Greetings all.
And so it is, the fourth week of January. This has been a long long winter. I miss the sun! I miss the shorts! I miss the patios and white wines! I miss warm. I miss happy.
Fortunately, my somber and flat mood of the past few months has been lifting. I am starting to feel a little better in work and in life. Obviously the stress of the pending major decisions I would be facing came into play. The thought of choosing, and the consequences of those choices, led to a lot of anxiety and self-initiated drama. I just couldn't go on. And so, with the helpful advice of a friend, and some fish oil, I have decided to not make any decisions. I have decided to just let life life happen and what shall be, shall be. This is not to say that I won't actively try to better myself and my position, it just means that I will wait out any relationship or geographic decision rather than make a decision that could be hurtful or wrong. As I have said in the past, I have a very keen and accurate sense of intuition, and I will know when I know.
Truthfully, what I have put off is breaking things off for real w/ Big. I have dodged and avoided any relationship question, changed the subject when it came to any future-speak, and flat out repelled any questioning of whether or not I was seeing anyone else. I have done my best to not face this elephant, but due to pressures from Big, that grace period has come to an end. He is demanding answers or commitments or promises, and silence doesn't seem to be appeasing him.
As I have said, I don't think I want to be in a relationship w/ Big. I find his financial instability too stressful and I cannot find peace with the idea of opening myself up to hardships. Does that mean I don't love him? It seems obvious to me that if I am not willing to try, to take a chance, then maybe I don't love him. But what if he is worth the risk? What if the problem is not him, but it is me? What if it is my pathetic need to "look" a certain way or to meet a certain societal class standard that has me turning my back on the love of my life? Am I too proud?
Then there is the real fear that I have. I am afraid of saying goodbye to Danny. I am afraid of losing him and in turn losing everything he has helped me gain and become over the last 8 months. He has helped me to grow, ask questions, eat healthier, open-up, inquire, gain new skills and become curious. He has made an effort to make me a more capable, interesting, informed, and better me. Can Big make me a better me?
To put it a different way, I feel Danny is like driving an electric hybrid while Big is like taking the bus. Sure, Danny is new and shiny and environmentally responsible, but, just as with a Hybrid, eventually that electricity will run out, our time together will run out and he will stop showing up. The slightly rusted, but still powerfully running bus, however, will always come, it will always be there to pick you up.
I know that it is hard for you hopeful romantics out there to understand, but Danny is not a real part of my life. Yes, I talk to him every single day, and he has met my parents and my best friends, and he is the first person I call for pretty much any reason ranging from job advice to bladder infections, but he is not someone who I can count on to be there for me. To him, I am a diversion from his complicated, isolated, intense life. I am his recess, a break, an activity that releases him briefly from his personal obligations and incessant needs. He is real to me, but I am not nor will I ever be, real for him in any larger capacity. That fact is very hard on me, but I knew it going in. And as I have said, I feel that with him, the benefits to knowing him, far outweigh the costs of being a recreation. The awful thing is that I may have fallen in love.
The reason why my friend's advice was so helpful to me is because she logically broke it down for me. She explained that I cannot make a decision about Big based on Danny. Danny cannot be a factor because he is not offering any long-term commitments. Therefore he is irrelevant in my decision making. The second issue I have w/ Big is monetary. She said that because I am not going to pay for Big, because I will set the expectation that he pays and contributes half to our future, money is also not a factor.
So I have decided that the right course of action is to take no action. I have committed to Big that if he can find a job in Chi, he can move in with me and we will try to make a relationship work. After all, after seven years, we do owe that much to each other. The catch is that he will need to move to Chi, and he will need to get a job. Now it's on him to prove he wants to be with me, and my job is to encourage and support him as he tries to make it happen. And in the meantime, it is business as usual in the Chi.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Saturday, January 22, 2011
My own worst enemy
Needless to say, I did not end up interviewing for the job in Tokyo. It interfered too much with my current work schedule and lets face it, I can't be bothered with a group interview. Not to mention that it took them 500 candidate interviews to hire 30 people! Why go through the rejection?
That said I am still interested in a new role, either with-in current company, or at a new company. Either in Chi-town or in a new city. Whatever the case may be, I need to make a decision ASAP and act on it.
December and January have been really hard months on me for a plethora of reasons. Its like I have this feeling of restlessness which is equally as bad as my feeling of contentedness. I feel restless, like I am constantly waiting for things to happen, and at the same time I am feeling too comfortable in my current circumstances which is to say that I have grown comfortable with my non-life in Chi. I still only have 1 friend, and unfortunately my 1 friend is too complicated and not really a friend at all. And all the worse is that all of this, my situation my lackluster job search, my complicated relationships, and now friendships, all of it is my fault. This is not to say fault as in blame, it is to say that my restlessness which yields feelings of resentment, is my own doing.
I am being a little hard on myself as I have done a lot lately to propel changes in my life. For example:
-I am eating vegetables (carrots and cauli, as I am newly allergic to broccoli)
-I only listen to NPR in the car to get my current events
-I am reading financial books and planning on investing in the stock-market
-I continue to cut back on my alcohol and cheese intake
-I am trying to be more strategic in my job searching (doesn't seem to be working)
A couple of the areas where I need to improve ASAP:
-As it was pointed out to me by a dear friend, I am trying to live a MN life w/o being in MN. This results in me watching others' lives move forward w/o me as if I don't exist, which I really don't. So, I need to create a life here in Chi. I need to meet new friends and start living here, in the present.
-I need to make a decision on my relationships. My Big keeps pushing for he and I to be together and in a relationship. He is even opening his job search to Chi. I have not felt "in-love" w/ him since this summer and I have been unable to accept it. I have been waiting to fall back in love with him, but its not happening. He is there now, and I am not. It is too late for us and I can't seem to accept it. So unfairly and for months I have been asking him to wait and give me time. I can't bear the idea of telling him that he and I don't have a future. I can't bear it. But I can't make him wait for something that I know is not going to happen. But, what if I am wrong? What if I am supposed to be with him? What if he is my one? I mean its not like guys are knocking down my door. Danny has made it perfectly clear that I am only a diversion from his reality. Am I willing to give up Big and risk being alone? But in one way or another, I have always been "alone". Outside of FWBs my life has been in absence of relationships. Big and Danny are the only men I have ever even been in a "relationship" with and the irony is that these "relationships" were not of the traditional variety of boy meets girl. They have been dis-functional, non-traditional, non-committed, inconsistent, volatile, and you name it. So the fact is that I have never been in a proper relationship which has really damaged my self-esteem, in case you hadn't noticed. There, honesty. And what I have fought against my whole life is feeling like I am bad at life or I am not worthy because my life has not turned out how society deems acceptable. Because I have not been able to conform to the mass expectation something must be wrong with me. Actually, I do think it is society and its invisible expectation and judgment where-in lies the fundamental problems. But who cares? The reality is that we are our own toughest critics and nobody else really cares.
So the point of my rambling is that I am faced with telling Big that I am not moving back to Minne. He said to me a few weeks ago that women have this idea that there is always something better our there, over the horizon. That we can't accept what is in front of us and that we think if we change x,y or z, we will find the elusive thing that will make us happy. Isn't that why I moved to Chicago? Isn't that why I moved to NYC years ago? And isn't that why I am considering job searching back in the NYC? And isn't that why I am afraid of moving back to Minne? I am afraid that going back will mean I have failed. Going back to Minne will turn me back into a heavy drinking party girl in a relationship with a broke and struggling dreamer. I may not know what I want, but I know that I don't want that life again. But I'm no fool, as Big said, it is not my geography that is the problem, it is me.
That said I am still interested in a new role, either with-in current company, or at a new company. Either in Chi-town or in a new city. Whatever the case may be, I need to make a decision ASAP and act on it.
December and January have been really hard months on me for a plethora of reasons. Its like I have this feeling of restlessness which is equally as bad as my feeling of contentedness. I feel restless, like I am constantly waiting for things to happen, and at the same time I am feeling too comfortable in my current circumstances which is to say that I have grown comfortable with my non-life in Chi. I still only have 1 friend, and unfortunately my 1 friend is too complicated and not really a friend at all. And all the worse is that all of this, my situation my lackluster job search, my complicated relationships, and now friendships, all of it is my fault. This is not to say fault as in blame, it is to say that my restlessness which yields feelings of resentment, is my own doing.
I am being a little hard on myself as I have done a lot lately to propel changes in my life. For example:
-I am eating vegetables (carrots and cauli, as I am newly allergic to broccoli)
-I only listen to NPR in the car to get my current events
-I am reading financial books and planning on investing in the stock-market
-I continue to cut back on my alcohol and cheese intake
-I am trying to be more strategic in my job searching (doesn't seem to be working)
A couple of the areas where I need to improve ASAP:
-As it was pointed out to me by a dear friend, I am trying to live a MN life w/o being in MN. This results in me watching others' lives move forward w/o me as if I don't exist, which I really don't. So, I need to create a life here in Chi. I need to meet new friends and start living here, in the present.
-I need to make a decision on my relationships. My Big keeps pushing for he and I to be together and in a relationship. He is even opening his job search to Chi. I have not felt "in-love" w/ him since this summer and I have been unable to accept it. I have been waiting to fall back in love with him, but its not happening. He is there now, and I am not. It is too late for us and I can't seem to accept it. So unfairly and for months I have been asking him to wait and give me time. I can't bear the idea of telling him that he and I don't have a future. I can't bear it. But I can't make him wait for something that I know is not going to happen. But, what if I am wrong? What if I am supposed to be with him? What if he is my one? I mean its not like guys are knocking down my door. Danny has made it perfectly clear that I am only a diversion from his reality. Am I willing to give up Big and risk being alone? But in one way or another, I have always been "alone". Outside of FWBs my life has been in absence of relationships. Big and Danny are the only men I have ever even been in a "relationship" with and the irony is that these "relationships" were not of the traditional variety of boy meets girl. They have been dis-functional, non-traditional, non-committed, inconsistent, volatile, and you name it. So the fact is that I have never been in a proper relationship which has really damaged my self-esteem, in case you hadn't noticed. There, honesty. And what I have fought against my whole life is feeling like I am bad at life or I am not worthy because my life has not turned out how society deems acceptable. Because I have not been able to conform to the mass expectation something must be wrong with me. Actually, I do think it is society and its invisible expectation and judgment where-in lies the fundamental problems. But who cares? The reality is that we are our own toughest critics and nobody else really cares.
So the point of my rambling is that I am faced with telling Big that I am not moving back to Minne. He said to me a few weeks ago that women have this idea that there is always something better our there, over the horizon. That we can't accept what is in front of us and that we think if we change x,y or z, we will find the elusive thing that will make us happy. Isn't that why I moved to Chicago? Isn't that why I moved to NYC years ago? And isn't that why I am considering job searching back in the NYC? And isn't that why I am afraid of moving back to Minne? I am afraid that going back will mean I have failed. Going back to Minne will turn me back into a heavy drinking party girl in a relationship with a broke and struggling dreamer. I may not know what I want, but I know that I don't want that life again. But I'm no fool, as Big said, it is not my geography that is the problem, it is me.
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