I'm Off The Sex

I'm officially off the sex. Well technically, you have to be on the sex to get off the sex. So technically speaking. sex is no longer on the table in the future, but like I said I wasn't previously offering it up as a main course on said table. So more accurately, I give up. I know my problem. I haven't dated in so long, I really don't understand the rules anymore. So I'm on the train reading my tablet today and people board what must have been 42nd st. I'm reading my tablet doing the introverted thing. Someone boards the train and stands in front of me. Let me be specific. This person, crotch first, is adjusting their position in front of me. I'm not paying attention. Adjust. Adjust. The train is not crowded enough for all of this. One more adjustment and the shoes of the person touch my bag. Enough already. I put my tablet in my bag and look squarely at the crotch positioned inches away from my face. I look up. I look up and down. Good GOD the hot dyke who clearly wanted to get my attention whose crotch stood before me was hot. Cute as hell. Black pants with a brown belt. Brown oxford shoes with turquoise shoe strings. Grey button down with the sleeves rolled up to the mid forearm. This chick was very fucking  cute. So what the hell was all of that primal bullshit going on before I actually looked at her? I personally like to keep my crotch as far away from everyone while on the train. I think it is rude. So some chick comes on the train does all of this bullshit to get my attention and says not one word to me. It doesn't make sense. And this is the reason why I am done. I haven't dated in so long, that I have no patience for the games and I don't get the rules. I'm more of a text me 4 days before you want to hang out kind of girl. So when girls do this and they do do this, I have no idea how to react. Is this the mating call of the modern lesbian? The kindergarten notice me notice me sort of way. If hot crotch would have said anything to me, I would have stayed on the train instead of savoring her crotch for one stop. 

Golf, Tennis, and Other White People Stuff

My co-worker likes to play the "If We Were Slaves" game. If you have never heard of this game, thank god for your blessings. It is a game I could only conclude was made by an only child who spent summers alone and wanted to distinguish herself from her imaginary friends. At least once a week she plays this game to her immense amusement, while I silently weep for the future.  Here goes: "If we were slaves, we would both be house Negroes, but I [she] would most likely be confused for an out of state cousin." You get it? We are both fair skinned, but she is the fairest one of all. This clearly means the world to her. I would rather be invisible when she says it. At work.  To the public. It is funny that she is obsessed with her lightness and yet everything I do is considered "White People Shit".  I love asparagus. White People Shit. I asked what I should eat as a black person and the answer was green beans. I like salad, raw spinach and kale and I sauté instead of frying. I read everything and do research and love the violin and I don't listen to rap music. White. People. Shit. The biggest laugh had at my expense was the word "cutlery".  I use the word regularly as would be expected from someone smart enough not to waste time saying three words that have been neatly summed up into one. Cutlery. A huge confused laugh was had. "Who says that?"  Who doesn't?  What should I have said?  "Forks, Knives, and Spoons"? What idiot would say three words when one has been created to sum it up nicely? This was also White People Shit, but more specifically, I speak like a white person.  I have heard this all before. Never by my black friends from HS and college who spoke exactly like me. Dare I meet people from different parts of NY. This is when I encounter the inter-race stupidity. I am told I know everything.  I correct them and say I don't know everything.  I try to learn everything and there is a difference.

What’s worse is that everyone assumes I won't date black people. Some of my oldest friends insist I won't date black people because I “don't like black people shit." Like when I cringe when some idiot says the word "nigger" around me. In reality, I like women and I don't care what color they are wrapped in as long as they are smart and have a good sense of humor.

I like golf. I love it. My mom bought me an indoor golfing set after I asked for it when I was nine and I have loved it ever since. I love tennis. Really love tennis. I mean Monica Seles, Maria Chonchita Alonzo, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario and not just Venus and Serena.  My favorite sport to play is volleyball. I am a huge sports fan. I like to read. I love music. Are these qualities black people don't like? I sat every night drinking tea while my family watched little house on the prairie. My mom, to my dismay, loved westerns. Is this not black people shit? Or is it people shit, which is probably what my mom would say about this whole stupid conversation.

Adrift

There’s a lot to be said post-divorce; or rather, a lot that you’d rather not say. After years of voicing every concern, petty grievance, and minuscule malcontent there is a freedom in not saying anything at all. I fought endlessly with the Ex. Challenged every single statement she made, questioned every difference of opinion as if mine was law and unequivocally accused her of mental duress because, more often than not, we didn't see a goddamn thing eye to eye.

Fast forward to my current relationship and it would appear that the problem is not she, but me. I don’t want to budge. I am a curmudgeon. I want to be left alone, free to speak when the mood strikes me and free to remain distant and aloof just the same. I spent ten years fighting the Battle of Codependence and realize that my definition of freedom may just be a bit extreme for the faint of heart. I speak a language unfamiliar to most. It’s a lonely space – this place stuck between trying to be ‘normal’ and trying to make sense of the lifetime lived with another person in cohabitation and complete dependence. How does one go from the tense ‘we/us’ to ‘I/me’ without missing a beat? How does one maintain a hard fought identity ensconced in a fairly solitary life while trying to maintain a relationship with someone who rightfully demands more than just the ghost of a gf? How do I keep myself while sharing my self, yet stand firm in my personhood?

I’m just one woman adrift, seeking an answer that is probably already apparent. I am easy to love. I am hard to comprehend. I am open and willing and funny and enticing. I am hardened and battered and stoic and cold. There is now a doorway so small, so conditional, that it doesn't really matter who approaches, I will cause a retreat. I will lay it bare and tuck it away so that no matter how hard she tries, I am impenetrable.

Another Year

I always knew I would have kids. I envisioned myself being married to a doctor, having two children and divorced by 26. I was going to raise my ingenious children with my ex-husband in complete amicable bliss. My children would grow to cure cancer. Reality is somewhat of a tempestuous beast. I had fallen in love at the age of 15 and that would render all of my plans moot. My nephew, Edwin, came to live with us October 1992. I was 15. He wasn't one. I was done for. We were inseparable.

As time went on, I came out. Of what I don't know. The closet, a cloud, a funk? No one, I'm sure, expected me to be straight. So when I had a girlfriend who had a son three years younger than Edwin, it was somewhat ho hum. My life changed. I didn't go away to college because of him. I told my mom I would take guardianship of him when she died. He was 8, I was 23, and she was gone. I had a college degree in my pocket, a kid I adored in my hands and a girlfriend I couldn't live without. I couldn't have been more overwhelmed if I tried. Eventually, I had to move out of the house of my raising due to circumstances beyond my control or anyone's understanding. To Brooklyn we go. Kid in tow and me with no clue.

I'm adopted. It took nothing for me to bring Edwin into my bosom as my own and bleed for him. It is that adoption laying over  both our heads that I thought would keep us together. I was better than my mom. I was better than his mom. I made sure of it. I maintained the shittiest of jobs that would help me keep him in the things he wanted and needed and keep us having dinner together every night. I was struggling, but we were happy. Or so I thought.

When it came time for my nephew to act like the man he thought he was, it was too late. I was no longer with my girlfriend. I decided I wanted to be single so I can focus on Edwin in this foreign land called Brooklyn. I held mindless jobs beneath my intellect so I could be the parent he needed. I was involved in school. Heavily. From Kindergarten on, I was that parent. The one all of the teachers knew. That is until he hit me.

My brother called today to wish me a happy birthday just in case he couldn't call me tomorrow. He told me Edwin came to see him. He tells me this not to hurt me, but to inform me. He said he was driving a brand new car with his younger brother. He said he gained weight. See, I sacrificed everything for my nephew. My education, my livelihood, relationships, sex, but I couldn't sacrifice my dignity no matter how much I loved him. My nephew was my child for 18 years and I couldn't see myself as a woman taking that from a child. My nephew's birth mother contacted him on facebook three years ago and he called me to ask what he should do. She hadn't seen or spoken to him since he was two. They were fast rekindling old times and this kills my brother. Like he raised him. Like he is me.  

So what? Why now? I'm having issues right now and I don't know why. I'm having dreams. I plugged my hard drive into my BluRay player and I saw a video "Edwin singing in the shower". It wouldn't play. So I sang the song he made up in the shower in the video like it was today. It was over a decade ago. When I think I'm good, I'm not. When I don't think about him, my brother calls me with an Edwin story. When friends ask me about him, I'm truthful but evasive. I don't know. When I'm honest with myself, it makes me sad. 

Now here I am 3 years removed from my nephew. I don't want to have kids and I don't know how to be in a relationship. I don't believe in regret. I believe in lessons learned. So what did I learn from this? The same thing I learned from my ex. Nothing. I would do it all over again.

Babies and all that jazz

Y'A

I don't know what letter the media assigned to my generation, but I consider people "my age" to be between 30-40. My circle of friends is refreshingly progressive. There is only one married couple in the bunch. The rest of us are either single or serially monogamous, but never getting to the U-Haul stage. It's pretty awesome to have Sunday Funday without waiting on babysitters. Ahhh the good life. Imagine my utter shock when, upon arriving at MID-THIRTIES, some of us (mostly the men) are suddenly talking about settling down. I don't know where they are getting this from. It must be in a Playboy or Men's Health because it basically reads like a script. "You know, I'm getting close to 40 so I'm thinking about settling down. We are the same age. You know what I mean?" No actually I don't. I, unlike most women, don't consider age a precipitating factor in my decision to marry. I have always wanted to have kids and even my rapidly declining egg production is not pushing the issue. This all makes me feel weird. A Peter Pan of sorts. And why aren't my female friends going through the same biological clock bullshit? Talking to these guys makes me feel old.

Maybe these male friends of mine waited so long to be mature that it all rushes them at once. One of my best guy friends asked me if he should ask out a single mom we know. She will never say yes because he is the most immature person that I know. He recently got a dog and I have no issue admitting I'm concerned about the well-being of this dog. I wouldn't trust him with a plant. I tried to tell him the single mom is awesome yes, but her son is like 12 now. He is basically a lil man and old enough to call out bullshit. The real problem I have is his reasoning for wanting to date her. He said "at my age, I don't know if I will ever get married or have kids so I think she is the type of person I should be dating." What the fuck does that even mean? I don't know what's going on with people in their thirties having a midlife crisis, but I cannot sympathize. I still have money to waste and wine to drink before I start feeling lonely and settle down to have babies and all that jazz.

Jess

This mid-life crisis business is hitting my friends a bit early. One female, 27, has already been married, bought and sold a house, and gotten divorced. So I guess you could say her practical age is accelerated. Instead of stepping back and enjoying singlehood, she’s been on a mission to find Mr. Right 2.0 and decided literally two weeks ago that she’s tired of renting and is going to buy a house. She’s already put an offer in and will be devastated if it falls through. Her boyfriend of 6 months must be shitting himself by now, knowing the next step will be the invite to keep his personal affects in several drawers at her new home. Soon after, she’ll let him know there’s just no reason to leave anymore, why not bring the rest of his stuff and settle in for the long haul. Oddly enough, I haven’t heard the K word being whispered. I think she just feels that in her str8 and narrow world, this is what she should be doing right now at this point in her life.  Which leads me to the BFF.

Last we saw her, she was recently enGAGed and loving the word FIANCE. This has not changed, it has merely accelerated. The wedding is 2/3 planned and it isn’t until next summer. New furniture keeps mysteriously showing up in her rental home. All in anticipation of the FIANCE moving in ‘soon’. Mind you, he owns his own home that he will be giving up to undergrad renters hell bent on keg stands in order to placate her need to live in the city. So they need more storage space – hence the new china cabinet.  He will need a room of his own in which to do ‘guy’ things (read jerk off to geek porn) so the basement has been cleaned out and a new couch arrived promptly. It’s like someone else’s life blew through her house and suddenly she’s trying it on for size, testing out the waters of spending recklessly (his money) and rolling the words ‘US/WE’ around in her mouth, getting a feel for the union.

I hate to nit-pick (not really, it’s my favorite pastime), but to recap this epic romance – 1. They dated for a little over a year and fought for half of it. 2. They painfully broke up for 5 months. 3. Death of a beloved pet bred reconciliation and 7 months later – engaged. If anything in this life seems rushed, it’s this engagement. I wonder if women look in the mirror and at the first sight of a grey hair, run screaming into the arms of the first available bachelor, convinced it was kismet and begin the process that ends with 2.5 kids and a white picket fence.

Life flashes by in a millisecond and to feel that you are not in the right place within it, when really you are exactly where you should be, because you stand in this moment now, is unfortunately why these men and women are in the throes of a crisis. Rushing to the end of one’s life means only that you haven’t enjoyed the journey along the way. 

Single Parent Guilt

I am a lesbian. I have cats. The second point was probably obvious. My cats were born of my previous LTR.  As a product of gay divorce, they have taken over the apartment and completely dominate our shared environment. If Chobee wants to lie in the sink, who am I to stop her? If Luxie wants to walk all over me and smoosh her face into mine at 4am, what can I say? If Zeke….well he’s the baby and always perfect so, no complaints. Our family was broken and their other mom lives 600 miles away (fine with me) and so I have absorbed all the guilt of being a single parent to three rambunctious kitties. They have a step-mom (of course, who didn’t see that coming) who loves them dearly, but does not share my lackadaisical parenting.  She arms herself with the spray bottle, waiting patiently for one to jump on the table or scratch at the couch or try to eat our mac n cheese and BAM mist to kitty face. I keep thinking that tomorrow will be the day I start to discipline them again, but alas tomorrow never comes.  If we’d had to split a daughter, I swear she’d be knocked up and on meth by now.  I’m thankful there was no lengthy custody battle. I’m thankful I was able to keep them all with me. I’m thankful that my girlfriend understood early on that my kitties are always #1. But DAMN if these cats don’t take full advantage of that fucking divorce.    

The Virgin

When I was 18, I introduced my then girlfriend to my best friend of 3 years. We attended college together and I really wanted them to like each other. For reasons unbeknownst to me, that didn't work out. After the meeting, the gf said something I never forgot, but actually never thought about again: "She's in love with you". This was ridiculous. Joyce wasn't gay. I, myself, was just creeping into that minute path in life called bisexuality. I thought my gf was being territorial as usual. 

When I graduated college, Joyce unceremoniously stopped speaking to me. When my mom died, she was unreachable. When I was banished to Brooklyn, she was on another planet ignoring me and I couldn't understand it. By the time I finally broke up with my gf, I didn't give any care to reaching out to Joyce.
Imagine my surprise when 3 years ago a friend of a HS friend of mine invites me to a surprise birthday party. She asked if I could find anyone else from HS, namely Joyce. I said I would try, but don't hold her breath. That's how Joyce and I began speaking again. She came to the party and we sparked up the whole friendship again. It wasn't the same, but it was cool to have her around again. We hung out; went to the gym together; just talked. It took a month to sense something was off with Joyce. I asked if she was dating and she said she was still a virgin. Mind blown.

She offered to go with me to lesbian bars and dinner on Saturday nights. I'm still oblivious. One such night after dinner on our way to Ginger's she let it slip that she considers me her teddy bear and dreamt we would be friends again. I said "you what!" She explained by pantomiming hugging a teddy bear . . . . At the bar, she was on me like glue. She wouldn't let me talk to any girls. This still wasn't it. I was still oblivious. That is until we went to the gym one Sunday. This is the routine: gym, then quick bite. This Sunday I told her to pick the after gym eats. She tells me the reservation isn't for a half an hour. Reservation? Why on earth would she get a reservation for a post gym sweaty meal? We walk to the restaurant and it is packed. We wait at the bar for the table. I am viewing the scene. Small, intimate place. Nice. White table cloth on the tables. I'm under dressed. I see couples and happy families everywhere. What day is this? A cold, blistery Sunday attracted all of these people. I go to the restroom and all I see are more couples. Oh shit, it dawns on me. It's Valentine's day. I was beside myself. We get sat and all of the surrounding tables and the server is treating us like we are a couple. I silently weep inside. 

After that ambush Valentine date, I had a plan. Joyce needs a boyfriend. I know a religious guy from work and I thought they would be perfect for each other. They could worship God together in virginal bliss. Joyce probably sensed my relief at them hitting it off because she amped it up a notch. Every time we hung out she made damn sure she made her presence felt. Long awkward hug after long awkward hug made me avoid her at all costs. I would have nightmares of her running her hands up and down my back. She actually did this every time we saw each other. We had to have "The Talk". I asked her to meet me. This was murder cause she was so concerned about my allergies. I was just trying to break up with her for God's sake. We meet up and I asked her why she stopped speaking to me when I graduated. She said "because you had your gf". I replied "what does that mean Joyce? I had my gf for 3 years. That didn't stop us hanging out." She said "well you had your gf, and your nephew and Gabriel so . . . " My frustration was mounting. Going backwards and forwards with her faulty logic was giving me a headache. I had to cut to the chase. I said "look, I don't understand how my having a gf stopped us from talking before, but you need to understand you make me feel uncomfortable. I don't want you to touch me. You need to stop acting like you are my gf or I'm never going to speak to you again". She got weepy. When we left she said some more weird shit and I told her that is exactly what I was talking about. She begged for me to continue speaking to her. She came in for a chester molester hug and I walked away. 

After this "break up", I hoped never to be felt up by Joyce again. No such luck. She did this shit in front of her bf even. At some point I had to realize she probably had no control over how she was making me feel. She would send me wispy texts about the moon and the stars and the sky and a whole bunch of weepy bullshit. Just my luck, she is still dating my work friend. I had to tell her via text that I have been nice and one more text I will cease to be. I have to send her a warning text that I will be at a work function if i know he is going just so she can adjust to fact that she will see me and I will avoid her. She has yet and never will tell her bf why the person who hooked them up no longer speaks to her. That makes this situation all the more weird. I gotta say, this entire situation angered me and made me feel all kinds of ways, but I feel nothing about losing my best friend again. This situation was so creepy and molestory that I will be happy never to have her hands on me again. Another BFF bites the dust.