I just returned from a wonderful three day retreat, followed by mom/family time, only to have developed in the last ten minutes and extreme sense of frustration, anger, and disappointment. I'll blog this mixture of emotions first so that I can blog all the good stuff later...Saving the best for last and all that jazz.
About a week ago I went home for some reason, that is unclear to me at the moment, and had every intention of...oh yes that's it...I went home having every intention to work at my mother's job if they needed me and to return her car. Of course the work aspect did not happen mostly from the fact that I'd caught the train home the prior night only to turn around and drive back to school at 7 A.M. in order to teach Girl Scouts about archaeology(I loved it). This event was at my professor's house; Afterwards I drove back to school,packed up again and drove back home which took around 3 hours because of rain and traffic on 95.
After a nice dinner from Mai Thai I started getting idle minded and as the women in my family say, "An idle mind is the devil's workshop"; so I called Him...self- destructive? Not exactly...My Board of Directors (my mother and Ashly) helped me reach this decision. What were they thinking?!? No folks, what was I thinking?!?!!!!!
What began as a supposed night of hangout/movie watching turned into:
"Hey my roommate's here is it ok if he chills with us?"
This my friends should have been the light bulb, sign from above, blinking NO VACANCY sign to make me get in the car and turn around, hell just not get in the car in the first place, but you know me:
"Yea its cool".
Let me set out a few things before I continue. First and foremost Him and myself have this sort of rapport; initially in our friendship he talked about school and work and yadee yah. I talked about life, beliefs, star gazing. Things which seem stereotypically gendered but it went deeper than that. He has beliefs and I'm educated...It was a balance. As time progressed we still talked about those things but we had/have this love/hate joking relationship. We argue about certain things and then laugh 10 seconds later after making faces and rolling eyes; this can go on days, its what we do and we're cool with it as long as we know when to turn that on and off which at some points we overlook. Second, I have a tendency to do one of two things when I'm in situations with new people, specifically friend of a friend type thing. I will be very quiet, feeling my way around the situation and getting to know what things are ok OR I will act with my friend the same way I always do trying to include the new person in on some...Defiantly not all of our jokes...but also be cordial and a little chill. Not too serious, not too silly.
Now that we've addressed those two things let us carry on. I picked up Him and The Roommate, and after 5 minutes of conversation, with which I couldn't input upon ,because it was all about "them" (Him acting to his roommate the way he always does and leaving me to drive) we arrived at Blockbuster. Amazingly The Roommate picks up my umbrella from the back seat and holds it open for me to walk under...Wow! I mean not that I think chivalry is dead, but I had assumed that maybe it was vacationing somewhere foreign to my neck of the woods. After a few joking remarks about movies and a few frustrating remarks from Him, we decided on three films (two for me and one for "them) I paid, we left.
Back to the car and The Roommate held the umbrella again, brief call from Ashly, followed by a pretty lacking conversation about The Roommate's ex...wife. At this point I think about how young I really am related to these two people even though it isn't a gigantic point of focus. The conversation moves into immigration policy...I will definitely blog this discussion in the future. After what I assumed was slightly interesting discussion and a rude drive-thru cashier at Wendy's, we went back to the house. Let's summarize from this point forward:
-Joking question concerning parking garage issues. Smart ass comment from Him.
-Aww the high rise (I love that apartment even without Him in it. That love is
in no way related to Him)
-Movie, Flightplan, really good...Random phone calls including one from my
mother who set her ring tone to Hard Out Here for a Pimp...go figure...Jokes
made about ring tones.
-Movie ends. PS2 play? I ask for Metal Gear Solid which I'm assuming as a woman
I was not supposed to enjoy, this illustrated by the shocked expression and
tone The Roommate took, but he didn't have it.
-It got late and I had to leave. "It was nice to meet you, we should hang out
sometime."
-In the morning a text message from Him "Last night was kewl"
Now I was told that The Roommate thought I was mad:
"No that's just how you and I are together I was cool with him and PLUS It takes me a while to get used to new people."
"It's all good."
"So everything was "kewl" other than that"
"Yes :-)" (This conversation took place on IM lol of course)
-This was all said, so then why is it today I was given this {Condensed Version}...
"You should come over next weekend, just be cool with my roommate"
"See I knew it, your roommate hates me."
"I mean you just were... I don't know."
"I was just like I am all the time WITH YOU. I was nice to your roommate, but me and you are a certain way when we're together we argue its how we are that has nothing to do with him, we joke."
"But you have to have common ground with people before you can be like that. I'm just saying if you come over you have to be nice or he's not going to like you."
"WAIT, I was nice and let me get this straight you want me to be a completely different person so that your roommate will be happy when I was nice to him the entire time anyway?!"
"No I mean really I don't care."
This all followed by more conversation to make me squint my eyes, tilt my head, and stick my tongue in the corner of my mouth...oh yes I was pissed. Not for the general everyday we've done this before reasons because as I said, after retreat I saw a few things differently, a lot differently and it was so freeing of this situation with him. I was at the point where "it's all up to you but, I won't be stressed of pessimistic either way."
After that phone call I'm... I don't even know. Frustrated at the fact that someone who in his screwed up way still flouts loyalty and care about me at the same time wants to alter me to fit a mold created by another person who should have no baring on this relationship at all and who has no basis for judging me when we didn't interact in a way that could possibly reflect how I may behave with people outside of Him. (Run-on...Yes, yes I know.)
This is me, uncompromising, focused, consistent me. Why in the hell would I even think of altering one inch of who I am with or without you in order to please your roommate. It is not a necessity that I have a relationship with this person, as a matter of fact as of late yesterday evening/this morning I was really laying to rest the necessity of having a relationship with you. I won't be that girl who succumbs to standards placed on her by that dominant masculinity. It amazes me that with all that I stand for and believe you would even consider making a suggestion, no, demand of me that is so illogical and disrespectful to who I am and to what we were.
What happens to respect when you allow someone to move beyond the deep friendship that you have into a more fragile place? It goes away. I mean why is there a need to respect a friendship if the friendship was just a replacement to the cold, lonely, isolation of your world? After moving past friendship and managing to deemphasize all of those things which were important to you about the other person you are just left with some fleeting physical closeness which is never significant unless you have the strength to allow it that. That won't last forever, no one will allow that to continue, to be insignificant and further more once the place that the friendship once held is then filled by another distraction you don't need to respect it anymore. You take it for granted slowly losing sight of what it was that drew you into it in the first place. I guess that works for some people; instead of expanding the space in your life once new things come into it you let that space remain the same and simply replace parts as needed; but what happens when in replacement you've thrown away that one good piece, that vintage item which you will never be able to reclaim? What happens then?
**FiREFly**
About a week ago I went home for some reason, that is unclear to me at the moment, and had every intention of...oh yes that's it...I went home having every intention to work at my mother's job if they needed me and to return her car. Of course the work aspect did not happen mostly from the fact that I'd caught the train home the prior night only to turn around and drive back to school at 7 A.M. in order to teach Girl Scouts about archaeology(I loved it). This event was at my professor's house; Afterwards I drove back to school,packed up again and drove back home which took around 3 hours because of rain and traffic on 95.
After a nice dinner from Mai Thai I started getting idle minded and as the women in my family say, "An idle mind is the devil's workshop"; so I called Him...self- destructive? Not exactly...My Board of Directors (my mother and Ashly) helped me reach this decision. What were they thinking?!? No folks, what was I thinking?!?!!!!!
What began as a supposed night of hangout/movie watching turned into:
"Hey my roommate's here is it ok if he chills with us?"
This my friends should have been the light bulb, sign from above, blinking NO VACANCY sign to make me get in the car and turn around, hell just not get in the car in the first place, but you know me:
"Yea its cool".
Let me set out a few things before I continue. First and foremost Him and myself have this sort of rapport; initially in our friendship he talked about school and work and yadee yah. I talked about life, beliefs, star gazing. Things which seem stereotypically gendered but it went deeper than that. He has beliefs and I'm educated...It was a balance. As time progressed we still talked about those things but we had/have this love/hate joking relationship. We argue about certain things and then laugh 10 seconds later after making faces and rolling eyes; this can go on days, its what we do and we're cool with it as long as we know when to turn that on and off which at some points we overlook. Second, I have a tendency to do one of two things when I'm in situations with new people, specifically friend of a friend type thing. I will be very quiet, feeling my way around the situation and getting to know what things are ok OR I will act with my friend the same way I always do trying to include the new person in on some...Defiantly not all of our jokes...but also be cordial and a little chill. Not too serious, not too silly.
Now that we've addressed those two things let us carry on. I picked up Him and The Roommate, and after 5 minutes of conversation, with which I couldn't input upon ,because it was all about "them" (Him acting to his roommate the way he always does and leaving me to drive) we arrived at Blockbuster. Amazingly The Roommate picks up my umbrella from the back seat and holds it open for me to walk under...Wow! I mean not that I think chivalry is dead, but I had assumed that maybe it was vacationing somewhere foreign to my neck of the woods. After a few joking remarks about movies and a few frustrating remarks from Him, we decided on three films (two for me and one for "them) I paid, we left.
Back to the car and The Roommate held the umbrella again, brief call from Ashly, followed by a pretty lacking conversation about The Roommate's ex...wife. At this point I think about how young I really am related to these two people even though it isn't a gigantic point of focus. The conversation moves into immigration policy...I will definitely blog this discussion in the future. After what I assumed was slightly interesting discussion and a rude drive-thru cashier at Wendy's, we went back to the house. Let's summarize from this point forward:
-Joking question concerning parking garage issues. Smart ass comment from Him.
-Aww the high rise (I love that apartment even without Him in it. That love is
in no way related to Him)
-Movie, Flightplan, really good...Random phone calls including one from my
mother who set her ring tone to Hard Out Here for a Pimp...go figure...Jokes
made about ring tones.
-Movie ends. PS2 play? I ask for Metal Gear Solid which I'm assuming as a woman
I was not supposed to enjoy, this illustrated by the shocked expression and
tone The Roommate took, but he didn't have it.
-It got late and I had to leave. "It was nice to meet you, we should hang out
sometime."
-In the morning a text message from Him "Last night was kewl"
Now I was told that The Roommate thought I was mad:
"No that's just how you and I are together I was cool with him and PLUS It takes me a while to get used to new people."
"It's all good."
"So everything was "kewl" other than that"
"Yes :-)" (This conversation took place on IM lol of course)
-This was all said, so then why is it today I was given this {Condensed Version}...
"You should come over next weekend, just be cool with my roommate"
"See I knew it, your roommate hates me."
"I mean you just were... I don't know."
"I was just like I am all the time WITH YOU. I was nice to your roommate, but me and you are a certain way when we're together we argue its how we are that has nothing to do with him, we joke."
"But you have to have common ground with people before you can be like that. I'm just saying if you come over you have to be nice or he's not going to like you."
"WAIT, I was nice and let me get this straight you want me to be a completely different person so that your roommate will be happy when I was nice to him the entire time anyway?!"
"No I mean really I don't care."
This all followed by more conversation to make me squint my eyes, tilt my head, and stick my tongue in the corner of my mouth...oh yes I was pissed. Not for the general everyday we've done this before reasons because as I said, after retreat I saw a few things differently, a lot differently and it was so freeing of this situation with him. I was at the point where "it's all up to you but, I won't be stressed of pessimistic either way."
After that phone call I'm... I don't even know. Frustrated at the fact that someone who in his screwed up way still flouts loyalty and care about me at the same time wants to alter me to fit a mold created by another person who should have no baring on this relationship at all and who has no basis for judging me when we didn't interact in a way that could possibly reflect how I may behave with people outside of Him. (Run-on...Yes, yes I know.)
This is me, uncompromising, focused, consistent me. Why in the hell would I even think of altering one inch of who I am with or without you in order to please your roommate. It is not a necessity that I have a relationship with this person, as a matter of fact as of late yesterday evening/this morning I was really laying to rest the necessity of having a relationship with you. I won't be that girl who succumbs to standards placed on her by that dominant masculinity. It amazes me that with all that I stand for and believe you would even consider making a suggestion, no, demand of me that is so illogical and disrespectful to who I am and to what we were.
What happens to respect when you allow someone to move beyond the deep friendship that you have into a more fragile place? It goes away. I mean why is there a need to respect a friendship if the friendship was just a replacement to the cold, lonely, isolation of your world? After moving past friendship and managing to deemphasize all of those things which were important to you about the other person you are just left with some fleeting physical closeness which is never significant unless you have the strength to allow it that. That won't last forever, no one will allow that to continue, to be insignificant and further more once the place that the friendship once held is then filled by another distraction you don't need to respect it anymore. You take it for granted slowly losing sight of what it was that drew you into it in the first place. I guess that works for some people; instead of expanding the space in your life once new things come into it you let that space remain the same and simply replace parts as needed; but what happens when in replacement you've thrown away that one good piece, that vintage item which you will never be able to reclaim? What happens then?
**FiREFly**
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