Sunday, January 03, 2010

Come What May

One more reason to be gay: (not that all women are like this, and plenty of gay men are…) I am at the coffee shop (my last day of freedom till spring break) and there is one table left (I got my favorite one!) and this straight couple with an adorable little girl came over to this table. He starts to sit down, and she starts griping and gesturing around the place. Wanting a better seat (this is the second best seat in the place, btw, so she’s nuts). He tries explaining how this is the only seat. She refuses. Gestures a lot. Finally, she walks away to stand in front of the coffee shop, staring at all the tables she would rather have. He follows her. They stand there for a bit, staring. Gesturing. They leave. Even in my darkest moments, I won’t trade places with that man, or that adorable daughter, for that matter.

Disclaimer: Nothing that follows is meant to be a resolution—it’s just poor timing. I don’t do resolutions. Haven’t in years and years. I think they are stupid. Plus, thanks to other people making resolutions, my gym gets more crowded for a couple months every year until people remember they never intended keeping their promises anyway.

Last night’s date was pretty great. Not perfect, but really great. He apparently isn’t a hand holder in the movies. I am. I would almost hold hands with the stranger beside me if the mood hit. However, from the very first moments, conversation flowed easily and genuinely. Doesn’t do drugs or smoke, wants kids, yada, yada. Pretty good kisser too!

Don’t worry. I’m not in love or even beginning to fool myself with such nonsense. However, it was wonderful to be on date with someone cute, whom I sincerely enjoyed and connected with. Plus, I got to go back to Pandora. (If I ever just disappear off the face of the Earth, just assume I found a way to get home.) We’ll see if he calls again. He said he would. . . but we know how that goes.

Disclaimer two: Very little of the following is due to a good date last night—although it did reinforce it. It has been going in and out of my brain a lot the past couple days—especially yesterday during the day, and even more so while at the gym this morning.

It is time for a change. A change of attitude. A change of outlook. A change of expectations. While I don’t believe you can totally simply make up your mind and change every one of your circumstances, it can’t hurt.

I am going to be happy. I’ve been so focused on the happiness I lost, I haven’t been able to let myself be happy at all. There are different levels of happiness, just as there are different levels of pain. I am such an all or nothing person, I’ve seen it as since I can’t have the level of happiness I want, I simply can’t be happy. That isn’t true. I don’t expect to have that level of happiness again—many people (I would argue most) never get to experience the happiness in which I lived. If I spend the rest of my life waiting to be that happy again, I will miss all the lesser happiness around me, which is still happiness. Just because a McDonald’s cheeseburger isn’t a Sonic cheeseburger, it’s still a cheeseburger, and that’s a good thing. And a McDonald’s cheeseburger is better than no cheeseburger at all. Yes, I know some people call that settling.

Another thing I realized, and this is due to last night, is that I will probably be in a relationship again (no I’m not thinking in regards to the man I went out with last night, just in general). Anyone that knows me knows that I am made to be in a relationship—I just function better—call it weak and enmeshment if you want. I’m fine with labels. Do I expect to have a love like I had with him? No, I don’t. Which means, I’m not really sure what a relationship could look like. I don’t think I would consider marriage when I didn’t love that person as much as I love him, and I can’t see that happening. But still. Even if it only looks like going on dates frequently or from time to time.

Also, I simply want to live again. I want to be happy with my body once more, and wear clothes that I feel attractive in. I want to be with my friends again, and sometimes go to parties and such. I want to quit hurting and quite crying. I want to smile and laugh and not bring everyone around me down with melancholy. I want to turn into a form of Brandon again. Even if that Brandon isn’t the same Brandon I was with him and before him. Any Brandon is better than the Brandon I was all last year.

Yes, yes, I realize I am on a high right now, and that these things are easy to say. However, I would argue, these things aren’t easy to say. I’ve not been able to say them before… I know there will be days when these words are far, far from me. I don’t know how I will handle it when I see him out and about, when I see him with someone else. None of these feelings or words lessen what I feel for him or what I want, but I can’t continue to let him not loving me ruin my life. Everyone, everyone says it’s his loss. I don’t believe that. If it were his loss, he would miss me, remember he loved me. Obviously, he is happier now, otherwise he would choose differently. It was MY loss. However, I can’t continue to live consumed by the loss. And, I have to call BullShit on the whole, well, obviously it was God’s plan. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard that. Maybe it wasn’t his plan, maybe it was. Who says that God’s plans always go the way he planned. He gave us this little thing called free will, which mean we can ignore his plan. A plenty of us fuck up our lives because we don’t do his will. And fuck the lives of others the same way. I blame God for A LOT, but he gets A LOT of blame for a ton of things he had nothing to do with. There may be a part of me that never heals, but there are other parts of me that can still function. And, it’s time I do that. Time to function. Time to face trying to be happy, even if that means facing his absence and rejection in a reality that I have yet to do. It’s time.

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