One Step Forward Two Steps Back?

I'm taking a step back. In everything. Cocooning, if you will, cloaked in a comforting blanket of my ipod and my crocheting (which is an extremely addictive habbit).

This hibernation was first inspired by the need to step back from my relationship with Doc Harley, as evidenced by Saturday night's pitiful crying in the snow episode. Things with DH had been going rather well after our wonderfully productive and mutually supportive discussion (which this slacker monkey never quite got around to translating into a blog entry - sorry). I wasn't freaking out, I wasn't overly sensitive, and I wasn't bringing past experiences into the present; I was more confident in our ability to work things out and inspired by the fact that he wanted to...he wanted to fight for this to work.

Last Thursday night, he met me and two of my friends (including my lovely stage manager, Potato Person, from the out of town show I did a little over a year ago) to go out for Thai food. He was positively charming over dinner and a lovely time was had by all. Afterwards, I was going to walk my two friends to the subway, and I assumed I would meet him back at his place. While we were walking briefly in the same direction, he asked me what my plans for the evening were, and whether I wanted to go to his place or go home. The truth was, of course, that I wanted to (and totally expected to) go to his place, but being the overly proud idiot who is slightly incapable of voicing her wants that I am, I said "Its entirely up to you; I can go either way. What do you want to do?" Ummm, hello, wrong answer! He responded that he was tired and wanted to go home, meaning alone. Naturally, I was wounded, but by my own sword. He mentioned getting together on Friday, but I told him that I already had plans, and that on Saturday I was going to Not-So-Sneaky-Eliza's party. He looked slightly disappointed, so I reminded him that I had already invited him to the party and he had said he'd go, and he said "Oh, well then I'll see you Saturday then. We'll go to the party."

Remember that sentence folks.

I walked my friends dejectedly to the subway, feeling like a grand asshole lying in the bed of my own making, wondering when the hell I would finally learn to say what I want. I dropped them off at their trains and decided to take a different train home, to walk in the direction of his apartment and allow him time to get home so that I could call and tell him that I did indeed want to come over. I was being proactive! I was being strong! And by the 7th unanswered call I was being pathetic once again! By the 8th call, he had turned off his phone, or for some reason it went straight to voicemail. I left a message saying that I did in fact want to go over there, and that I didn't feel like making the long trek across and uptown. The message was just a fruitless formality, really, as I was almost at the subway and his ringer was off. While changing trains on a subway platform that allows enough signal to text message, I sent him a text message saying "I did want to come over, but I wasn't sure u wanted me there."

By the time I arrived home the whole thing had snowballed to epic proportions in my mind. I knew, however, that I was being silly, and that he had just spent several hours having dinner with my friends so clearly his wanting to go home and sleep was not a rejection of me. I miraculously did not end up sobbing on my roomate's breast, and instead went to sleep with the understanding that I would see this all differently in the morning. I did.

Friday night, I was out with one of my lovely Vagina Warriors, whom I had not seen in months. We were splitting a bottle of wine and talking about everything under the sun, including Doc Harley, when lo and behold a text message arrives saying that he was going to the Russian baths for a steam and then wanted to go get sushi at 10 and asking me if I was around. So I quickly composed a message back saying that I was with the Kissable Kiwi (I had to go for the alliteration there...too tempting not to) and to call when he got out of the steam baths. He replied "Ok". Now perhaps I am being presumptuous here, and perhaps "ok" has a different meaning in his world, but I assumed that it meant he would call. I am clearly not entirely insane, as the Kissable Kiwi took it to mean the same thing and was looking forward to possibly meeting him. When he hadn't called by 10:30, at KK's urging, I sent a text message saying "What time is sushi?" (the definitive no loopholes message). Still no response via text or phone call. We finally left the bar at around 12:30pm or one bottle and 4 glasses of wine later, depending on which unit of measurement you ascribe to. I called and left a voicemail message saying "Clearly you evaporated in the steam, because you never called me." The next voicemail message, left on the way home from the subway after a short ride with my short fuse, said "It really bothers me when you say you're going to call and you don't. It wouldn't bother me if you just didn't call; but when you say you're going to call and don't that hurts my feelings. It's inconsiderate. I hope you enjoyed your sushi." (ever the petulant child, I couldn't resist)

[Editor's note: here would be where I spent a good hour or two composing a brilliant (I can say that because its lost) rest of this post, which was subsequently and frustratingly lost out somewhere in the blogosphere. Perhaps when I learn how to be in a good relationship, I will also learn to write in word and then copy and paste for saving purposes. It is now 3:45am on Thursday morning, and as I can't sleep, I am bound and determined to finish this epic post begun so very long ago. Perhaps then rest will come, but its doubtful...]

Saturday was spent in the arduous and treacherous task of discovering that there was indeed a floor in my room, long ago buried under mountains of clothes and papers and plastic bags filled with clothes and papers and other various and sundry missing objects long ago forgotten but suddenly vitally important enough not to throw away. This grand feat was celebrated by all, especially The Lone Star Talent, who could now enter my room without the usual tripping and falling among the unintentional booby traps. The celebration was , however, slightly marred by the conspicuously and continually silent phone. As the party hour drew closer, I stubbornly refused to break the silence and call DH. He presumably knew we had plans for the evening (considering it was discussed a mere day and a half ago), he presumably knew I was upset that he had not called the night before, and damnit, he still owed me a fucking phone call. I was not going to call him like some nagging parental figure reminding him of our plans and instructing him where and when to meet me only to be disappointed. I prefer my disappointments to be with a side of dignity, thank you.

By 8pm, the appointed hour for the festivities to begin, he still had not called. I phoned Not-So-Sneaky-Eliza, the host, to ask her if she needed me to bring anything. She asked me to bring some beer and then asked, "So are you bringing..?"at which point I interrupted her saying, "No one. Just me, myself and I." Being the phenomenal friend that she is, her reply was "Yay! That's my favorite person anyway!"

Why can't men be like that? You know, magically say just the right thing that makes it all okay?

I had a lovely time at the party, pre-crying in the snow episode at least; I felt social capable, perhaps even slightly attractive and interesting. I usually tend to be slightly shy at parties which comes out in one of two modes: silent human art wall decoration or sarcastic bitch; I'm still not sure which is worse. But Saturday night I was neither, I was actually interacting and flirting a little (having been pimped out, by the host in the know who was trying to help me achieve my goal of a little holiday smooching), having conversations and meeting people. Early on, despite my solemn vows not to, I made the mistake of checking the phone. I had decided that for the evening I was going to pretend like I didn't have a boyfriend, thus preventing disappointment in the behavior of a certain pseudo-non-boyfriend. I broke my own rule, however, and found a text message waiting for me. It read, "Its 9:30pm on Sat. U at ur party?" So he did remember about the party. Wow, even pretending to be single couldn't erase the hurt and disappointment at being knowingly stood up. Mind you, the text message contained no explanation for not being there, no explanation for not calling, and IT WAS A TEXT MESSAGE AND NOT THE FUCKING PHONE CALL I WAS OWED!!

Now, dear reader, can you understand how I might have ended up in that alley crying in the snow?

The Lone Star Talent informed me that when I got home that night I was drunkenly sobbing "I'm defective! I'm defective!", at which point she lifted my shirt and said, "Nope, there's a quality control tag here on your back and its dated 1976. you're most definitely not defective." My brilliant change in tactic was to then start sobbing "I'm faulty then! I'm faulty! Something's wrong with me...it must be me." Yeah, good times in the 'ol apartment o' sobs. Our neighbors must love us. We've decided that we should just make crying noises and shout random self depricating phrases even when we're not upset just to further the illusion that we are the freaky manic depressive sobbing girls. We actually tried this the other evening, but ended up laughing too hard to disguise it as crying.

Sunday I decided that I most definitely needed to pull back and just go about living my own life, as Lady Charon counseled me to do. I decided to pull back, I was going to really and truly pretend like I didn't have a boyfriend; trial singledom, if you will. And it actually worked quite well. I enjoyed time with friends, I shot a trailer for an indie film, I went to a Code Pink protest, and enjoyed a few glasses of wine with SL2000...all without being hurt and disappointed that my non-boyfriend STILL HAD NOT CALLED. Not one word. But I was okay, because I didn't have a boyfriend in whom to be disappointed. Doc who? No, no lack of respect was felt when there was "no one" to feel it from.

On Monday I recieved a text message at around 4pm which said "Where are you? How you doing?". I did not reply right away, as it was a text message, and just in case I hadn't amde myself painfully repetetively clear in all caps, HE OWED ME A FUCKING PHONE CALL! Instead, I went to yoga, where I found inner peace and stillness of the mind through a series of bodily contortions and an instructor who ranged from what sounded like hebrew chanting at synogogue to drill sargeant. With my newfound inner peace and stillness of the mind, I decided to return DH's text message, as I was feeling quite loving and compassionate. I wrote "Doing ok, and u?", as I wasn't feeling so loving and compassionate as to forget that he still hadn't called, he stood me up, and he never acknowledged any of that. The textation that ensued went as follows:
"ok. I was not feeling well. I think I'm better now...just working..."
"Sorry you were ill-glad yor feeling better."
"Thanks. Doing much better..."

Wow, that was such a productive exchange! I'm so glad I didn't waste valuable thumb energy on that one. The discerning reader will note that there was no reference made to the lack of contact throughout the weekend, nor the thoughtless behavior echibited, nor the standing up of Saturday night's plans. Oh, unless of course that was meant to be covered under the blanket caviat of "not feeling well." Wow, he must have been truly dying, because I know even when I've been incredibly ill myself, I can at least muster enough strength to contact someone I care about to let them know what's going on, even if its by carrier pigeon.

To make a long story slightly less epic (if I am indeed capable of such a thing), as its now 4:30am and I have yet to sleep, I broke the stubborn fast Tuesday when I initiated contact after receiving a rather severe 2nd degree burn to 1/4 of my lower lip (don't ask - I'm incredibly accident prone to say the least) and the ensuing gigantic swollen blister was threatening to take over my entire face. I was frightened by the ever increasing swelling, so I text messaged him (I wasn't frightened enough to actually call, as I still had some stubborness about me) and he was quite sweet and helpful. An hour or so later, miracle of miracles, he actually picked up the phone and spoke into it under the auspices of calling to see how my lip was. We spoke briefly about my lip, his tentative plans to go to LA Chanukah/Christmas weekend, and his not feeling well; no mention was made by either party of the huge white elephant in the room. I cut him off mid-unintelligable-yawn-sentence and told him to go to bed, as he was clearly tired and really, I didn't know what I wanted to say and I wanted to talk to Lady Charon before making any moves to be sure that I wasn't making mountains of molehills or trafficking in the past rather than the present. He seemed quite surprised, having assumed that the burn text contact initation meant he was in the clear. He said, "Ok, I'll talk to you tomorrow?" I replied, "Sure."

Of course, he never called yesterday.

Lady Charon provided a wealth of sage insight, as always, among which was the fact that he is clearly acting out like a little child, running full speed ahead in the opposite direction from my voiced expectations (which include oh-so-burdensome things such as not blowing off previously made plans and calling when you say you're going to call). She also said that there's something funny going on - either another woman on the side (highly unlikely) or some secret he's hiding regarding his emotional life which I'll probably never be privy to considering his withholding patterns (highly likely); she said people don't just disappear like that for several days from someone they care about. She said either way he is deeply wounded, but as he's unwilling to share his wounds, there's little room for growth the way things stand now. She agreed that his behavior was thoughtless and highly unacceptable, and no, I wasn't making mountains of molehills, I was in fact being treated like shit. She did say it was a mistake to contact him about the burn, as it amounted to jumping over the gigantic pile of poop on the living room floor of the apartment that is our relationship (see, she does actually speak in Synge metaphors) and now he thinks its all okay when its not.

I have a few options now. I can sit down with him and say that we are at a plateau in our relationship on which I do not want to set up camp; we either go deeper into the canyon, or agree to see other people and start the hike out, thus beginning the process of disentangling. Or I can just cut my losses and jump ship totally right now. I'm not sure what I want to do, but I know I don't want to leave things as they are.

Its not okay to be sobbing alone in the snow at 2am; that is not the mark of a healthy happy loving relationship.

Its time to shit or get off the pot - I just need to sit on it a little bit longer in hopes of a little clarity. I didn't bring in a magazine or anything, and I don't intend on staying there all day, but I do need a little time before I do whatever I end up doing.