Morning in Random Thoughts

I started my day well rested. I love early mornings where i have the world to myself. My brain is at its best during these times and i find peace in a quiet space. My alarm wakes me each weekday at 5:15, and during this time in the year, it is already light.

The last few days, though, by the time i get to work, i feel heavy. Like i mentioned in an entry at the beginning of the week.... my heart and soul have a pull from gravity that seems to defy laws.

That being said, i don’t really know what to write, only that it seems to be cathartic. On my mind is an interaction i have had with a person i am friends with on fb, and had been friends with in middle/early high school.

Amanda sent me a late night message on fb saying that she’d had a couple glasses of wine, couldn’t sleep and needed to talk with me. I was really worried. My first thoughts were that maybe i was mean to her when we were younger, but honestly, i probably was mean to no more than like 3 people ever in high or middle school :) Then the next thought was that she had sad news for me- maybe she knew what happened to my friend Derik, who disappeared from my life in 2009/2010.

So, i decided to text her and figure out what the cryptic message was for. It turned out to be sad, in a way, but also sweet.

She wanted to know if i remembered listening to a boom box cassette tape of Chicago down my the river with my middle/high school best friend, Jennifer. Jennifer killed herself by hanging when we were 17. It was a defining point in my life and has had echoes throughout my life.

I actually do not remember this incident, or spending any time with this person, but truth is, it is something that Jennifer and i would have done.

Amanda kept going, saying that those were the best times she spent in our little backwater hometown, the times in which she was happiest. It was bittersweet. I loved that i was that part of someone’s life. I was sad that i did not remember her. I was sad that my memories of Jennifer are more static. More like photographs than moving pictures and events.

As a result of that feeling, i asked Amanda to share with me some of the memories she had of Jennifer and us. She was so sweet and said that she would write them down for me.

I will cry when i read them.

Then the next day, Amanda asked me whether i remembered a certain person that we are mutually friends with on fb, saying that she had a “volatile” relationship with this other woman, Annie. I have two distinct memories of Annie, one of them kind of momentous.

When i was in middle school i attended a Baptist church (because they would pick my siblings and i up from the projects where we lived and give my mom some time alone on Sundays). I have always been keenly aware of injustices and Annie once called me “scum” while playing basketball in middle school. Annie also attended my church. This precipitated my belief that church and people who attended it were hypocritical. Thusly, i decided that i was no longer going to attend church and that religion was hypocritical.

I know there probably was more to that decision, but distilled in my mind, it was Annie who caused me to make the choice to turn away from church and religion.

The second memory i have of Annie was running into her at a coffee shop within the past few years. She was very nice to me, her mom knew and recognized me (i have no idea why) and they both invited me to get together the next time i was in town.

So, it turns out that Annie was horrible to Amanda. Both their mothers were best friends and the girls would play together. The would play “doctor” together and Annie would lock Amanda in her room. From there, Amanda did not go into more detail, but just wanted to know if Annie was mean and vicious to anyone else out there.

On another topic, i am ignoring something that i need to address. This always happens. Its children, my being 38, and seeing someone who is a committed non breeder. Dios is vocal about how he feels and has had a vasectomy. He actually had that done 3 years ago when we first were seeing one another (just happened to be planned then). I knew this from the beginning. I told him i was not ready to get into a partnership and part of that was me knowing that this would be an issue.

To be blunt, Dios wants to partner up with me. He sees us as a good match. He feels as if he “let me go” last time. When he visited me last weekend, he dreamed and it was sweet. It was what Kevin refused to do. Dios was talking with me about how he could rent out his house down in Oregon (its paid off) and that the rental income would pay for most of a mortgage here in Washington. The idea would be to buy a house just on the edge of the sketchy neighborhood i live in, because it is the neighborhood all the Portlanders who have been priced out of Portland are moving to (you could walk in my neighborhood and not know whether you were in Portland, Eugene, Seattle, Bellingham, etc). From there, and with 2 people paying all the other bills, money can be saved for travel.

Dios likes to make sure i am aware of all his good qualities in a partner. He loves to cook, he is thoughtful, passionate, has some very, very similar beliefs when it comes to a disdain for consumerism and the middle class “american dream.” He gardens, loves animals, loves the outdoors..... and actively wants to better himself as a partner. He also works so, so hard at pleasuring me. I have yet to orgasm during sex (involving penetration), but i have gotten incredibly close.

But. I do remember telling him, way back when we first were together in 2011, that i “chose” Kevin because Kevin was willing to consider having a child with me. The truth really was that i had fallen madly in love with Kevin, but i did not want to hurt Dios. I have not spoken about it with him and i feel bad about that. I know that it is not ok for me to withhold this information. I am so confused anyways. I love my alone life, can i really take on adding a child in there (whether that is with a partner or not). Originally, i just thought i would do it on my own. Then, of course, there is Mark. Mark would marry me, be a father, and find his life’s fulfillment in all of that.

I dreamt about Mark last night. I have a lot of guilt. I shouldn’t have gotten myself into any of this. Why couldn’t i have just broken up with Kevin without making any connections with people who are so good to me, but i would just eventually hurt? Why could i not have been stronger and just made the change i needed without needing whatever emotional scaffolding i get from other people?

I know it is actually unreasonable for me to think that i could have made that life change without support. I reached out to Mark because of my unresolved feelings from the horrible break up we had in 2009. I always dreamed of how good he treated me when Kevin was treating me so badly. And when i visited Bellingham around Christmas and tried to tell Mark that i was going to get married, the resulting internal emotional turmoil is what showed me that i needed to end it with Kevin. I really tried not to lead Mark on. I did not want to end up doing what i am doing now- being wishy washy, or ambivalent, or not able to follow through with what i may have said i could possibly do (get a job in Bellingham, move there, possibly get back together). While i never did say that i was going to do all of those things (i did apply for teaching jobs, and looked into moving if i did get a job), i did ask whether Mark was willing to be a father (his answer was he was not really doing anything else, not super enthusiastic sounding, though i know he did mean that to be what he portrayed). I asked that, but i did say that i could not guarantee anything, because i knew that i was going to fall apart after i broke up with Kevin and i did not know what was going to happen to me.

Mark never did fight for me. He just let me make my decisions and let the cards fall as they would.

I just have to stop now, i am winding myself into a tither and kids start coming in in about 5 minutes.