Comedy or Tragedy?

Having stopped dead in the middle of Stranger than Fiction by the compulsion to share something, I am inspired by the question facing Harold Crick (played by Will Farrell) asked by Jules Hilbert (Dustin Hoffman), "Is the story being written about you (Harold) a comedy or a tragedy?" I find this question remarkably relevant to my life right now.

Having travelled to Asia to teach in Thailand, falling in love with teaching, I returned to a wonderful job in the field of design and am studying a full time teaching course in the part-time hours I am afforded with a full time job. The teaching course includes a ten-week long practical teaching component in which I attend school full time. So my days, for the past ten weeks have looked like this:
5:20am Wake up and eat breakfast
6:20am Leave for school
7:00am Arrive at school
2:00pm Travel from school to work (ETA 2:30pm)
4:30pm Leave work
5:00pm Arrive home and continue with the work that I missed that day.
After completing ‘work’ work, I study for my teaching course.
I have felt nothing short of emotionally and physically exhausted over the past couple of months. My teaching practice is nearly over and immediately following that, I have my mid-year exams. A couple of months ago, I (literally) put my neck out. I do believe the start of this is strongly related to my latest ex-boyfriend, however that is another story but basically, on top of this complete exhaustion, I am facing intense tension headaches and throbbing upper back and neck pain.

I felt like so much had come right when I began seeing Tom, someone who I had met about 6 – 8 months ago and we linked up again recently. Tom was flattering, adored me and all I was about. I got swept up in the situation and began to let myself develop feelings for him. We had so much in common and spoke for hours. I felt like I may have met my match. I broke every rule in the book with him. I made contact initially, I replied to his messages immediately, I called him back, and I let him kiss me on our first date. It felt right, it felt like me. I hate playing games and this seemed to work so beautifully and come so naturally. It was by no means perfect but it felt real-which makes it perfect for me.

On date number two, a Wednesday, I had had an intensely emotional and busy day. I was calm and a little reserved at dinner that night. He asked what was wrong and I said that I thought it was not a lack of attraction; it was a case of being ‘once bitten, twice shy’. He was sick and I think that added to it. When I left, he said we could take things slow. I felt like I made it very clear to him that I did like him but something felt off to me, I don’t know if I was picking something up from him or what but I felt like I had blown it. On Friday morning he sent me an email saying that he was sorry but he still had unresolved issues that needed to be sorted out. He didn’t want to put those issues onto someone else and I deserved someone without those issues. The dramatic irony of this situation is that I didn’t read this email until this (Sunday) evening. He had said we could do drinks on Sunday evening, after I got back. When I hadn’t heard from him all weekend, I sent him a message on my way down, saying that if he wanted to do something, he should let me know. As noble as his email sounds and as much as I agree with him, I don’t think he’s telling me the whole truth. Its situations like this, when you think you have found a vital puzzle piece for your life and it turns out that it is actually from a whole different puzzle, that makes you doubt people, relationships and love altogether.

I have had very few relationships in my life because most of them are long lasting, which I quiet like but it makes my experience, somewhat limited – let’s put it in a nutshell of lesson’s they’ve taught me:
Tristan  I don’t want to be controlled in a relationship or the places or people I interact with to be dictated to me by a boyfriend. I want my independence in a relationship. I am not stupid and I do not want to be demeaned or patronised in a relationship. Change comes from within or from external situations but primarily from one’s own desire to change – no exceptions.
David  I want someone who will love and adore me like David but I don’t want to be worshipped – I am not worthy of that and it makes me uncomfortable.
Ivan  I want someone spiritually mature. I want someone who loves my personality and encourages my misbehaviour but I don’t want to be controlled or have my family and friends criticised in order to manipulate me. I don’t want to be an emotional crutch to someone who has unresolved issues although I am happy to help them out if they are willing to do the work required.
Tom  I am worthy of someone great, who will love and appreciate me. Don’t get too caught up too quickly in something that hasn’t actually happened yet.
Brent  I am special and I don’t even know how special. Some people think of me without even knowing how or why.

I am so sad that Tom won’t give this a chance. I felt like we could give this a shot and I don’t know if any of my actions or things that I said put him off this. I do know that I felt like it was over on Friday morning, so if nothing else, I am picking up on people’s ‘vibes’ a whole lot more than I was realising because the feelings I felt on Friday morning were of regret and I couldn’t understand why I was feeling that.

One cannot change other person (Thanks for the lesson Tristan). I don’t want to change his mind. I want him to want to change it. I think he is scared and is retreating. I was scared. I was scared by what I felt for him and the crazy chemistry we had. I was scared by how much he liked me and how he spoke about long-term so soon (first date).

In the past year, I had David confess his undying love for me, which I said ‘Thanks but no thanks’ to. I had Ivan sweep into my life, blinding me with spiritual waffle and forcing his insecurities onto me, leading me to believe that my father’s infidelity that I witnessed was ‘just him (father) trying to survive’, my mother an emotional ice-berg (the warmest, most inviting woman I know…?), my friend a lesbian (I have nothing against homosexual’s but if you knew this friend, you’d know how impossible it would be to imagine her not gawking and drawling and every male object that walks past) and me, a person that apparently cheats on him with a friend of mine (which also conveniently happened to coincide with him meeting someone else to pursue a relationship with and, in turn, someone else’s life to turn upside-down). After Ivan, I decided to get to know someone before I leap head-first into a relationship with them, which led to my slow start with most guys and although I kissed Tom on our first date, I brought up that I wanted to take things slowly and I don’t know if this didn’t scare him off a bit. I think I may just be making excuses for him.

My other problem is Brent, my step-cousin and someone who I have basically spent the summer with. On Friday night, after his farewell, Brent and I stumbled back to my parents’ house in our drunken stupor and, I can’t remember how it started (my memory is severely impaired from this night) but he said he wanted to talk to me. He loved getting to know me this summer, loved my energy and he didn’t think I knew how beautiful or special I was. I have liked Brent for quite a while but didn’t think it was mutual as he never made a move. He bought me a bracelet when he was in Nepal, I think. Not intending to buy it for me - he “just found himself buying it in a curio shop and kind-of knew he was buying it for me.” He was much better than I was expecting and we made out for hours, only briefly interrupted by my mother and I don’t know what she saw but we’ll just ignore that for now and pray like hell that it never comes up ;-) I told Brent that night that I thought it was crazy and would hurt the family (especially the kids) – he said he didn’t think his parents would mind and that his Dad already knew he liked me – wish I could remember that story, I thought it was so funny that night.

This is why I feel like my life is a tragedy, because all the guys I like either turn out to be arseholes that use me or aren’t interested in me. Guys I’m simply not attracted to profess their love to me. Now there is someone, who is interested in me, who I have grown to love and who, when I am around them, I simply cannot stop laughing and guess what…? We’re related. Is this some kind of joke? Not the comic-relief kind - the black-humour type. The irony, the pain, the cleverness of how it is all put together makes me feel like I am the lead character in a brilliant but shattering, Romantic-Tragedy, rated 18 F for fear of ruining the youth’s perception of what could happen in their lives.

Broken

We had a public holiday on Thursday - I worked my arse off to work off Friday's hours during monday - wednesday and i took Friday off and had a 4 day weekend. My family and the new boyfriend, Ian, went camping in a remote bushy area and set up camp on the corner of a river and the sea and didn't have showers etc so we were roughing it but it was in a beautiful setting and it really was an amazing time. We paddled up the river and hiked up to exquisite waterfalls and went swimming and suntanned like lizards on the rock and didn't see any other people except the locals. Out of this world!

The only glitch was that I'd gone with a friend on Wednesday evening to a wine tasting evening, when Ian had stayed home at his place (an hour away), that he said that this 'wine tasting' sounded very much like a date. I reassured him as best I could and he sulked and didn't participate in anything on Thursday. We chatted on Thursday evening and he said I should have asked him how he felt about this before going. I tried to explain that it was all very last minute and I didn't feel I needed to ask as I felt I was a pretty good judge on whether a guy is a mate of mine or if he's keen on me. He said he just needed time to think about this because he (all of a sudden) didn't think that I was the 'type of person' he wanted to be with. When he went to bed he said again that he'd think about it but "its not looking good". He was very hard that night - like he'd shut off his emotions completely and this freaked me out. I have no idea how someone can do that when they say they love you and are crazy about you. I didn't sleep that night.

Friday morning he woke up saying he still loved me and proceeded to be his usual self the rest of the weekend. I took this as an "We're A-OK" and hoped to just talk it over when we didn't have the whole family around. We came back on Sunday night and all had some much-needed sleep. Monday morning he calls me and breaks up with me. I was so flabbergasted over this whole thing - I didn't even think I was still on trial!! I get this news Monday morning at work over the fucking phone. I tried to keep it together at work but it was rough. I texted him asking him to please have the decency to talk to me face to face and I said as nicely as I could that I didn't think this was the root of the problem and I'd be happy to talk it through. He called later and said we'd just be prolonging it if we met and he apologised for doing it over the phone but said he needed to protect himself. Again - he's been hard and cold - I now feel like I'm dealing with someone I've never known and am at a loss at all of this! Clearly he wants out - I get that and respect it but wish he could give me a reasonable explanation. I'm just so bleak because I thought we had so much that was SO good and it seems like the most ridiculous reason to break up over but I know he is really insecure and sensitive over this kind of stuff - I just wish he'd let me talk to him.

It has been said time and again that relationships are there to teach us things and I have learnt a huge amount from being with Ian. He is a very spiritual person and this is a side of myself I began to explore in Thailand and he was able to extend me further in this regard when we got together. Another thing Ian said to me in the 'argument' on Thursday evening which resulted in being his 'reasons for the breakup' was that I do this to my boyfriends to get back at my father subconsciously. I don't really have clarity on exactly what it is that I am doing and this is making it very hard for me to give the relationship closure and allow me to move on.

He has had a similarly traumatic childhood to mine in that he walked in on his mother kissing another man when he was a young boy. This has led to a large amount of mistrust with women - I remember saying at the beginning of the relationship that we were the most unlikely couple as I didn't trust men as much as he didn't trust women but somehow this seemed to make us work...or so I thought. Unfortunately many of his previous girlfriends proved to Ian that women couldn't be trusted and that has led him to believe (in my opinion) that I was up to no good. The confusing thing is he said he knew I'd never cheat on him and I know in my heart of hearts that if I am in a committed relationship, I do not flirt or consider anyone else - that is just who I am. I said I would be willing to work on this for him and for us and he said that the sad thing is is that I am the kind of person that would work on it but he wasn't willing to wait around.

I am at a loss but suspect that this has happened before with him. I think there is a point that he reaches with a woman and from thereon out there is a brick wall which no one can penetrate. It is incredibly frustrating to be on the other side and feel like you are not being heard. Like I said there is so much that was right about us and I had a very strong feeling about the two of us - I am worried about him as I feel he is throwing away one opportunity after another of loving another with all his heart and allowing himself to be loved. I believe this retaliation comes from a place of severe fear but he holds onto it because it is what he knows and he believes he is protecting himself. People in this situation feel like they are fighting for survival but in fact it just breaks them down more. I know I love very deeply and I have been hurt by this but I cannot imagine depriving myself of love - to me that is just tragic.

I wonder if parents realise the extent of damage or joy they inflict in their children's lives. Sometimes I think they simply do not realise how malleable their children are at these tender ages and how much each action affects them. Having said that, I do not believe that we can blame our parents for our beliefs - at some point we have to pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off and we all know deep down that our beliefs are our choice. If you read through my earlier blogs, you will see the kind of emotional turmoil that I have endured since a very young and influential age. The funny thing is is that in all honesty, I saw something that no one at any age should see their parent doing and a much younger age than he was. I saw my father sleeping with another woman at age 5 and he saw his mother kissing another man at age 8. The extremities are vastly different and while I certainly come with my share of issues and problems - I do not feel they come close to his. This is not a competition, I'm not trying to be better than him - I just wish he would take it into consideration in realising that I would never dream of compromising what we had because of what I've been exposed to.

Extra, Extra, Read All About It!

My new boy is organizing a surprise for me for my birthday. I'm so excited and so stoked coz all I ever wanted was for my ex to take the initiative and do something like that - just once. Even if he just phoned and made a reservation for us or something. I would hint for it or leave it open, I even threw him a couple of surprise parties so he could see how much fun they are but he never did in all our years together and here this boy is - who hasn't even been with me for a month - and he wants to do this for me. I'm blown away. In fact, very weird this, but I'd be lying if I said I was completely comfortable with the situation. The truth is that I really am not used to being treated the way he treats me. All I wanted from my ex was just a little bit of what I'm getting now and I think its because the only proper relationship I've ever known is that one with my ex and how he treated me and if I ever asked for anything he'd say my standards were too high and he was a shit boyfriend bla bla bla. So I stopped asking for change and decided to lower my standards and just be happy. Something a friend said to me (from her mum) which is something I'm trying to convey to all my friends because it's such a valuable lesson was, "Don't let anyone EVER tell you that your standards are too high. They are your standards and they are what will make you happy. Do not compromise on that."

People that aren't very close to me are starting to hear about my new boyfriend and I'm hearing things that I'm expecting everyone to say, "Sho! That was quick!" Anyways, I've decided that people have already made up their minds of what they think about me and I'm sick of bending around everyone else's standards and lives so they don't have anything to talk about. It's my life and I'm an adult and I know what I'm doing so.... a little scary but like I said: my focus now is happiness and me.