Lowenstein, Lowenstein
Feb. 4th, 2002 09:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
raybearThis weekend was celebratory honoring of the insitution of brunch. In that, I had it twice. Once at Juan's apartment with his lovely roommate and friends who are too nice for words and can occasionally make a socially shell-shocked person nervous ("he seems a little TOO nice, if you know what I mean....") but I've gotten better at getting over it and just enjoying the company of pleasant strangers and wholesome conversations about overseas travel and good Colombian restaurants while eating crepes with nutella and raspberries.
On Sunday I had brunch a second time at Differently Paced Coworkers apartment, a sort of celebration of her birthday the day before. Despite the almost-intoxicating (and not in a good way) presence of 30something lesbians, I had a nice time. I previously mistook the atmosphere for being overly white, partly because I was influenced by L__ complaining of her experience of being asked numerous times whether she had made the tamales herself. But not everyone knows it takes 10 pairs of hand and 20 hours of labor to make tamales. And looking back, I realized that out of the 11 people there, one woman was Indian, two were Middle Eastern (one woman Iranian, the other I can't remember correctly), one was Cuban, and one was Chicana. So L___'s characterization was NOT quite accurate. Far be it from this white boy to tell her what did or didn't happen, but I also don't want to typecast the entire brunch atmosphere either.
Maybe my perception has been re-written by two follow-up incidents. First, DPC called to thank me and she's so nice sometimes it kills me. Figuratively. Second, L__ wanted to have lunch with me today to talk more about a revelation I made to her last week. I made the mistake of sharing something with her that I had been thinking about regarding my relationships to other people and how they've been shaped by my relationship to my parents (who's hasn't?). And she seemed a bit overly enthused, as if it somehow explained everything in our relationship. I immediately bristled and changed the subject. Yesterday she said she noticed I moved the topic away and wanted to talk more. I said no. Just flat out no. I never fcking just say no. I mean, of course it followed with 20 minutes of explanatory discussion, but I'm still sort of impressed with myself for inititaly just unapologetically saying "ummmm. no."
What I said last week:"I constantly search with my parents for recognition and ways to make them love me. I noticed that sometimes with friends/lovers, I do the same thing, but once I 'win' their love, I don't know what to do and I just move onto to someone new to try and win their love."
Her response: "YESSS!!!!!"
My response: "uh, yeah, so anyway, I do have the capacity to have friendships that last longer than a month, but it's an interesting superificial trend. i watched this great movie last weekend -- have you seen Gosford Park?"
Why her response bothered me: Whenever I need space away from her (or even just everyone) she has a tendency to make it about her doing something to upset me, and she attempts to win me back, which of course drives me crazy since I'm looking for time apart, not having her buy me gifts. Sure, I probably go overboard at times in acting withdrawn and make a mistake by not articulating my concerns (i.e. just straight up tell her "hey I'm needing some time alone and feeling really busy, so I probably won't be calling folks for awhile"), but to be honest, this bothers me. I don't have to do this with other friends. In fact, this is the benefit of friends -- you don't have to have talks about your relationship because they're my friend, not my girlfriend/boyfriend/lover/mistress/spouse/wife. But she wants to have discussion about us and how we interact and what we mean to each other. And then I feel like some weird asshole for just being like "let's just watch the john woo movie -- pass the beer and potato chips." I don't mind occasionally having spontaneous discussions about our friendship, but for the love of every fcking god, goddess and spirit, please do not schedule a time to talk to me about our relationship. And I don't want her taking my statement and being like "oh, THAT's why he sometimes pulls away from me -- because I already love him and he's looking for someone new to love" or some other type bullshit. No, suprisingly enough, I do have the ability to maintain a close friendship for years. Yesterday she said that my admittance made her feel relieved because she puts so much on herself. And part of me wanted to say "yeah, you do. so stop it."
I think I need to be completely honest about what this is really about. And it's going to sound weird, but if she's treating this like a dating relationship, I will use the same language. She's more into me, more in love with me, than I am with her. I do adore her and I love her and I support her wholeheartedly and am happy to have her in my life. But thinking back towards the beginning of our friendship, she was the first person to talk about how I'm like family to her. And I was surprised and flattered, but I would be lying if I said I initially felt the same way. It's almost like she was the first person in the affair to say "I love you" and I said it back even though I might not have been ready or it might not have been totally true. So now it's like I've been caught lying.
I have no idea where to go from here. I don't need some sort of "break-up", i.e. an extended period away from her. The amount of time we spend together is perfectly fine -- I just want the expectations to go down some, and I need to do away with half of our conversations being about us or what I mean to her or whatever. I mean, MelRo will tell you I have a high tolerance for sap and sentimentality and emotional confessionals and talks of relationships (she saw me watch The Prince of Tides last night for the 15th time in my life), but hell, even I have some limits.
And the bottom line is I can't talk about something that isn't there.
Fuck I didn't mean to write about any of this. And maybe not all of it is true. Though I've obviously mean marinating on it some, I guess even subconsciously. I was planning on writing about watching parts of The Handmaiden's Tale and 'gender treachery' and how it reminds me of my college friend who moved to Seattle and I will hopefully see her when I'm there in a couple weeks. Or writing about![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
wearemany's uplifting phone message reminding me of people from another time in my life.
Oh well. Now it's too late and I must work.
On Sunday I had brunch a second time at Differently Paced Coworkers apartment, a sort of celebration of her birthday the day before. Despite the almost-intoxicating (and not in a good way) presence of 30something lesbians, I had a nice time. I previously mistook the atmosphere for being overly white, partly because I was influenced by L__ complaining of her experience of being asked numerous times whether she had made the tamales herself. But not everyone knows it takes 10 pairs of hand and 20 hours of labor to make tamales. And looking back, I realized that out of the 11 people there, one woman was Indian, two were Middle Eastern (one woman Iranian, the other I can't remember correctly), one was Cuban, and one was Chicana. So L___'s characterization was NOT quite accurate. Far be it from this white boy to tell her what did or didn't happen, but I also don't want to typecast the entire brunch atmosphere either.
Maybe my perception has been re-written by two follow-up incidents. First, DPC called to thank me and she's so nice sometimes it kills me. Figuratively. Second, L__ wanted to have lunch with me today to talk more about a revelation I made to her last week. I made the mistake of sharing something with her that I had been thinking about regarding my relationships to other people and how they've been shaped by my relationship to my parents (who's hasn't?). And she seemed a bit overly enthused, as if it somehow explained everything in our relationship. I immediately bristled and changed the subject. Yesterday she said she noticed I moved the topic away and wanted to talk more. I said no. Just flat out no. I never fcking just say no. I mean, of course it followed with 20 minutes of explanatory discussion, but I'm still sort of impressed with myself for inititaly just unapologetically saying "ummmm. no."
What I said last week:"I constantly search with my parents for recognition and ways to make them love me. I noticed that sometimes with friends/lovers, I do the same thing, but once I 'win' their love, I don't know what to do and I just move onto to someone new to try and win their love."
Her response: "YESSS!!!!!"
My response: "uh, yeah, so anyway, I do have the capacity to have friendships that last longer than a month, but it's an interesting superificial trend. i watched this great movie last weekend -- have you seen Gosford Park?"
Why her response bothered me: Whenever I need space away from her (or even just everyone) she has a tendency to make it about her doing something to upset me, and she attempts to win me back, which of course drives me crazy since I'm looking for time apart, not having her buy me gifts. Sure, I probably go overboard at times in acting withdrawn and make a mistake by not articulating my concerns (i.e. just straight up tell her "hey I'm needing some time alone and feeling really busy, so I probably won't be calling folks for awhile"), but to be honest, this bothers me. I don't have to do this with other friends. In fact, this is the benefit of friends -- you don't have to have talks about your relationship because they're my friend, not my girlfriend/boyfriend/lover/mistress/spouse/wife. But she wants to have discussion about us and how we interact and what we mean to each other. And then I feel like some weird asshole for just being like "let's just watch the john woo movie -- pass the beer and potato chips." I don't mind occasionally having spontaneous discussions about our friendship, but for the love of every fcking god, goddess and spirit, please do not schedule a time to talk to me about our relationship. And I don't want her taking my statement and being like "oh, THAT's why he sometimes pulls away from me -- because I already love him and he's looking for someone new to love" or some other type bullshit. No, suprisingly enough, I do have the ability to maintain a close friendship for years. Yesterday she said that my admittance made her feel relieved because she puts so much on herself. And part of me wanted to say "yeah, you do. so stop it."
I think I need to be completely honest about what this is really about. And it's going to sound weird, but if she's treating this like a dating relationship, I will use the same language. She's more into me, more in love with me, than I am with her. I do adore her and I love her and I support her wholeheartedly and am happy to have her in my life. But thinking back towards the beginning of our friendship, she was the first person to talk about how I'm like family to her. And I was surprised and flattered, but I would be lying if I said I initially felt the same way. It's almost like she was the first person in the affair to say "I love you" and I said it back even though I might not have been ready or it might not have been totally true. So now it's like I've been caught lying.
I have no idea where to go from here. I don't need some sort of "break-up", i.e. an extended period away from her. The amount of time we spend together is perfectly fine -- I just want the expectations to go down some, and I need to do away with half of our conversations being about us or what I mean to her or whatever. I mean, MelRo will tell you I have a high tolerance for sap and sentimentality and emotional confessionals and talks of relationships (she saw me watch The Prince of Tides last night for the 15th time in my life), but hell, even I have some limits.
And the bottom line is I can't talk about something that isn't there.
Fuck I didn't mean to write about any of this. And maybe not all of it is true. Though I've obviously mean marinating on it some, I guess even subconsciously. I was planning on writing about watching parts of The Handmaiden's Tale and 'gender treachery' and how it reminds me of my college friend who moved to Seattle and I will hopefully see her when I'm there in a couple weeks. Or writing about
wearemany's uplifting phone message reminding me of people from another time in my life. Oh well. Now it's too late and I must work.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
things we think but do not say...
Date: 2002-02-04 08:48 am (UTC)um, this is why your journal is perfect. i feel this way far too often for it to be written off as a personality quirk. but i have had lots of trouble articulating it. because it just seems so damning. i wish i could be more comfortable with the "spoils" of love, instead of the chase. i'd hate to think astrology [aries] or myers-brigg personality temperment [ENFP] plays a major role in this area.
I have no idea where to go from here. I don't need some sort of "break-up", i.e. an extended period away from her. The amount of time we spend together is perfectly fine -- I just want the expectations to go down some, and I need to do away with half of our conversations being about us or what I mean to her or whatever. I mean, MelRo will tell you I have a high tolerance for sap and sentimentality and emotional confessionals and talks of relationships (she saw me watch The Prince of Tides last night for the 15th time in my life), but hell, even I have some limits.
oh totally. i seem to attract people who want to *talk* about the relationship as if it is some invalid that needs hushed controlled discussions in order to survive. i hate this. it isn't as though i don't have some of the same concerns or other concerns, but i do better to work them out somewhere else [in my journal, in my head or with other people]. it doesn't mean i don't love the person or the relationship, but that's not the way i choose to exprss my love, by talking the 'ship to death. people should stop expecting love to come in some predescribed package and accept the one in front of them. so much anguish could be avoided. like my boyfriend is wildly forgetful. and i don't bitch about it, because well i'm wildly forgetful as well. [which is neither here nor there] but if i really really wanted that trait in a person i wouldn't find someone who didn't have it and then demand they acquire said trait. i have so much to say on this subject, but as usual you've articulated my thoughts better than i could.
Re: things we think but do not say...
Date: 2002-02-04 08:55 am (UTC)I think I'm feeling delayed embarassment for my confession, which might be a hint of the problem. like i just blurted it out, then felt ashamed afterwards. usually i feel ashamed first, then spit it out in a confessional-manner later. and I guess I never realized I was a "chase" type of person before -- because I wasn't doing it in a sexual way (more commonly seen and commented upon by others) and tended to do it in a more emotional way.
i realized that i am the king of emotional one-night stands. and like sexual ones, sometimes they become friendships, sometimes they become hilarious anecdotes, sometimes they become cringe-inducing stories....and sometimes they become partners.
i will be king and you will be queen...or vice versa
Date: 2002-02-04 09:28 am (UTC)i realized that i am the king of emotional one-night stands.
and i am the queen. i can't believe i've made TWO references to bowie's heroes in less than a month. something is seriously up with me.
but in all seriousness, thank you for this entry. it's given me some stuff to think about and write about in my paper journal. *mwah*
no subject
Date: 2002-02-04 10:34 am (UTC)myles the super processor
no subject
Date: 2002-02-04 11:07 am (UTC)or something.
yes! i'm probably going to go out to dinner, but later in the evening is good.
no subject
Date: 2002-02-04 09:50 pm (UTC)and by the way, GHSHCF = gREAT song, sigh, en vogue = my heroes