Sexuality Happens

I mentioned something last week about how our past experiences color how we interact in the future. And it’s becoming more and more evident.

I’ve written (not sure if it here, or in my private blog) about how I have a problem with letting people walk all over me. I try to be a good person, a good friend, the best I can be. In college, I drove people all over the place, pretty much never getting gas money. I’d help people move in and out. When I was an RA, I was the one who would pick up all the extra shifts to make sure they got cover. I also, fall of my junior year, went with to the hospital with every single alcohol poisoning case because no one else would. I would cry myself to sleep a few times a month, but never let anyone see me cry. I would never ask for help, even if I really needed it…I could do everything myself

I wound up seeing a therapist for a few sessions, paid for by the college. She told me I was counter-dependent, had a lot of of trouble asking for, or even just accepting help, and that I had to start opening up to people and standing up for myself, or else I’d eventually explode. I worked on learning to trust people more, and put more of my own emotion out there. I had two best friends, and I talked with them about this a lot, and got to the point where I could ask them, occasionally, for help.

Then I moved to Philly. I worked on trusting people more. And really lost out because of it. There was my first derby league — I left because of how an issue of sexual assault was dealt with, but wished them well. Suddenly, the majority of women that I’d spent 10-15 hours with a week for months, the women with whom I’d traveled around the East Coast, the women who were my close friends and a significant part of my life, were no longer talking to me. One even hacked my myspace page. Fine. Then, a new friend of mine, to whom I’d grown really close to, and hung out with and talked to several times a week, left me standing on a street corner in Philly, crying (oddly enough, on crutches with a broken foot), and sent me an email asking me to never contact her again. My derby wife, who always seemed excited to hang out, who planned fun outings for us together, whose wedding I performed…started canceling our plans. 8 weeks in a row. I saw her a couple of times when I went into her husband’s shop to get tattooed. She told me she’d come to my going away party, and then didn’t. And I never heard from her.

I had one or two good friends in Philly…but for the most part, I got really screwed over. I’d drive into the city, or take a 60 minutes train ride into the city just to be stood up. I’d have people cancel on me an hour or so before we were supposed to meet. I’d always have to go meet them in their area…plan what we were doing, suggest it, etc, and then half the time, they’d find something more exciting to do. My choice was to either have no friends or flakey friends, so I put up with it, but I felt really shitty about things.

Then I moved back here. My friends have been amazing…helping me move, hanging out at my place and theirs, going out with me, helping me with my ankle injury, etc. They are GOOD friends (with a few flakes). But I can handle a few flakes in the midst of a lot of good, reliable friends….much better than one or two good friends amoungst a bunch of flakes.

So with that ridiculously long back story, here is the deal.

I am really fucking confused about this L situation. I like her. I do. Other wise, I wouldn’t be dealing with these feelings. When we hang out, I enjoy myself. We have interesting conversations, we laugh, we’re awkward together. I want to make this work.

But I keep over thinking and second guessing everything. We had a date (the 3rd) scheduled for tonight, and she canceled. She had good reasons; her band’s video shoot ran long, and then practice ran late, and she’s leaving Thursday for Portland, so she had a bunch of things she needed to take care of before she left, she was in a bad mood, etc. I understand. These things happen.

The problem is my brain. It’s scared. We’ve had 3 planned dates…one got rescheduled (again, for a good reason — she had a huge test to study for), and one has been canceled. Can you see how my history might be making me a bit nervous? Add to that the “I don’t want a relationship” talk after the second date, and basically, I’m confused.

I mean, if she had told me yesterday that she was super busy, and we couldn’t hang out until she got back, I would have been disappointed, but understood. Instead, we made plans for tonight, and she actually made me nervous the other way — she started telling me all the reasons we couldn’t hang out again (other than on Monday night) before she left. I was like “um, ok, we’re hanging out Monday…so that’s fine. You need time to get stuff done, and you’re going on a trip. Have fun.” When I suggested she come to my next derby bout, she told me it was the day before her father’s 60th birthday party, which she was planning, but that she’d ‘try to pull some strings’ to come. I told her it wasn’t a big deal, I wasn’t even skating. She told me she’d definitely make another one this seasons. When we were talking about movies, she asked me to promise her one thing, that we’d definitely watch Shark Attack 3: Megalodon, even if we didn’t watch it on the Monday night date. These things, to me, are much more indicative of seriousness…and yet, she was the one who had told me she didn’t want anything serious.

I was so fucking confused. And tired and cranky after having a bad and stressful day. And not ready to spend the next week (plus) until she gets back in limbo. I wrote a text telling her that “do whatever you need to do. I totally understand — I don’t want to cause any drama!” But I stood up for myself, I erased it before I sent it. Damn it, I couldn’t rearrange my plans to get to do something tonight — I can’t drive with my ankle the way it is. So I was missing out on hanging out with friends. She finally called around 7pm to tell me she definitely couldn’t make it, because she didn’t want her bad mood to rub off on me and had stuff to do. It was all I could do to inform her that her actions had already affected my mood, that I was feeling like I was back in my college and Philadelphia cycle all over again. She said she’d call me soon. I said something snarky about “yeah, I’m sure.” And hung up.

I was in self-preservation mode. The last two years, I’ve put myself out there, and been hurt, even with friends, far too many times. If she didn’t want to hang out, I wasn’t going to put myself out there to get hurt again. I texted her (I know, all this texting is becoming crazy) that I wanted to know if this was a legit excuse, and whether this was going to be a common occurrence. That I was getting mixed messages, and wanted things plain and simple.

Then I said “fuck it” to texting, and called her.

We talked. I talked first, and tried to explain where I was coming from. And then she talked. And wanted me not to make assumptions, that she was flakey, because she wasn’t, and that she didn’t use people. I explained that I wasn’t making assumptions about her…but that I had lots of issues with this in the past and wanted to make it perfectly clear whether she was trying to tell me to bugger off, or whether it was really just a situation where things came up, and she legitimately had to cancel. She told me it was column B, that she did want to see me. I tried to explain that this wasn’t me trying to take up her time, or become super clingy. It was just that we had something planned, that I had turned down other things on my schedule, and then to have it canceled when I then had to spend the rest of the night home alone thinking about it.

I wished her a good night, and a good trip. She said she’d call me soon.

I was silly, and texted her, telling her I was glad we had that conversation, and to play well on the radio tomorrow.

And I’m going to leave it at that. Ball is in her court. If she calls, and wants to set up another date, I’m game. If not, well, at least I had a fun adventure in the ER (let me tell you, my foot is still a rainbow of pretty colors), and some really fucking good conversation.

And then I’ll have to figure out how to not like her anymore. Sigh. It’s so much easier when you’re just hooking up with friends.

-Essin’ Em

PS. Will someone tell me if this is normal for “seeing each other” or if these drugs and my weird brain are making me way more dramatic and emotional that one is supposed to be…