Ten Days in Burma - Part 2
Friday, August 22, 2008
Read Part 1 here.
About 2 days into my pen pal’s departure for
Michael made my stomach flip. I loved being around him, and it was seemingly mutual. We enjoyed the same things – wine, food,
On our 2nd date Michael slipped into the conversation that he'd been talking about the "girl he was dating" to his best friend in Colorado. I coyly asked him if she knew he was cheating on her with me, and he laughed and kissed me across the table. He asked me out for Valentine's Day for our 3rd date and he told me he wanted to take me to
But despite the disappointment of having my heart stomped on by yet another New York man, errr- boy, I was struck by the fact that I had finally realized that there was absolutely nothing I could do to change or help or fix this. It was the first time I had ever conceded to the lack of control I had in a relationship. Usually I spent several hours, ok - days (occasionally months) berating myself, going over and over and OVER the relationship in my head, trying to figure out how I'd screwed things up, what I could have done differently. I wasted hours of my precious 20's worrying about what had gone wrong, even with men that I really wasn’t particularly interested in. (It was fine that I didn’t want them, BUT WHY on EARTH DIDN’T THEY WANT ME!?!?!) This time was different. I finally realized that I was never going to know what had gone wrong. I could take Michael's word for what he had said (even though it sort of sounded like a crock of shit) or I could squander away days of my precious youth figuring out how it was my fault. I finally chose the former. Whether or not it had anything to do with me, I had no control of this situation. All I could do was move forward.
My move forward was helped by Burma Boy’s consistent emails. And although they put a smile on my face, they still seemed harmless since he was living in
Well, let’s go out this week in NYC... I'll be visiting my little sista and her baby - need a little play time points before I bail to
this actually seems like a perfect point in this one-sided email conversation to throw in the minor detail that the boy and i are done for right now. he has some stuff he needs to work through, and under the circumstances, it doesn't seem like the time to be starting a new relationship. it feels weird to tell you this but also weird not to so i'm telling you. i'm babbling. because i'm not sure why i feel like i should tell you but not telling you feels sort of like lying and i'm not so into lying. i just think it's bad karma to strategically leave out information. i feel like since i told you when i was dating someone, i should also inform you when i'm not. and that's the end of that. so if you still want to, let's play in nyc this week (for the record, i would have wanted to hang out and meet you regardless of my single or not single status...) i have your cell and here's mine…
As it turned out, Burma Boy agreed with me about karma and not lying and decided that he did still want to meet me for drinks. Fabulous.
But on Friday, the idea of finally meeting Burma Boy started to feel far less fabulous. I’m not sure if it was that I’d been violently ill on Thursday and had been in bed all day comatose from the amounts of Tylenol Flu that I’d taken, or if it was because I just couldn't stomach the idea of yet another blind date. Michael had given me a 2 month break from the string of 8 or 9 horrific Jdates I’d gone on since January 2003, when my therapist informed me that in order to actually have a boyfriend, I was going to have to go on dates and meet new people. Novel idea. Since, I REFUSED to go to “singles nights” and I’d pretty much depleted my supply of friend’s friends, AND I worked in the Broadway theater where men wear stilettos more often than women, Jdate seemed like my only option.
Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 11:10 AM
Labels: 10 Days in Burma, past, writing exercise, yeah...i'm a little bit crazy
ahhhh! im loving this little saga...
ps- this whole story feels like it could be a movie. or a satc episode. in fact, if you could post this at say, 8pm some night, so that i could enjoy reading this with a cocktail in hand, that would be really swell ;)