Tuesday, November 09, 2004

 

Moment of Clarity

Ok, so I've had a moment of clarity and reading over what I wrote yesterday it occurs to me that I'm a total asshole. You don't believe me? Well, first I'll let you read what I wrote yesterday, and then I will describe the crystal-clear insight that I had this morning.

Dr. Crazy's Relationship Issues (yesterday's aborted post)

In comments to the last post, Profgrrrl asks why I'm freaked out by potentially ending up in a couple with Freud. The simple answer is this: I hate being a girlfriend. But of course, the simple answer really has to do with a lot of things. Reasons I hate being a girlfriend/being in a relationship have to do with a range of things, some shallow and others not, but at the bottom of all of it is this:
  1. My radical insecurity about failing in relationships. And so of course, the answer is not to be in a "real" relationship with anyone so that when it doesn't work out it doesn't feel like I've failed at making a "real" relationship work.
  2. My deep, deep fear of feeling more about somebody than they feel about me. And so of course the answer is to make sure that I don't feel anything about my suitors so that this cannot happen.
  3. My feeling that I will have to compromise if I am in a stated relationship and my feeling that I don't want to compromise. And so the answer, again, is not to feel about suitors and not to enter into "real" relationships with them so that I won't be compelled to compromise by my pesky emotions and socialization as a female person in this godforsaken world.
  4. My anxiety that if I really let a person see all of me (i.e., the intimacy) that the person will then not like what they see and will reject me and then I will feel exposed and pissed off at not only the person but also at myself for having allowed for the intimacy to occur. And again, the key is not to have "real" relationships, to have "feelings" about suitors, or to do anything nice for them.

Ok, reading this list I feel like I am really fucked up, or at least that I'm coming off as really fucked up, and I'm not sure that I like that or that I should post anything this self-indulgent/whiny. But these are the things that make me really fearful about the couple thing generally - and Freud has little to do with any of them. And, truthfully, I don't know if Freud wants to be in a couple with me (in fact, it's entirely possible that he would be horrified by the notion) and so all of this may be just some sort of attempt on my part to reject him before he rejects me. Perhaps the thing that makes me freaked out about Freud in particular in this context is because he's the first person whom I've seriously considered as a potential boyfriend (god, I sound like I'm 12) since Jerk (the ex). And we all know how that worked out. And so, while all of the insecurity, etc., has nothing to do with Freud in theory, in practice he will bear the brunt of all of it. Oh, and another added ingredient is that I'm totally afraid of getting involved with him for real if I have notions about potentially leaving this job (which, of course, may not happen, but still) or if he ends up leaving the area (which he may well when he's done with his PhD).

Now, you may be asking, why is she freaking out about this now? Well, the timing of this definitely has to do with Mr. Freud and what's gone on with us over the past week-ish length of time:
  1. All of the sleep-overs... three nights in four days.
  2. He let slip that he's told his mother about me. He's really close to his mom, so this shouldn't bother me, but considering the fact that I am a 30-year-old woman who doesn't admit to her parents that she has any sort of dealings with the male sex... well, I'm freaked out by it.
  3. Saturday night I made dinner and while things were cooking he played piano for me (Moonlight Sonata) and we drank some wine and then after dinner we watched a movie. Don't like this, as all seems very weird and date-y. Though I was as relaxed and happy as I've been in weeks - maybe even months - while all of this was going on.
  4. The way that he acts around his friends with me is not friend-y anymore. For example, later on Saturday night we went out with a couple of his friends and he was going on and on about how awesome a cook I am, etc. Creepy. Or I'm just on drugs and this is normal.
  5. Conversations about how our last serious relationships ended/what we'd want in relationships now.
  6. He told me that I'm the person he most wants to see/hang out with out of like every person he knows.
  7. He begged me to come over Friday night (because I made him beg, which is as weird as the begging).
  8. He wanted me to stay there yesterday afternoon and watch football with him even though we'd been together for like a zillion hours already. I didn't. I wasn't even swayed by his offer to make me brunch.
  9. He keeps bringing up the issue of Christmas presents in the context of things like what he would get a girlfriend (me - and he actually did say this, I'm not just interpreting) for Christmas or needing a girlfriend to buy him Christmas presents. All said in jest, but what the fuck? A. It's not even thanksgiving and B. I don't generally have boyfriends on the holidays because they are very time-consuming and difficult.

I could go on, but this list, too, is ridiculous and, again, I fear that I'm being a fucked up girl. Perhaps the answer is to say that if I'm doing all of this crazy analysis then what it all "really" means is that he's not that into me and that I'm just being an ass out of a desire to be distracted from other more pressing matters (the fact that I think I'm coming down with a cold, the fact that I have a ton of work to do, etc.). Anyway, so yes. This is the latest whirlwind of brain activity. The only way out of it is to a) focus on work and b) actually have a conversation with him that addresses some of it at some point if I can ever get the guts to do such a thing. Oh, and I need not to talk to him for a few days, too, except for that if he calls me I will lunge for the phone like a silly, silly teenager.

Speaking of silly teens, I thoroughly recommend the movie Mean Girls. Totally enjoyed it.


***

Ok, so that's where the idiotic post of yesterday ends. So, this morning I was still thinking about all of this crap (while doing laundry, and thus it wasn't completely wasted time) and it occurred to me that in order truly to consider what the fuck I'm doing/feeling it could be useful to refer to the trusty tome that is my journal. See, I have been keeping a journal since I was about 12, and it has been my tendency to use the journal as a window into what the fuck I'm doing by reading and rereading it (perhaps its own kind of craziness) to look for patterns in my behavior. So, I busted out the journal and looked over the past 3 fucking months (for the Freud thing has been going on for about the length of the blog) and what did I find? Well, what you all probably already see because you don't suffer from the selective amnesia that afflicts me: Freud is an inconsistent motherfucker when it comes to me! He calls a bunch and then he is silent for weeks. He wants to see me and then he disappears. He wants to fuck me and then he doesn't lay a hand on me. And with all of this, I have been running around like a fool thinking that Freud really likes me but just doesn't know how to articulate himself. That he's sending mixed messages. And I've been trying to fucking interpret them.

I am a total asshole. A bored total asshole, but a total asshole nonetheless.

And this, my friends, is the insight that I achieved in my moment of clarity. It is an insight that is at once liberating and completely demoralizing. I really had believed that I was beyond all of this sort of thing. Ah well. Apparently, I am not. And since I am not, the likelihood is that, in spite of my grand revelation, things will continue on in exactly the fashion they have been, in part because Freud is safe and I do enjoy hanging out with him in spite of the fact that he's so lame when it comes to me. Oh, and because of that whole selective amnesia thing that I've got, so I'll probably forget I ever had this grand insight.

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