to do the same thing. However there is nothing to read into here.”

We settled into a conversation for the rest of the hour that was reasonably pleasant and agreed that perhaps we’d see a movie in the near future.

The next day I got an email from him in which he explained that he was having a difficult time stepping down off of a medication he takes from time to time to assist him with sleep. In the email, he made the statement that he just needed “power through” it. I responded with a few thought of how he might approach the step down rather than merely powering through it. So that he might learn to be more aware of his body and how it reacts to the medication.

He responded with an email thanking me for my thoughts but felt the need to clarify what he meant by “power through” as it seemed I had misunderstood what he meant by the statement. He went onto to explain what the statement meant to him, how he was using the statement and in what context.

After I got done reading the email I thought WTF? I understand quite clearly what is happening.

But after I got over the initial shock of the self-superior tone of his email and fighting the compulsion to send him an evermore self superior response, I sat back for a moment and realized something. He was behaving just like me. I let out a good laugh and thoughtwow that’s really unattractive and I just don’t feel like dealing with this right now.

I thought of sending him an email to thank him for being the much needed mirror and to let him know that I didn’t think it was going to go much further with the two of us. But I didn’t. Instead I just let it die on the vine. Which perhaps in a way is growth as in the past I would have continued to think it was my place to fix and or heal him.

A few days after the email exchange, I was having dinner with S. and M. and relayed the story to them over dinner. S. got a rather sh*t eating grin on his face and said, “I hope you can see the irony in the situation.”

“Yes dearest.” I volleyed back. “I may be obnoxious and an over-bearing A-hole at times. However, I am at least self-aware enough to realize it.”

“Most days.” I said as we both let out a good laugh.

On a different subject, I had a gentleman over today for a little play time fun. And that he was. Once again, as he was leaving I was amazed at the irony of the fact that I’m treated with more kindness and respect from guys who I meet for hook ups than I have been with guys who claimed to be all about friendship and relationships. And who claim to put such great value on them. Now if I could just find a way to integrate the good sex, kindness and respect into a dating relationship with a guy. I have to believe it’s coming. But in the meantime…

Sending you much love!

Funboy:
You are seriously f*cked up.
Would you look in the mirror?
I mean, you need professional help!
-from The Crow

Dearest B.,

It looks like I need to bake up a big old pie with crow filling and cut myself off a slice and consume it with and huge mug of hot steaming STFU. I made a snarky comment the other day in a letter to J. about MMRFRO not having the courage to post photos of his own in his flickr account.

Now I feel really bad. Like a major a$$hole. As he does have a few vacation photos posted. A couple of which illustrate what great eye he has and the promise he shows as a photographer if he’d pursue it. However, I understand completely whatever fears and insecurities might hold him back, as I suffer from the same myself.

As I sit in this moment, and I consider the snarky statement written (due to residual anger). It brings up the memory of a moment at dinner with my friend K. about this time last year when I was trying to come to terms with my feelings for D. and his lack of being honest and forthright with me concerning his.

I had just finished a 15 minute diatribe of everything he’d done and not done, how he was emotionally jacking me around, blah, blah blah. K. looked me square in the eye and said, “I’m not really feeling a whole lot of love here. You claim that you think that you love this guy. But, I’m not hearing it.”

“What?!” I said as I looked back at her incredulously, “Then what are you hearing?”

“A great deal of hate.” she said slightly wincing, “Is there anything you really like about this guy?”

“Oh my god,” I replied. “Do I really sound that bad?”

“Uh, yeah!” she said.

We sat in silence for a moment. I then looked into her eyes and said, “There are a great number of things I find very attractive and appreciate about D.”

“Then what are they?” she asked.

I told her I found him very attractive physically but beyond that there was much more. He was smart, funny, and creative. He was reliable and for the most part seemed to be a grounded individual. He didn’t drink or do drugs. He was atypical and quirky and given I myself am that way it felt as though we were kindred spirits in a way as a result.

And she then said, “But…”

“Yeah, I know.” I replied.

She then asked me if I would be able to deal with all of his shortcomings (and mine as well) that were contributing to the impasse and attempt to work through them even though it might possibly destroy the developing friendship as a result. I told her that I thought I might be as I could longer live with the way things were at that particular moment.

So shortly thereafter, I began to push D. ever harder for him to “get honest” with me. Which of course is something he wasn’t able to do; and yes, I’m firmly aware of the fact that’s it’s his inability to be honest with himself which was the cause of that.

As I was running around this morning getting a few last things in preparation for being home-bound this weekend due to the weather, I began to consider what it is that continues to bother me in regard to what happened with D. and why I continue to hold onto such anger.

Of course, there’s the obvioushe hurt me. Therefore, I’m angry. But, I think what bothers me the most is the pretense. It’s the fact that he was so amazingly pretentious with me (and with others no doubt). Probably the reason it irks me so much is that fact that I used be quite pretentious my self. Now, I’m only kinda pretentious. Ha!

How does that old Al-Anon saying go? We’re always most bothered by characteristics in others that remind us of ourselves. How true that can be for me most of the time.

So it would seem I owe D. an apology. It appears he has more courage than for which I gave him credit. There were probably many more moments in the past that were quite similar to this. Moments I could have been better with recognizing and acknowledging his courage to him and/or the lack of mine in such moments.

I’ve thought of making and sending him a Valentine. However, I realize it would be a pointless exercise and further wasted energy.

Well, it looks like the snow has arrived. It’s going to make the next 48 hours very interesting no doubt. I’m hoping to work on the planned self-portrait this weekend and get some other photos ready to upload to flickr. Plus delve into some Tarot-related stuff. And work on some web design projects needing my attention.

Sending you much love!