Inside, I’m laughing, but also rolling my eyes.  I said, “Why did Dad tell you not to tell me that?”, thinking, “He knows I do the opposite of what you say”, or, “‘Coz you sound a leeeetle bit crazy right now!”  She said, “He knows that you’ve been hurt in your past affairs, well, you know what I mean–”. I interjected, “Relationships.”  She went on as if she hadn’t heard me, “And he doesn’t want you to get hurt again.  He’s very protective of you in that way.”  That was the cringe-worthy part.  I shrugged it off, but I also felt a flash of pure anger.  Protective of me?  What the fuck is that shit?  Still, I said in my head, “A good man is better than God, apparently!” and moved the conversation to another topic.  This is huge because even a year ago, I would have gotten into it with her over her words.  Now, I can just say, “Whatever, Mom,” and go about my merry way.  And, as friends pointed out, if she thinks she had a hand in me meeting the ape, she’ll be more for the relationship.  And as another friend said, “Let her nag God.  At least she’s leaving you alone!”

All right.  Back to my narrative.  When we last left the titular couple, they were climbing Mount Everest, swimming in the Amazon, and–oh, all right.  They were at taiji and meeting with the grrl’s best friend for dinner.  Which went swimmingly.   We closed down the Thai restaurant, causing the manager to push a vacuum noisily past us as a hint to get the fuck out.

Then, Friday.  Idle’s last full day here.  We planned on getting Indian food (his favorite) and visiting the Snoopy statues around St. Paul.  We didn’t manage the latter, but we did do the former.  My absolute favorite Indian restaurant got raided and closed years ago.  Three others have come and gone, but couldn’t hold a candle.  The one to which I took Idle was very good, though–except for one thing.  It was ninety degrees out that day, and the restaurant didn’t have air, for whatever reason.  It was brutal, especially since both of us do not like the heat at all.  Sometime in the evening, I started saying, “It’s not so hot.  It’s not bad at all!”  Idle looked at me and kindly said, “You’re hallucinating, honey.”  Apparently, part of being dehydrated is entertaining delusions.  I didn’t care ‘coz at least I didn’t feel as if my brains were being scrambled in preparation for the zombie apocalypse.

The weather broke while we were in the restaurant, waiting to pay.  Idle had gone out to smoke, and he said it looked like rain.  I have to say, as I watched him walk away (nice ass, by the way.  Yum), I was bursting with pride that he was my man.  I loved walking around with him by my side–absolutely loved it.  I thanked the powers that be who brought him into my life (including ABL) as my skin melted off my bones.  Afterwards, he asked me about the cuisine in general in MN, and I said it was bland and not very spicy.  He said that when I go visit him in Ottawa, he’ll take me to an authentic Indian restaurant.  Yum!

Then, we went back to my place after picking up some beer and celebrated Canada’s Day.  Or, as he insisted on calling it, Canada Day.  I had my customary one beer (OK, half) as we sat on the porch, smoked, and talked.  We held hands or had our hands on each other’s knees, and there was no place I would rather have been than with my ape. The night had pleasantly cooled off because of the rain, and it was so peaceful sitting outside with Idle.

People who have known me for some time know that for most of my life, happiness was not what I was seeking. To me, happiness is a fleeting emotion, and it’s to be cherished when it happens, but not sought after. No, for me, my Holy Grail was peace. I just wanted to feel serene, calm, and at peace with myself and the universe. When I was the deepest in the abyss, I quietly gave up hope that I would ever find any serenity or peace in this lifetime. But, that’s exactly what I find with Idle, even over the intertubez. Just chatting with him on Skype soothes my frazzled nerves (and by chat, I mean typing ‘coz neither of us likes the phone), and that’s especially helpful with my mother here for her yearly visit. The feeling of peace that came over me was especially strong when he was here, though. My mind, always going at hyperspeed, would slow down and just go twice as fast as most people’s with a touch of his hand. And, after an explosive session of sexing in which he’d made me come a time or a dozen, my mind, body, and soul would all be aligned and at peace. I would have a hazy, melty, blissed-out feeling that, from what I’ve been told, some people experience during meditation*. I had no desire to do anything or think anything. I didn’t feel I had to jump up and take a shower (as I used to a long time ago). I didn’t have to talk if I didn’t want to, but I could if I felt like it.

This feeling didn’t just last for a few seconds or even a few minutes–no. It lasted until we went to sleep. Or rather, he went to sleep. I know it might sound like not a big thing, but he gave me the gift of a quiet mind, and I treasured it very much. As I spooned him while he fell asleep, I would match my heartbeat to his, and I would just be content to touch him and to breathe. I’m usually someone who has to do three or four things at once–it was incredibly relieving to only have to do one, at the most, two.

Then, the day I was dreading was upon me. Saturday. It was hard. I’m not going to lie. Driving him to the airport was fucking hard. Holding his hand as he slowly made his way through security? Even harder. And, when I had to let go so he could go through the gate? Killed me. I was numb as I left the airport, and somehow, I made it home. I felt something was missing, though, and that something, well, someone, would be him.

I’m not going to lie to you. Being away from my ape is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. Yes, I’ve done long-distance relationships before, but never with someone with whom I actually had a future. By the time Idle left, we both knew that we wanted to be together; we just had to figure out how to make that happen. To that end, I am visiting him in three weeks to check out his fair city, Ottawa. After that, we will discuss the pros and cons of Minneapolis v. Ottawa, and then we will make a decision.

We. It’s still a little weird to say that, to think of myself as part of a team. Weird, but wonderful, too. From a very young age, I learned that the only person I could rely on was me. And, to be painfully honest, I couldn’t rely on myself much, either. But, for as little as I trusted myself, I trusted other people even less. And, because I was so fucked up, I chose partners who reinforced my view that love was not to be trusted–and neither were romantic partners. I’ve never really thought of myself as part of a we, even when I was in a steady relationship. I chose partners who would eventually leave me, therefore, I felt justified in never fully trusting said partner. A neat little vicious cycle I had trapped myself in without fully being conscious that I was doing it.

In addition, I saw what my parents’ marriage had done to my mother (or how she was in it because I can’t say how she was before it), and I wanted no part of that. My father treated her like a maid/housekeeper/all-around-drudge, and he bristled any time she tried to hold him accountable to her or to the family. Then, when I discovered feminism, I had the perfect reason for eschewing marriage. It was the feminist thing to do! Patriarchy! Mantle of the oppressor! And, there was the fail-safe position of, “Well, I couldn’t marry a woman I loved, so I’m not going to marry a man, either!” Let me hasten to say that these are all legitimate reasons to be wary of relationships and marriage in particular, but I was using them as excuses so I wouldn’t really have to examine the issue. My best friend and I used to discuss marriage back in the day (she’s been married for as long as we’ve been friends), and any time I would complain about this or that about marriage, she would say, “Marriage is what you make of it. You get to decide what marriage means to you. You and your spouse.”

I pooh-poohed her at the time because I was deep into my “relationships fucking suck” mentality, but I have slowly started to see that she’s right. I don’t have to do X, Y, or Z while in a relationship because women are expected to do it or because I think I should do it. It helps that Idle doesn’t have many preconceived notions about relationships, either–except that once you commit to a relationship, you work hard at it. I can get behind that!

I feel like I’ve known Idle forever, and yet, I’m learning new things about him all the time. I marvel at how much change I’ve made, just in the short time we’ve been together.  Silly things like the public declarations of affection I make on his FB wall, mostly through videos, not to mention the very fact that I have my status as in a relationship with Idle Primate.  That may not seem like a big thing, but it kinda is.  If you had told me a year ago, no, six months ago that I would be in a relationship and declaring it thus at this point in my life, I would have laughed in your face.  Or, in my mind so as to not be too rude. I was skittish of even contemplating a relationship, let alone declaring myself in one–and loving it. We call each other by endearing nicknames–this is another thing I never would have done two years ago.

A big one: I see myself as having a future–one starring him. Or rather, starring us. In the same place (be it Canada or the US or elsewhere) within a year at the very most. I see us living together at some point soon. Let me pause and repeat that: I see us living together. WTF? This from the woman who declared she would never live with someone (what is it ‘they’ say about never saying never?)! We’ve discussed marriage, and I haven’t run screaming from the room, my hands over my ears. Again, WTF? Who is this woman? I can barely recognize me sometimes.

Another big change is the fact that I chose to be with a man who has a history of committing to his partner and who is happily monogamous. He’s not someone with one eye out for the better thing, never quite content with what he has. He loves me, and I know this (I really do, and that’s another new feeling for me), and he wants to be with me. With me. No ifs, ands, or buts. He wants me to be his primary partner–no, he wants me to be his only partner–and I can’t tell you how wonderful that makes me feel.

More to the point (yes, another big realization), he is the only man I want, too. I’ve pondered monogamy and nonmonogamy for much of my life. I can see the value in both, but my realization is, I’m a one-person person. Part of the reason I hesitate to love is because I do it so deeply when I actually do dare to love. And, I could give many well-thought-out reasons as to why I have chosen monogamy, but the bottom line is, this is who I am. I can be happy in a polyamorous relationship as long as I’m the primary partner, but I think I am more wired to be monogamous. I’m not sure about how hardwired it is in me, and more to the point, I don’t really care. I want to be monogamous with Idle. That’s all I need to know.

It’s been a long journey to get to this place. I am a person who has regretted much of my life, but I would not change a thing if it meant not being with Idle right now. I don’t know where we’re going (literally and metaphorically) or what will happen in our future, but what I do know is that I’m ready to finally take a chance on love.

P.S. I decided to post this without much editing. Why? ‘Coz.

P.P.S.  The videos are songs that are now ours.  The first, there are three versions.  My favorite is the original by Depeche Mode, which I posted on his wall; his is by the band that is comprised of pin-up girls, The Saturdays; we both like the Nouvelle Vague embedded in this post.  The second video is one that the ape posted on my wall.  The third vid, I posted this version on his wall after he posted the original by Abba on mine. The fourth is a song I posted on his wall. It’s one journey’s end, but just the beginning of our journey together.

*Not me. I hate meditation, as I’ve expounded on before.

Where was I?  Oh yes, musing about having Idle in my life.  More on that later.  For now, more on the rest of his visit.  We’re up to Wednesday, and I have to share with you an odd detail about me:  I hate the end of things with a passion.  If I’m watching a TV series on DVD, I will delay watching the last episode because then I have no more left to watch!  It’s so bad, I start the countdown when I am halfway through the series (if there are not a large number of episodes).  Take, for example, Miracles.  There were only 13 episodes made of the show.  When I hit 7, I became increasingly morose with each episode viewed because it meant I had less to watch than I had already watched, if that makes sense.

I’m the same way with trips (at least, ones I want to take).  When the midpoint arrives, I start becoming depressed thinking about the end of the trip and how soon it’s approaching.  It’s funny because my friends were shocked I’d let Idle stay in my house for eight days (so long!), and all I could think of was, “I wish he were staying longer.”

Wednesday was the halfway point of his trip.  I pushed it to the back of my mind because I wanted to enjoy his company to the fullest, but it was lurking like an evil, lurky thing.  We went to my therapy session–or rather, I went to my session and he wandered around St. Paul, the lesser-known of the Twin Cities, in the ninety-plus weather we were having at the time.  After my session, I joined Idle in the wandering, and we checked out some of the local shops.  Oh, he also got excited about the Snoopy statue we saw in front of a nearby vet’s office ‘coz he’s a big Peanuts fan.  Charles Schultz is from MN, and they did a series of Snoopy statutes to commemorate something or the other in relation to him.  We saw another one further down the street that had been vandalized.  Poor Snoopy.  Idle didn’t have his camera with him, so I said we’d do a tour of the statues.  We didn’t get to that, but hey, it gives him added incentive to visit me again, amirite?

We went into a neat local boutique called Bibelot ‘coz the ape likes soap.  I had told him I didn’t like scents of any kind (‘coz I’m allergic to everything), but I neglected to say that some natural soaps are actually soothing to my poor, afflicted nose.  Nevertheless, I wasn’t really into soaps–I view them as utilitarian.  Idle has a very keen sense of smell, and he collects soap.  In Bibelot, I started sniffing one soap after the other, and I was really drawn to one (apple pear).  I held the bar to my nose as we walked throughout the store, and when I gave it to Idle to smell, he commented on how the bar was warm from me holding it to my face.  That pretty much sealed my fate; I had to buy the bar after that!

I need to interject something here.  Idle and I have both had shitty childhoods and traumatic events happen to us later in life.  Yet, despite that, Idle has the ability to find beauty and joy in seemingly mundane things.  He also has a childlike glee that is infectious.  We started a series of inside jokes that to the outside ear would have been outrageous.  As a survivor of trauma, though, I found it a relief to be able to joke with Idle about some of the horrors in life.  It was also healing in a way.  Being able to crack wise about terrible events allowed me to put some of the trauma where it belonged–in my past.  Cops are notorious for their gallows humor, and Idle and I engaged in something similar.  We both knew that it was only appropriate for the two of us, but we couldn’t help muttering joke after joke under our breaths whilst out in public. We did this in Bibelot, and it felt really good.  We weren’t disruptive–just boisterous.  We were partners in hijinks, and it was so much fun.  

Another telling point:  I was cooing over some three-legged pigs because I collect pigs (I was born in the Year of the Pig).  I regretfully put down the one I was holding because I have a ton of pigs, and I did NOT need to buy another one.  Idle picked up the pig, looked it over, and commented about its origin.  Unlike me, he didn’t put it down.  I didn’t think anything of it as I just assumed he was taking it home as a reminder of me.  You astute readers probably can see what’s coming–he gave it to me when we got back home.  I was touched because that was such a sweet thing to do.

After we were done in Bibelot, we went to Garden of Eden, another local boutique, to see more bath stuff.  I don’t normally hang out in St. Paul, so it was cool to see one of my cities with my ape in tow.  I was having a blast smelling soap after soap, something that would have befuddled me if you had told me about it merely a year ago.

That night, I was feeling a bit melancholy when my mom called.  Now, conversation with my mother is always strained.  Idle slipped outside to smoke, and I gritted my teeth and took the call.  I had laid down the law some time ago that she was NOT to mention my weight as she had no concern about my health–only my looks.*  She adhered to the letter of my edict, but not the spirit.  She talked about going to a clothing shop and buying things for my niece (who is tall, thin, and gorgeous).  She added, “Of course, I couldn’t find anything in your size”, and my esteem plunged.  After a few more minutes of noncommittal chatting, I hung up and went outside to smoke with Idle.

I thought I was OK, but later, after we went inside, I suddenly burst into tears and clung to Idle as if I would drown.  I told him it was because he was leaving, but my reaction was out-of-proportion to his departure.  As he said, I was crying as if I would never see him again.  He figured out that in the deep recesses of my mind, I was afraid the one visit was all we had.  It had nothing to do with Idle at all, but with my past.  I was used to people leaving me.  In fact, I picked people who were unable to commit, in part because I was dicey on commitment myself.  Still, the end result was that subconsciously, I expected Idle to return home and say, “That was fun.  We should do it again!” and then disappear or fade away.  Again, it had nothing to do with him as he has shown no inclination to bolt. Additionally, I realized in retrospect that talking to my mother had made my vulnerabilities sharper, and my intense reaction to Idle’s departure was in part a response to said situation.

Still, it was difficult for me not to obsess over the fact that Idle was going to be leaving soon and that it would be some time before we saw each other again.  I’d done long-distance relationships before, but they were under different circumstances.  There was no possibility of a future, so the long-distance, while frustrating, was actually an integral part of the relationship.  With Idle, the distance is an obstacle to be overcome because we do have a future together.  I don’t know what that future will bring, but at least I know I have one now. I’m terrible with delayed gratification, and the thought of being apart from Idle after just having found him was almost more than I could bear.

So, Thursday.  This was the big day.  I was taking him to Taiji, and he would get to meet Choolie, my teacher (there was a substitute on Saturday). After that, we would meet my best friend, Kat, at Sen Yai Sen Lek for dinner so she could vet him properly.  He was nervous about meeting them.  I said that Choolie was very gregarious and that Kat was one of the sweetest people he would ever meet.  She’s very good at putting someone at his ease, and I had no doubt she would do the same for Idle.

Class was a bit nerve-racking for me.  I am one of the senior students, so I sometimes tutor the newer students.  This includes teaching them new postures.  When Choolie called me over to work with one of the newer students, I was nervous because I did not want to fuck up in front of Idle.  Fortunately, the posture I had to teach was really early in the first section of the form–it was one with which I was comfortable.  I am a pretty decent teacher, if overly concerned with doing everything perfectly (me, not the student).

One of the other students was someone from my Saturday class.  She’s a dynamic, Indian (from India), sixty-year old woman who reminds me of my mother from time to time.  She came late to class, so I didn’t get a chance to introduce her to Idle.  She admonished me sternly for it after class, and I was abashed enough to call him over and introduce the two of them.  She gave me a taste as to the reaction of my mother when I tell her about Idle.  Idle has asked me what my parents would think of him, and I was sad because I had no idea.  I could imagine my mother being anything from elated that I was with someone and not TOO old to have the babies (no) to being disappointed because he’s not a MD neurosurgeon/pastor/ Taiwanese/Christian/doesn’t want kids/etc.  As for my father?  No idea.  And, honestly, I don’t particularly care.

After we chatted a bit with various people in class, we walked over to the restaurant.  Kat was meeting us later, so we ordered right away.  Kat came breezing in, and it was as I said–she put Idle at ease.  He was still nervous, but he told me she was easy to talk with.  Later, she told me that she really liked him and could see the four of us (including her hubby) hanging out.  I could, too.   They had an easy rapport that boded well for future encounters.  Nothing sucks more than having your best friend and your partner be at loggerheads.  We shut down the restaurant and went outside to smoke and chat.  Kat had to leave early-ish the next morning to drive to Iowa, otherwise, we would have continued the conversation elsewhere.  As it was, it was a very pleasant night.

So, to recap, two of my closest friends met Idle and approved of him.  More to the point, they approved of the way he treated me/thought of me.  Score!

Oh, there’s another important thing:  We had two arguments, and I didn’t react as I normally would.  I have been trained that my opinion isn’t important.  When I have a serious disagreement with someone, my tendency is to withdraw, avoid, or go cold.  I’m not particularly proud of that trait, but it’s how I handle adversity.  Or rather, it was.  With Idle, I was able to look past my own hurt and see that he was hurting, too.  One time, he said something hurtful, but I was able to see that he hadn’t meant it the way he said it.  He was in a vulnerable spot, and he hadn’t phrased what he wanted to say in the best manner.  But, he wasn’t trying to be malicious.  So, after I went to the bathroom to, well, pee and to cool down, I returned.  He had slipped outside to smoke, and I so wanted to go out to him, but I was afraid.  This was right after he said the hurtful thing and before any explanations.  What if he was disgusted by me?  What if he thought I was more trouble than I was worth?  I was paralyzed.  Later, I found out that he was having a hard time of it, too.  Coming back in the house was difficult for him, and I am glad he was the bigger person in making the first move.

We had a lengthy, serious talk about what had happened, and we were able to talk about it in a constructive manner.  For once, I was more concerned about us than about me.  That’s not to say that I am a doormat–I’m not.  It’s just, I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and we were able to work through the pain.  That helped me see that it was OK for me to speak my mind in a non-accusing, nonjudgmental manner in order to work out our problems and issues together.

On a tangential, but related note, I am utterly enjoying being part of an ‘us’. I told Idle this earlier in the evening, and I admitted how strange it was to me. I have spent most of my life fiercely declaring that I was an island (Guam, to be precise) and that I wasn’t part of anything–least of all, a couple. The bonding part of me was broken pretty early in life, and it’s taken me this long to slowly, painfully, painstakingly put it back together again. Now that I have, I am tickled by saying things like, “After I visit you next month, we have to decide what we’re going to do to be together.”

We’re a team. I like that.

Whoops! Running long again. I’m going to post this as is and start part five sometime soon!

P.S. Videos, top to bottom: A scene from Truly, Madly, Deeply, one of my favorite movies of Alan’s. It has Alan Rickman AND cellos! Idle posted this clip to my wall, and I loved him even more for choosing the right Alan Rickman clip. Nina Simone and Barry White because Idle and I love both of them.

*I can say this for certain because not once did she murmur any word of concern when I was anorexic/bulimic.

By the way, have you noticed that where I left off, with the hug at the airport, makes both a perfect ending and a perfect beginning?  Chew on that for awhile as I regale you with what happened during the actual visit.

Idle and I hugged for what seemed like forever, but was probably only minutes.  He felt solid, comfortable, warm, reassuring, and just so damn right in my arms; I didn’t want to let him go.   I did, reluctantly, and we were on our way.  I had to focus on the road, of course, so I didn’t get to stare at him as I wanted.  I did catch him staring at me when he thought I wasn’t looking, and it didn’t really fluster me as it normally would.  I pointed out things of interest on the way home, but I wasn’t really thinking about my city.  I was giddy with happiness and lust that the ape had finally landed.  It didn’t seem possible that we were actually in the same city, my city, in my car, driving back to my house.

I was nervous, yes, but I was also just overjoyed to have him with me.  We stopped at Subway because he hadn’t eaten all day, and then I drove him to my house.  I am uncomfortable having people in my house for many reasons, but I was so eager to be with Idle (and touch him), I managed to quash the small panic I had as he walked into my house.

How did the cats greet him?  In their usual way.  Raven sniffed and let Idle pet him right away, and Shadow stood aloof.  But, I am very proud of my shy guy because he didn’t leave the room.  And, he did let Idle pet him the first day.  By the middle of the visit, Shadow had accepted this stranger into our household–probably because Idle awoke before I did and would go to the kitchen to make coffee.  Those with animals know that any time you go into the kitchen, the animals think it’s feeding time.  By the end of the visit, Shadow was planting himself in front of Idle and arching his back–his way of demanding to be pet.  Raven accepted Idle as another piece of furniture and would flop all over Idle, sometimes at inconvenient moments.

Back to the narrative.  After we ate, Idle and I retired to the bedroom so we could get to know each other better.

Now, as longtime readers know, I have body issues.  I don’t like my body at all, and I have only recently begun to feel like I’m not totally gross.  I am a big woman.  Even when I was at my skinniest, I had broad shoulders, big boobs, sturdy thighs, and thick calves.  To Idle, all this was a plus.  He likes women with meat on their bodies and with lots of curves.  The first video is one he often posts to my FB wall.

As we explored each other’s bodies, he made it very plain that he was hot for my bod. And, I was just as hot for his. I like my men big and solid with broad shoulders and big hands, and he had it all in spades. I loved the scent of him, the taste of him, the feel of him, the sight of him, and the sound of him. We spent many hours just finding all the sweet spots on each other’s bodies. Wouldn’t you know that he found a few new ones on my body (and inside) that I never knew I had? Erogenous zones, I mean.

Our attraction was electric and primal. He simply had to touch me for a few seconds, and I was ready to sex him up. I couldn’t keep my hands off him, even when we weren’t sexing, and he felt the same way about me. We managed to keep it under control when we were out and about town, but in my house, all bets were off. We were on each other all over the house, and I never wanted to stop touching him. One thing I loved about sexing with him is that it was by turns gentle, primal, tender, torrid, passionate, sensual, and animal.

Idle and I both have rich and varied fantasies. I have tried to rid myself of mine for decades because I thought they stemmed from dark and horrible places. I wasn’t comfortable with that part of me until Idle and I started talking about our respective fantasies. He was gentle and nonjudgmental, and I was a little less ashamed of my fantasies. I tried to do the same for him, and being able to explore those deepest, most private parts of ourselves together brought us even closer. I have my issues with Dan Savage*, but I heartily endorse his GGG (good, giving, and game, but I thought it was good, giving, and generous) as long as both partners are equally so, and Idle felt the same way.

I will touch more on the sexxxing throughout the piece, but there’s one important thing I need to say now–I loved having him in my bed. This is revolutionary because I am a shitty sleeper and have preferred to sleep alone for most of my life. When I did sleep with a partner in the distant past, I couldn’t bear to be touching as we fell asleep. Or, more accurately, until the other person fell asleep. I cannot fall asleep before my partner. Is it a safety issue? No. I snore, and I’m very self-conscious about it, so I trained myself to not fall asleep first**. With one of my exes, he would lie on his side, and I would be behind him by a foot and a half or so. I would have one hand on his shoulder, and that’s as much as I could stand touching him (or anyone in general) as I slept. One night, he turned to spoon me, and I immediately went rigid. I wanted desperately for him to turn back the other way so I could have my space.

With Idle, I wanted to be as close to him as possible. I would spoon him until he fell asleep, and then I would just look at him and touch him to my heart’s content. Since we both sleep very poorly, we would take naps whenever we wanted. Thus, I could watch him in the waning daylight or in the dark as I have better vision in the dark than many people. I would watch his chest rise and fall, and it would comfort me. Sometimes, I would place my hand on his chest as he breathed, and sometimes, I would match my breath to his. That always made me feel better and more connected to him.

I would watch as he tossed and turned, and my heart would go out to him. I wanted to soothe his troubled sleep, but all I could do was stroke his arm or chest to try to calm him down. When I found myself getting tired, I would put on my gear (eye mask, mouth guard, and ear plugs) and then snuggle up against his back again. I would curl my hand around his belly (or lower) until I fell asleep. He would wake up before I did, and the first time I woke up to an empty bed, my heart fell to the bottom of my feet. Where was he? Where had he gone? It turned out that he didn’t want to disturb me, and he had crept out of bed to start the coffee. Then, he would sit on my porch and drink his coffee as he waited for me to awaken. I have a kick-ass porch, if I do say so, myself.

Anyway, he later told me that he would wake up and hear me grind my teeth in my sleep (I bit clean through my last mouth guard). When he put a hand on me, I would quiet down. He said it would be the same way if I was tossing and turning. He would put a hand on me, and I would be soothed. Once, he bumped me and apologized. He said I put my hand on his arm and said it was OK. Just as he was about to say something, I snored. I don’t remember any of this, so apparently, there is a part of me that never sleeps–no wonder I’m so fucking tired all the time.

When I got up, he would pour me a cup of coffee, wait for me to nuke it ‘coz I like my hot drinks boiling, and then we would go out on the porch and just sit and laugh at the golfers as we leaned into each other. I have to say, this was the image I had in my mind most often before the visit. Yes, I was looking forward to the sexxxing and the physical intimacy, but I was most anticipating just being with him in the quiet moments of the day.

I took him to visit Northeast Minneapolis–the area in which I feel most comfortable and want to live. My Taiji studio is there as is the Eastside Food Cooperative, and I always feel like I can breathe better when I’m in my ‘hood. He visited my Taiji class twice (more on that later), and we had Thai food in a neighborhood restaurant, Sen Yai Sen Lek, that is eco-conscious and gets much of its ingredients from said local co-op. After we ate, we would walk around the neighborhood.

OK. I just have to say something. It’s not very feminist of me, but I LOVE the fact that Idle is big (6’2″ and sturdy) and knows how to fight. I know, I know, I am woman–hear me roar. I can take care of myself, and in fact, I am currently learning how to kill a man with my bare hands. Yes, yes, yes. It’s true that I can do for myself, but you know what? I’ve had to be on the alert all my life, always vigilant for danger. I’ve done it mostly on my own, and it’s really really nice not to have to be strong all the time. When Idle was here, I could let down my guard somewhat, knowing he had my back. When I walked down the street with him, I felt safe and protected. It’s not a feeling I have often, and it’s one I really, really liked.

More than that, I was so damn proud to walk down the street with him. He’s my man, and I wanted to shout it to the world. Yeah, I felt like I was strutting my stuff with him on my arm, but so what? I know I sound more like a teenager than a grown woman, but he just makes me feel so damn giddy and blissful, I have to crow about it a bit. OK, a lot.

The second video I embedded is Natural Woman by Mary J. Blige, and it’s a song I often post to Idle’s FB wall. I am not very feminine by society’s standards. I like sports, dislike shopping and other ‘girly’ things, don’t wear makeup or shave…anything (I’m Asian!), and I have little interest in clothes. I don’t wear any scents as I’m allergic, and I don’t do anything to my hair other than brush it. I am not maternal in the least.

Idle looked at many of those things as positives (he likes natural women), and he really does make me feel feminine, sexy, and desirable. In return, he is exactly the kind of man to whom I’m most attracted–sensitive, yet strong, artistic, creative, funny, sturdy, witty, good with words, tender and tough, sexy and hot, and passionate. Both of us are an amalgamation of characteristics, and we fit together beautifully. The third video below right below is by one of my favorite indy folk duos, Lowen and Navarro. Pat Benatar had a big hit with it back in the eighties or so. I posted it on Idle’s FB wall, and he said it fit us. It does.

You know how much I love this man? I actually went to a movie theatre with him and watched a movie that doesn’t have Alan Rickman in it! For those who don’t know me, this is a big deal. I don’t like movies much, and I really don’t like going to the theatre ‘coz I hate noises, crowds, and people. And I’m claustrophobic. So, for me to go to an actual theatre with actual people to see a movie that has neither Alan Rickman nor cellos in it, well, that’s mind-blowing. Granted, it was the latest X-Men movie and I’m a big fan (mostly of Wolverine), and granted it was the midnight showing with a maximum of ten people in the theatre, but still.

I really enjoyed it. The movie itself was a great summer action blockbuster film with really hawt whips and chains action by Michael Fassbender as the young Magneto, but what I really dug was the date aspect of the whole event.  I haven’t dated much in my life, and it was really nice to go to a movie, hold hands, and just be immerse in the experience.  I can’t remember the last time I went on a date to the movies, but I do remember that seeing Pulp Fiction with a guy and telling him what I thought of it caused him to dump me. So, yeah, me and movies–not a good combo.

Going to the movies with Idle, though, was loads of fun. I realized during his visit that there were many things that were infinitely more enjoyable when I was doing them with him. Even something as inane as surfing the ‘net for stupid videos (protip on being a good girlfriend, ladies. Make sure you shave your legs EVERY DAY so your stubble doesn’t hurt your man’s delicate skin! It’s true. I saw it on the internets!) was a blast when shared with Idle. This is something I’d forgotten–how much my daily life is enriched by having a partner, specifically Idle, in it. I like it. I like it a lot.

Hm. Getting long again. Go figure. I will end this for now and leave you with this teaser: Idle met two of my closest friends who are like family to me and survived the experience! Tune in for the next episode of A Grrl and Her Ape, coming to you sometime soon.

*Don’t ask. I would have to write a whole post about it, and I’m not in the mood.

**My brother once told me that I had a funny laugh, and I stopped laughing out loud for years. Self-conscious, me? Never!

As we last checked in with the grrl, she was anxiously awaiting a visit from her ape.  When he told me (the grrl.  Try to keep up) he had bought the tickets, I was jubilant.  In the back of my mind, I was afraid that he would back out at the last minute.  I couldn’t quite believe he actually WANTED to see me, so much so that he would fly a thousand miles to meet me.  He hates flying as much as I do; he hates change as much as I do; I was floored that he was actually going through with it.  With my history, I have a hard time believing that I’m worth someone making that effort, especially someone as averse to traveling as he is.

Once we had establish that yes, he was coming for realz, I had to do something I hate:  Clean.  I absolutely loathe it.  Plus, I suck at it.  Not a good combination.  I’m not comfortable having people in my house, not even good friends, and here I was eagerly offering Idle Primate to share my bed.  My friends were floored by the fact that I was letting him stay in my house.  Frankly, so was I.

As I prepared for his visit, doubts started flooding my mind.  I am a dynamo online. I’m funny and witty and charming as hell.  I am MUCH better with the written word than I am with the spoken word, and I was worried that all my neuroses and quirks and idiosyncrasies would be annoying in person–not endearing.  The demons were whispering in my ear that once Idle Primate spent some time with me, he would realize that he had made a mistake.  I didn’t want to disappoint him.  One thing that made it marginally easier for me not to panic was that I knew he had similar worries about disappointing me.

We have some of the same life experiences, which means we have similar issues.  We also both think of ourselves as the caretaker in a relationship, which makes for a very interesting dynamic.  In the past, I’ve tended to be with people who, in the long run, didn’t want to be with me as much as I wanted to be with them, and then my concubine nature would take over and I would do whatever it took to make them happy.  Idle has a similar personality, which is actually refreshing.  We both wanted to make the other happy, which is much better than one person doing most of the work.

As his visit neared, we started to post more on each other’s FB walls.  Mostly videos, and mostly ones that one of us found funny.  We have a rule that we had to listen to the entire song if the other person posted it on our wall. As we both have devious minds, it led to lots of mirth, especially as neither of sleeps very much and one of us has OCD (that would be me). For example, as I said in my last post, I loved the hair bands of the ’80s such as Cinderella and Warrant.  My poor Idle, well, let’s just say he was a punk back then and leave it at that.  In our serious moments, he posted the video Home by Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros.  I had heard the song before and hadn’t been immediately captured by it, but through my new lens of love, the song had a resonance that it lacked before.  I felt such a strong connection with Idle, being ‘with’ him was like being home.  I wrote a brilliant essay many years ago (as it’s not online, you’ll have to trust me.  It’s quite possibly the best thing I’ve ever written.  Pulitzer Prize worthy) about how I found ‘home’ in people, rather than places, and I felt it strongly with Idle.

I was in a tizzy because nothing about our relationship was like anything I’d ever experienced before. I’ve loved and been in love, yes, but this was something entirely different. I was different in this relationship, and it flummoxed me. As I have said, I am a control freak with OCD who likes to map things out in excruciating detail, think things over (too much), and then slowly, agonizingly make a decision.  Not this time. We went from taking things off Facebook to meeting in real life in roughly three weeks. For me, that’s a blink of the eye. Now, arguably, I’ve been working all my life to reach this point (much like I talked about getting cats for years before I suddenly went out and got them. Come to think of it, I did the same with my first tattoo. Protip: Do not get a tattoo at midnight at the only shop open. Trust me on this), but it still is a relatively short amount of time.

But, as time tends to do, it seemed forever to get from talking about meeting until the day he actually arrived. A funny aside, my brother left me a message on my machine saying that my niece had a band camp recital that evening, and she would really like me to be there as she wrote one of the songs. No, he couldn’t tell me about it weeks earlier because that’s not the way he rolls. I did tell him I would ask Idle if he felt up to going, but not to expect us.  The fact that I was comfortable with the idea of introducing Idle to my family, any member of my family, is also a first. In the past, I have kept my love/sex life completely separated from my family (and friends, really) for a variety of reasons. With Idle, I wanted him to meet my brother and my friends (he got to meet two of the latter, more on that later) as I wanted him to be a part of my day-to-day life.

By the way, the second video is of Friday as done by Stephen Colbert. I am one of the last people with internet access who has not heard the original, but this became one of our songs. Why? Because he was flying out here on a Friday. Yes, the tuff grrl got all silly and mushy with her ape, just as do most people in love*. It was a bit disconcerting to me to realize a few things–like I love the fact that he is big (tall and sturdy) and strong. Why is that disconcerting? Because as a feminist, I am supposed to be able to take care of myself, thankyewverymuch. I am getting ahead of myself as usual, though, so hold that thought. I’ll return to it later. Maybe.

I was freaking out pretty badly before Idle flew out. He was, too, but not as volubly as I was. We both had thoughts of disappointing the other or not clicking in person or whatnot. The not-clicking part, though, was always on the other person’s part. I was convinced he would not click with me (or more to the point, I knew I clicked with him), and he was convinced I would not click with him. That’s not exactly right. We both thought we would click, but worst case scenario would be as how I described it.  And, because we’ve both been hurt terribly by that in the past, each of us grew increasingly skittish as his arrival date neared.

I was filled with thoughts of him and anticipating his visit.  I didn’t talk much about him with anyone in part because I was having such difficulty understanding exactly what was happening myself, but also because I was feeling a bit sheepish about the whole thing.  I’ve been very vocal in the past that I wanted no part of a relationship, no way, no how.  And, when I started allowing that maybe I wanted one, I insisted that I would not live with the person, that we wouldn’t see each other every day, and that I would be very sedate in the pacing of said relationship.  Still, I didn’t see that I could be in one or that there was someone who could tolerate being with me daily, let alone embrace it.   In addition, dating wasn’t a priority as I had many plans as to what my next step should be.  Meeting someone was not in the top ten, I thought.  But, at the same time, I kept thinking about dating and wanting to meet someone.  It was frustrating.  When I told my therapist about it not being a priority, she said it sounded like it was, even if I didn’t want it to be.

Yeah.  That.

As I drove to the airport, I had difficulty concentrating on the road because all I could think about was meeting Idle.  I am not a good driver in the best of times, and let’s just say it was a good thing the traffic was relatively light.  I got there early as is my wont, and I had a book to keep me company.  I was a mess inside, but I know how to play it cool, and I kept my countenance unruffled.  Hey, I’m Asian.  I do inscrutable perfectly.  I sat down by the international gate and tried to concentrate on my book.  Unfortunately, there was a child sitting next to me nattering on about his/her open, gaping, pus-filled wound.  It was covered with a bandage, and the father (I think)  was lecturing the child to take the bandage off.  This is when said child talked about how smelly and pus-filled the wound was.

Yum.  So not what I wanted to hear while waiting to meet the man of my drea–er, daydreams.  I only have nightmares, so he was not the man of my dreams.  He was the man of my daydreams, and I was hoping he wasn’t really a figment of my overheated imagination.  I waited.  And waited.  And waited.  His plane was early, but he had to go through customs.  I was getting nervous as I stared fixedly at the glass doors.  Suddenly, from another direction, a tall, cute, redheaded man was smiling down at me.  It was Idle!** I smiled broadly and threw myself into his arms and hugged him hard. In an instant, all my doubts melted away. I didn’t feel as if we were meeting for the first time, but that we were continuing a well-established relationship. His scent was powerfully attractive to me, and I didn’t want to let go. I had come home.

P.S.  Running long as usual.  I’mma end this here and will write about the actual visit in the next post.  By the way, I found this totally adorable series of a girl and her ape, and I wanted to use one of the pics, but they’re not open source.  So, instead, I link for you.

*So I’ve been told.
**There are two international gates at the airport, and I always mess up in choosing the gate.

Remember how I’ve written in the past that while I have started longing for a relationship, I never thought I’d find one?  Of course, that was back in the dark ages (MONTHS ago) when I wondered if I was dating material.  I wanted love, but I was deeply afraid that I wouldn’t find it in this lifetime.  I thought the best thing to do was to go to activities that I would enjoy anyway and see what happened.  I would test the water and see what was out there.  I would take it slow and not expect anything to happen for some time.

At least that was the plan.

Funny how things change in a heartbeat.

A few months ago, I got into an epic word battle with a guy on ABL’s Facebook wall.  He went by the name of Idle Primate, and he knew ABL through a cultural commentary site called Pajamas or something like that**.  I don’t know how the great ate debate started, but it evolved into the two of us exchanging ripostes involving words ending in -ate or derivations of.  We went on for hours.  It was a blast, and I included a song that he immediately claimed.  It’s the first video posted below.

He requested to be friends on the FB, and I accepted.  We started flirting almost immediately after, but I was determined to keep it light because he wasn’t in my city or state.  Hell, he wasn’t in the States at all.  He’s from Ottawa, Canada, and I was determined not to get into another long distance relationship.  Sure, he was intelligent, witty, funny as hell, thoughtful, goofy, creative, poetic, and we clicked right off the bat.  Yes, he was single and not afeeeeered of commitment as my past partners have been.  He was in fucking Canada, and not in Winnipeg or anywhere close-ish.  I was NOT going down that road–uh uh, no sirree.

The internet is a funny thing.  It allows for a connection that isn’t based on physical proximity; indeed, I didn’t even know what he looked like since he only had pictures of apes as his profile pic on FB.  Yes, we were both putting our best feet forward, but the real us still came out loud and strong.  We quickly moved to PM’ing each other, and then I suggested we take it off FB because I don’t trust them at all.  No, I don’t trust Google and gmail much more, but FB really is the nadir of privacy.

I soon grew to anticipate emails from him.  My heart would skip a beat if I had one, and it would thump in disappointment if my inbox was stubbornly empty.  Sure, we bantered on FB, but it wasn’t the same.  Still, I told myself that it was just for fun and that I was just practicing my dating chops since I haven’t used them in a long time.  Honestly, I’ve never really dated as I find the concept an anathema–I tend to plunge right into relationships or flings or whatnot.   I was determined to keep it on a fling-like level because he was so far away and the chances of us meeting were slim.   Months earlier, I had decided that I wasn’t going to be the first one to fly to meet, especially not for a booty call.  I’d done that in the past, and I didn’t want to do it again.

Besides, I was going to find me someone local.  It was my new motto:  Fuck locally.  It’s better for the community and for you.  If Idle Primate wanted to fly to MN for some companionship and some sexxxing, that was fine by me.  However, I was NOT going to get involved with a Canuckistani.  No, no, no.  Not going to happen.  I was firm about this in my mind.

Except, I was starting to have more than warm, “come on, let’s fuck” feelings about him, and I panicked.  I couldn’t fall for someone so far away–I simply couldn’t.  But, I didn’t want to give up the connection we had, so I tried to have it both ways.  I continued flirting with him and exchanging intimacies, but I also encouraged him to date locally.  I wasn’t quite ready to date yet (I was looking more for a fuck buddy), and I didn’t want to be unfair to him since he seemed ready to jump in the dating pool.

He called me on it.  I realized that I was being disingenuous in pushing him towards other women.  You have to understand that I see this now, but it was all a muddle at the time.  I truly did want him to be happy because he’s a good man who deserves happiness with a good woman.  I didn’t think I could be that woman, particularly because of the geographical distance, and it seemed churlish of me to stop him from meeting local women.  What I didn’t acknowledge, though, was that I was quickly becoming attached to this man, and I was ruing the distance between us.  Indeed, I hardly allowed myself to even think about it in the privacy of my own mind, let alone voice it out loud.

We were talking every day through Facebook and email.  Neither of us like the phone, so we stayed away from that for the most part.  We did migrate to IM on Skype, and we both found our comfort zone in that arena.  I found it a lot of fun to post videos on his FB wall (hair bands like Poison and Bon Jovi are a guilty pleasure of mine and a bane of his existence), email him a long, intimate email, and chat with him at the same time.  We could talk about anything, and I felt really simpatico with him. He was making a home in my heart, and it scared the shit out of me.  What do I do when I get scared?  I try to shape the situation into something familiar.  What’s familiar to me?  Sex.  And, we had similar fantasies, though in the opposite.  I may go more into that in a future post, but I’m just going to let you stew on it for now.

I admit it.  I freaked the fuck out.  I had made this big declaration to myself about dating locally and blah-di-blah-blah, and yet, I was falling for a man a thousand miles away.  Again, I am much more clear-eyed about this now than I was then.  Then, I just had to try to turn the situation into something I knew and with which I was comfortable.  So, I gave him the now-infamous (between us) speech about the window of opportunity.  I blush a little to think about it in retrospect, but it’s important in getting us where we are today.

I told him that while I knew we were just flirting and weren’t really thinking of meeting (though we had talked about it in more concrete terms), if we did meet, it had to be soon because the window of opportunity was closing.  He was, rightfully, confused, and asked met to elaborate.  I took a deep breath and gave it my best shot.  I said that I didn’t want to do a long-distance relationship because I’ve done enough of those in my time.  If he wanted to come and hang out and have sex, I’d be down with that.  However, if he wanted to do that, he had to do it soon because the window of opportunity was closing.  I was beginning to care about him too much to keep him in that category, and as I didn’t want a long-distance relationship, there was no reason for us to meet after the window of opportunity closed.

Sounds fucked up, right?  As Idle Primate said to me later, “I was thinking, let me get this straight.  I can meet you and be with you as long as I don’t care about you too much.  If I do care about you too much, though, then we can’t meet.”  I winced to hear him say it so bluntly, but that was the gist of it.  That’s the familiar road for me–being with someone who couldn’t or wouldn’t commit to me.  Being with someone knowing there would be an end to our relationship. Being with someone who wasn’t as into me as I was into that person. Did I like the way those relationships unfurled? No. Was I comfortable in them? Yes. And so, because I’m a control freak and someone who really really really likes her world to be small, I tried to force Idle Primate to walk down that road with me.

Idle Primate was having none of that. He wanted to meet me, yes, but he didn’t understand the artificial constructs I insisted on placing around the meeting. He was quite clear about his feelings for me, and by baldly stating them, I had to confront my twisted logic, my fears about caring too much for him, and I had to figure out what I really wanted from him.

I looked past my fears and my damage and realized that I didn’t want to walk down the same road with this man that I had walked so many times before. Yes, it would be comfortable and easy (in a sense), but it would end up with the same result–me alone with a mess to clean up. In addition, he’d been hurt badly by women in the past, and he was too good a man to mess with like that. I had to make a decision–either we stopped talking sexy-sexy and truly be just friends, or I had to acknowledge that the dreaded window of opportunity had already closed. I was past being able to be casually-involved with Idle Primate, if I ever was able to be in the first place. For all my brash talk and all my flirty ways, when I fall for someone, I fall hard. It’s why I tend not to love–it’s really hard for me to stop loving someone.

I made my decision.  I told him to forget my window of opportunity speech and that I wanted to meet him without restrictions. To my astonishment, I meant it. I wanted to meet this man without trying to push him into a previous paradigm. That freaked me out, too, but in a better way than my previous freak-out.

By the way, Idle Primate had posted three pictures of himself by this time on his FB wall. I like men of all shapes and sizes, but he was definitely my type. 6’2″ tall with a solid frame (I like big men). He had tats, short-cut red hair with matching mustache and beard, gorgeous blue eyes, a sexy smile, and really nice hands.   I was immediately physically attracted to him, which was made all the hotter by the fact that I was immensely attracted to him in other ways as well.

I wanted this man. Badly. I wanted him as more than a fuck buddy or a fling. The feelings I had for him, nearly from the beginning, were foreign to me. When he told me he had bought the tickets to come see me, I was filled with joy, elation, fear, and astonishment. He actually put his money (literally) where his mouth was, and I was moved that he thought enough of me to walk the walk.

I was ecstatic. I was burbling over with a mixture of lust, excitement, jitteriness, fear, rapture, and….love. Ah, yes, the other four-letter word–the one that I had such issues with. I was determined not to say it to Idle Primate because it was too soon and we hadn’t met in person and because because because…I held good to my vow for weeks, and it was pretty impressive how I was able to creatively tell him that I loved him without using the actual phrase, “I love you”. But, I did. I knew I did, and while I wanted to wait until we met in person, I realized that it was folly to keep dancing around it. So, one day after he said it to me, I said it to him, and it felt like the most natural thing in the world.

As usual, I’m running long. I’m just going to end this post there and leave you hanging for the next post about the actual meet-up. Hopefully, I’ll get to it in less than three months!

*That is the extent of the computer metaphor this time around.
**OK, OK, it’s called Pajiba. Sheesh.

Minna 4.0 is more stable in functioning.  The downtimes are briefer, and maintenance is not as intense.   In addition, her firewall is stronger.

The earlier editions of Minna had a big flaw–I couldn’t say no.  I thought if I said no or stood up for myself, I would lose a friend.  For the most part, this wasn’t the fault of said friend as my friends are solid people who love me for who I am.  But, there have been people over the years who didn’t like this one bit.  And, because as I said earlier, I tended to store things up until they exploded, the ending of said friendships were ugly and brutal.  And, of course, it would reinforce my notion that I couldn’t voice my real opinion or I would lose my friends. My best friend, Kiki/Kat, who has been there for me since 1994, gave me a plaque for Christmas that has this quote by Dr. Seuss:

“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind. ”

It really resonated within me, first of all, because she’s one of my biggest supporters.  She’s seen me through some ugly things, and she’s never faltered in her friendship.  Secondly, I am used to feeling that I fall short of some amorphous ideal, and it’s soothing to hear from a very dear friend, “Hey.  I like you the way you are.”  Thirdly, I am slowly reaching the point where I am OK with myself.  And, that quote just underscored the inchoate sense of self-acceptance that is burbling inside of me somewhere.

So.  I am slowly starting to say no once in awhile.  I’m beginning to demur and say, “No, I don’t agree. ”  In other words, I’m becoming more than a mirror for other people, merely reflecting what they want to see.  And, if someone doesn’t like it, then she wasn’t really a friend in the first place, was she?**

Let me add–I’m not talking about being needlessly cruel or gratuitously contrary–though some would say I do the latter, anyway.  I just mean that I want friendships that are healthy, and it’s not healthy to be a yes-woman or to constantly fear that the other person in the friendship is going to drop you if you say something she doesn’t like. This is something I discussed with another friend.  Setting boundaries with someone can, ironically, lead to a closer relationship with that person.  If a friend knows where she stands with me and that I will let her know when I’ve reached my limit, then she is freer to be herself with me.

Boundaries.  Limits.  This is you.  This is me.  It’s really figging*** difficult and scary for me to set boundaries, but I see the rewards I reap when I do set said limits.  And, I’m less likely to blow up at someone if I’m open with her about my boundaries in the first place.  It’s a win-win-win-win!****

Minna 4.0 also has some forced upgrades.  The procrastination code has been re-routed.  Somewhat.  I am a champion procrastinator, especially when it comes to doing things I really don’t want to do–like switch doctors.   My old doctor used to be great until she got bitter and fearful of insurance companies.  The last time I saw her, her main technique was to shame me.  Now, I can do that myself, thank you very much.  So, I did not react well to it.  Plus, there were shenanigans over my last refill, and I had to go without my meds for weeks.  Yeah, that didn’t go over well with me.  So, I dragged dragged dragged my feet, and then finally made the change.  I go to a new doc tomorrow, and while I’m freaking out about it, I know it’s for the better.

In addition, I’m trying to fix my sleep schedule.  Longtime readers know that me and sleep don’t get along.  I have viewed it as a nemesis for most of my life–only bad things happen in my sleep.  My therapist suggested years ago that I get on a set schedule, one more geared towards not sleeping into the afternoon.  I started doing it back then, but then with one thing after the other, I slid back into my old habits.  I recently decided to try again.  I set a 1 a.m. curfew, much as I did last time, and I stuck to it, more or less, for a week or so.  Then, something bothered me, and I let it slide.  Then I got back on it.  Then, this weekend, big drama with the mama, and I let it go to Hades again. The thing is, there’s always an excuse for backsliding.  There will always be upsetting events and drama and crises and whatnot.  I can’t control that.  What I can control is how I react to it.  If I want to be in the dingdang bed/couch by 1 a.m., I have actually control over that (no matter how much I argue to the otherwise).   It’s not easy as there are several reasons I hate going to bed, but in the end, I can make that choice.

This segues nicely into the hardware upgrading that I’m doing.  My body.  My other nemesis.  I haven’t been very kind to it, preferring to pummel it into submission than to treating it with kindness. Right now, I am near to the top of the heaviest I’ve ever been.  I have started a new fitness program.  And, given my history with eating disorders, I’m nervous about it.  See, I can say it’s to get in better health, and, sure, that would be a nice bonus, but the reality is that I want to be thinner.  Oh, and I want to get my eating under control.  But mostly, I want to be skinny.  I know myself well enough to know that’s the driving force–not the health bit. That makes me worried.

Every time I set out on a new fitness program, I am always determined to do it the healthy way and not go overboard.  Every dingdang time, I go overboard.  The last time, I ended up passed-out on the floor of a nightclub.  The difference this time?  I actually feel my body.  I wrenched my shoulder months ago, and I can actually feel the pain now.  I  can feel hunger, too– something I had suppressed for decades.  I am aware of being in my body, instead of thinking of myself as a brain that is carted from place to place by this lumbering form of mine. I want to do this in a sensible way.  I am cutting down on my food intake and increasing my energy output by increments.  I know the signs of me becoming obsessed, and I am trying not to go down that road again.  I also have friends who saw me go through it the last time and are unwilling to watch me do it again.  Plus, new friends who are having themselves no part of that.  This has been my bugaboo for over two decades, and I don’t want to carry it with me any further.

Minna 4.0 has had many upgrades, but the biggest one is this:  I am not a pacifist.  This is pretty mind-blowing to me because I have self-identified as a pacifist for decades.  I used to say I would let someone kill me before I killed him (and, I always imagined it was a him).  I shied away completely from violence as it was another forbidden subject.  Well, it was.  If anger was unacceptable, then violence was unthinkable.

So, what changed that for me?  Taking Taiji classes.  See, I wasn’t taking it just for the health benefits, though they are many.  I wasn’t taking it for the meditative aspects, which I currently dread and with which I struggle.  No.  I wanted to know about the applications of the postures.  Choolie told me she knows who’s going to like the sparring by who’s giggling as she describes what the application is for each posture.  That’s me.  The nastier the application is, the more I like it.  The more damage it will inflict, the more I’m eager to learn it.  This is discomfiting enough for someone who was taught by society and her family to be a nice girl and that nice girls were…well…nice.  Nice girls didn’t want to hurt anyone, no how, no way, not ever.

The next step happened when I was practicing a Baguazhang drill.  I went into a zone, and I immediately imagined I was attacking the enemy–and I was killing him.  What’s more, I had no problems with it.  This deadly calm lasted for the entire drill, and it shook me the Fu Schnickens up.  It was bad enough that I was grinning over the idea of breaking someone’s collarbone; I couldn’t believe I could imagine killing someone and not feeling bad about it.  Yes, even a hypothetical attacker.  That’s just not the way I roll. Or didn’t.

Republicans across the land are making abortion laws more and more draconian.  The Christian Extremists are, at last, putting into practice what their rhetoric has suggested.  They believe abortion is murder; therefore, they have no qualms about outlawing abortions after 20 weeks (in Idaho)–even in the case of rape.

I’ve been raped.  I will not be raped again.  And, I will be DAMNED***** if I carry a baby to full-term, especially a baby that is the product of a rape.   That choice is mine.  Mine only.  Abortion is another issue on which I’ve evolved, but I’ll leave that for another time. I have covered some of these insane bills over at Angry Black Lady’s place, and  I have become aware that my response is, “If I’m in that situation, I would kill the guy before he could rape me.”  Now, that’s partly because I don’t like my chances of living through another rape at all intact.   But, it’s also because I am starting to feel that no one has the right to do that to me–rape me OR dictate what I should do with my body.

I’ve told this story often, but when I was a kid, I was bullied mercilessly.  I have to give my parents credit in that they did talk to my teacher once, but he said there wasn’t anything he could do.  And, as immigrants, my parents didn’t know how the American school system worked.  Plus, back in the day, bullying was even more scoffed at than it is now.  My parents gave me the well-meaning, but useless advice of, “Ignore them, and they will stop.”  Uh, no.  That didn’t work?  You know what does?  At least for me?  Fighting back.  A girl used to tease me every day (and I still remember her name) until I snapped.  I pulled her head back by the hair and told her if she ever fucking bothered me again, I would kill her. You know what?  It worked.  She never bothered me again.  Sometimes, bullies will only respond to a greater show of power.  I didn’t yell at her.  I didn’t even raise my voice.  I actually dropped my voice, and I was serious.

Unfortunately, I felt guilty afterwards (per my breeding), and my takeaway was that I had to tamp down my anger and not let it get so out of control again.  My takeaway should have been that standing up for myself is a not wrong.   If I had stood up for myself in other ways prior to the death threat, I may not have had to use that last resort. And, that’s what it is.  A last resort.  I don’t want to use violence if I can settle matters in other ways, but I am no longer crossing it out as a viable option when I have exhausted other possibilities.  Choolie is teaching me how to defend myself so hopefully, I won’t have to dip into that particular bag of tricks, but if I’m backed into a corner and it’s down to me or him, I want to be confident that I’m going to be the last one standing.

*Check back in a month for updates and patches.

**Generic she.  I have male friends, too, but more female than male ones.

***Lent NEEDS to be over.  I really miss my swears.

****Me, my friend, and the voices in my head.

*****Sometimes, only a swear is good enough.  I’ll throw some Hail Marys and eat some rosemary as penance later.

For the most part, however, I just have to deal with incompatibilities between Minna 3.0 and Minna 4.0.*  There is a surprising amount of software which is not usable in the upgrade, and I have to figure out how to get rid of it without trashing the entire program.

For example, Minna 4.0 can’t keep her temper, anger, and opinions under control as well as Minna 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0 did.

All right.  I have to say this.  There is going to be a lot of recapping in this post.  I will talk about things I have talked about previously.  So, if you are a long-time reader who starts feeling a sense of déjà vu as you read this post, it’s not you.  I really am saying shiitake I’ve said before.   Now, back to the show.

I was taught that all negative emotions were not to be expressed and that anger was not acceptable.  No, it was stronger than that–anger (except as exhibited by my father) was a display of hate.  If you were mad at someone, that meant you didn’t love that person.  No, it was never said in words, but it was felt deeply–at least by me.

I want to be careful here.  I have talked to my brother about our childhood, and his memories are vastly different than mine.  We were talking yesterday, and the topic of our visit to Taiwan came up.  He was wistful as he said, “That was so much fun.”  I made some murmuring noise and changed the subject.  I didn’t need to get into it with him why I felt differently, but it struck me anew how two people can have such diametrically opposing reactions to the same experience.

Back to my childhood.  Anger was verboten.  I stuffed it down, only let it out on ‘safe’ subjects–such as social inequalities.  It wasn’t safe for me to stand up for me, so I stood up for the underdog in general.  I couldn’t say something that happened to me was wrong, but I could say it if it happened to someone else.

Now, I can acknowledge that I am an angry person.  Many things piss me off, but I still try to control it to a certain extent.  If I feel myself getting overheated, I take a breath and try to walk away.  I think this is good advice in general.  After all, many of the things that piss me off are, really, of little consequence.  I don’t need to give a Damascus fig what other people think–not really.

However, Minna 4.0 disagrees that showing anger is always wrong.  Sometimes, the best thing to do is to display one’s anger in order not to allow it to fester.  I have realized that if I allow myself to be pissed off about something for a length of time and do not address that anger, I will eventually explode about something trivial.  And, when I reach the point of explosion, I am less able to have a reasonable discussion or even a heated argument about why I’m pissed.

It’s a vicious cycle.  I bite my tongue because I do not want to upset another person.  I allow the anger to build and build until it comes pouring out of me, thus, upsetting the person I was striving so hard to protect in the first place.

On a similar line, in the past, I would let many debates slide by because I didn’t want to get involved.  Now that I am more invested in politics, it’s harder for me to not step into the fray and add my two cents worth.  However, as someone who has been trained to smooth things over and to placate ruffled feathers, it’s difficult for me to push a debate too hard.  In addition, I tend to think it’s my fault if the person with whom I’m arguing doesn’t seem to get what I’m saying.  I come up with links and explanations, and I try to approach the subject from different angles.  And, if the other person still doesn’t get my point, I assume it’s a failing on my part.  Only recently have I started to realize that in many cases, it’s not me–it’s the other person.  That person either doesn’t have the capability to see things outside of her viewpoint or is willfully ignorant and doesn’t want to see things from my point of view.  Sometimes it’s a mixture of both.  Sometimes, it’s really is a case of two people having different opinions.

In other words, it’s not all about me.  That’s been one of my most-ingrained flaws throughout my life.  I have both a low self-esteem (my opinion doesn’t matter; no one wants to hear what I have to say; I might as well just shut up) AND an inflated sense of my importance (everyone is judging every little move I make; I can irrevocably hurt someone by disagreeing with him; I can kill people’s soul with a disapproving glare), both of which strive to shut me up.

Minna 4.0 is having none of that.  She has things she wants to say, and she’s going to say them, gumdropit!  So, even though I dread confrontation and even though my stomach knots up when I do jump into a debate, I am doing it.

It helps that I have friends with whom I have been able to argue and not have it completely destroy the friendship.   In fact, one good friend has reassured me repeatedly that he isn’t going to stop being my friend because of one argument. Or two or twenty, apparently.  This is eye-opening to me.  I can disagree with someone, even a friend, and it isn’t the End of the World (as we know it).  We can argue.  I can get mad.  He can get mad.   Then, we can get over it and either find common ground or just disagree.

What I’ve realized when it comes to argument and debate is what is worth it to me and what isn’t. Some people enjoy debating for the sake of debating. I don’t. I can’t, really, given my background. Plus, if I’m following a discussion/argument/debate online, I tend to hang back and take in the whole debate before jumping in.  More often than not, I see that someone else has made my point or it’s not worth my effort to jump into the fray.  Therefore, when I actually do dip a toe in the water, I’m pretty invested in the argument.

I don’t argue with people just looking for a fight or people who are not debating in good faith.  I argue to the best of my ability, and then I walk away when I feel it’s done for me.   Now, remember, this is the ideal for me and not what I’m actually able to do.  The brushing off my shoulder and walking away part is not so easy for me.

Taiji has helped me deal with the fact that I have a lot of anger to work through.  A LOT.  It also helps that my teacher has dealt with similar issues and has seen it in many students, especially women.  I am not at all comfortable with my seething rage, but I also realize I’m past the point of being able to stuff it down or pretend it’s not there.  It is.  In multitudes.  And, even though I’m afraid my head will ‘asplode if I let out my anger, I’m more afraid of what will happen if I don’t.

Breaking news!  Minna 4.0 is also going to streamline the hardware options over the next year or so. **

This is running long, as usual.  I’m going to end this here for now and save the rest of the upgrades for part four of this seemingly never-ending series of posts.

*That’s about as far as I can stretch the computer upgrade metaphor.  Any further comparison is solely a figment of my imagination and may or may not be accurate.

**Yes, this means I’m watching my diet and exercising again.  I’m trying to do it in a non-obsessive way this time.  Wish me luck.

Now, today is my birthday.  Longtime readers know that I have a tempestuous relationship with my birthday.  I disliked it as a kid, positively loathed it through my twenties and early thirties as it was a nasty reminder of the fact that I was, yes, indeed, alive in body and that I was a year older with nada to show for it.  In the last five years or so, I had been slowly working my way to being neutral about my birthday.  I didn’t love it, but I didn’t hate it any more.

Last year, I returned to struggling with it, and it’s been even harder this year.  Why?  Well, first of all, it’s a round number–40.  Now, I have never cared about my actual age.  In fact, at the beginning of the year, I just say I’m a year older in order to prep myself for my birthday.  Of course, then when my birthday arrives, I sometimes get confused as to how old I really am, but that’s neither here nor there.

40.  That’s old.  Or at the very least, middle-aged.

I fixate on certain things (no, really?), and apparently, 40 is one of those things.  I keep staring at the number as if it’s an alien being with three heads.  It doesn’t look anything like I feel.  On the one hand, I wasn’t taught healthy ways to navigate the world when I was younger, and I stayed frozen in time for fifteen years.  So, on that hand, I feel very young, as if I’m just learning to walk.  On the other hand, I’ve experienced things that I sincerely would not wish on someone I loathed because the way back is just so long and arduous.  I feel as if I’ve been alive forever, so on that hand, I feel very old.

40?  How can I be 40?  What the Hades happened to my twenties and thirties?  For that matter, where are my aughts and teens?

I look around me at my friends doing shiitake, going places, and in general, living their lives.  Families, careers, homes, love, laughter, life.  No, no one had it all, but they all had some of it.  In the past, it didn’t affect me so much because it was unfathomable to me that I would ever have it–which part of it, you ask?  All of it.  Any of it.  How could I even dare to dream that one day, I, too…no, scratch that.  It wasn’t even about dreams–I just didn’t allow myself to think about anything as lofty as having a real and actual life.  Unimaginable.

The last few days, I’ve had a rough go of it.  I was in a deep funk (deep deep deep almost abyss-like), and I was ruminating about the futility of my life again.  I had a similar funk about a month ago, and it freaked me the Fu Schnickens out because I don’t want to go back to the eternal abyss again.  But, after a few days, I pulled out of it, and when I told my therapist, she didn’t overreact.  She simply said she understood my fears and that if the feeling lasts for two weeks, we’ll talk more about it.  Just that simple statement by her soothed my fears that I was on a one-way street back to the endless pit.

So, this time, even though I plunged far, I tried to hold on to the fact that my depressive episodes these days are much shorter in duration.   That’s the upside.  The downside is that my demons, the negative voices in my head, are much nastier this time around.  I am more able to fend them off these days, so I sense they are making their last desperate bid to pull me back to where I was.  What they don’t know is, I won’t go back there.  I have reached the point of no return, and I would rather be dead than live a barely-there-life again.  Still, it’s hard for me to fight them off when I created them.  They know my weaknesses, and they are not afraid to push every dingdang button I have.

They can still bring me to my knees.  I have, on occasion, hurt myself to shut them up.  But, those occasions are very few, and I am determined to completely stop hurting myself.  The relief I get from one of those sessions is so fleeting, it’s not even worth it.  One thing that helps is listening to what my friends tell me.  I have friends willing to say, “Minna, your demons are full of caca.”  My friends believe in me, and they will fiercely defend me from all attackers–even when the attacker is me.

Another thing that helps is that I actually have things that I want in life.  In the past, I never gave a thought to my future because I never thought I had one.  I didn’t think I’d live past thirty, and I was pretty disappointed when I did.  As I stated earlier, I thought all the things other people had were off-limits to me. I simply couldn’t fathom having my own place, a steady job, and a partner.  Now, I can.  Well, to be more specific, I need the first one urgently, and I am closest to realizing that goal.

The second is a bit more fluid and complicated as I intend to make my living as a writer/freelance editor.  But, the fact that I can even articulate this is huge.  For too long, I kept my writing hidden as if it were something of which I should be ashamed.   I thought it was, at best, a hobby–something I had to do, but not something I could do for a living.  And, quite frankly, I was too skittish to really show my fiction.  Now, however, I realize that I write really well.

Huh.  No lightning strike.  Whew!

I shouldn’t feel like a criminal writing that, but I do.  It seems wrong, somehow, to acknowledge something good about myself.  And, that makes me sad.  I mean, I have no problem rattling off all the things wrong with me, but I get all wobbly inside ‘admitting’ that I’m good at something or that I’m proud of myself for something.

But, ever since I started blogging, I’ve noticed that people respond to my writing, much as they responded to my performing.    It was harder and harder to think that my writing wouldn’t have an audience because it obviously did.

As to the topic of romantic relationships…that’s the most frustrating one for me.  I used to think I was destined to be alone.  And, in order for it not to hurt too much, I convinced myself that I did not want to be in a relationship.  Hey, if I didn’t want it, then it didn’t matter than I wasn’t in one, right?  Well, over the past few years, I started opening myself up to the possibility of being with someone–and I discovered that I wasn’t as averse to the idea as I always thought I was.  In fact, I started longing for…something.

When I stopped living, it made it easy to ignore any desires I might have had.  I didn’t inhabit my body or my soul, so I wasn’t aware of what resided there.  Oh, sure, I liked sex (a lot), but who doesn’t?*  As I started to be more aware of my body and of my soul and of, well, me, I couldn’t deny that there was a voice inside me saying, “Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to walk over to someone’s house and just chill with him/her for a few hours, have some hawt sex, and maybe spend the night?”  Then, as I started to become more comfortable with myself, the idea of spending an appreciable amount of time with someone began to appeal to me.  It kinda crept up on me, and my first instinct was to vigorously deny it.

Now, though, I am trying to accept that it’s OK to want to be with someone as long as it’s not what drives me.  To that end, I need to start doing activities I would enjoy otherwise, such as politics and theatre, meet new people, and just see what happens.  The problem is, I still have doubts that I am dating material (i.e., the kind of girl you’d take home to mother), but I’m trying to not let that stop me from testing the waters.

I’ve been in a much better mood today than I usually am on my birthday.  I’m enjoying the crisp, cool weather, even though I know it’s the harbinger to the end of winter.   I still have a lingering regret over all the years I wasted, but I can’t do anything about that.  What I can do is try to make sure that I don’t waste even more years of my life.

To that end, here is a list of my admirable qualities/pluses/assets.  I’ll start with the easy ones:  My brains, my wit, my twisted sense of humor, my writing ability, my hair, my tits, my dancing ability.

Harder ones:  I’m a good listener.  I truly care about people.  I believe there is good in most people, despite the fact that I know there is bad in everyone as well.  I have a great smile, so I’m told.  I’m a loyal friend.  I have a thirst to learn new things.

Flaws that I can make work for me:  My OCD.  My stubbornness.

After I posted the entry from yesterday, people told me I was strong.  That surprised me as I’ve seen myself as weak for most of my life.  But, it was pointed out to me that the fact that I was still alive proved I was strong.  That was an odd, but welcome viewpoint for me to hear.  I mean, I’ve been told in the past that I come off as intimidating and so together and whatnot, but not that I’m strong.

I have to say that while I don’t feel strong, I feel determined.  This is Minna 4.0, bay-bee.  New and improved and better than ever.  Sure, she still needs a few patches, and I am sure there will be future upgrades, but she’s all right for now.  This is the best I’ve ever felt on my birthday, and it feels kinda nice.  A new year for the new me.**

*Rhetorical question.  I know some people don’t.

**Friend of mine wrote that on my wall on the Book of Faces.

The pictures, top to bottom: The first picture was taken at a friend’s wedding almost seven years ago.  I was sick as a dog, and yet, this is one of the best pictures of me–ever.

The second picture was taken at a cousin’s wedding roughly ten years ago.  I was in the middle of my second bout of eating disorders, and I still felt ugly, fat, and grotesque.

The third picture was taken approximately six months ago.  Kel’s daughter does Irish dancing, and I tried on her tiara for kicks.  And, since it’s my birthday, I thought I’d dub myself queen.

The videos, top to bottom: The first, by Concrete Blond,  is my self-appointed birthday song.  This is the third year I’ve posted it.

The second is a classic Indigo Girls song.  They hold a very dear spot in my heart.

The third is from the real queen, the incomparable Queen Latifah.  This song just gets me moving.  Initially, I was looking for songs by women about powerful women, but I thought it was more apropos to just include songs by women I like.  Plus, this is a powerful woman song–she does what she wants, no matter what the naysayers say.  And, she’s hawt.

We are gathered here today to mourn the passing of someone very dear to me:  Me.  Oh, I know I am still alive, so obviously, I am not mourning the actual physical passing of me, as fascinating as that may be.  No, I am mourning the passing of the girl/woman I used to be–the one who I am trying to no longer be.

For decades, I hated that girl/woman.  I wanted her to die.  If I had the guts, I would have killed her and her whiny, mopey, puling ass.  I couldn’t stand being inside her head as she brooded about how much her life sucked for hours on end.

I hated that she was weak and indecisive and just so gumdropit* spineless.  She was a complete mess, and she couldn’t do anything right.  I hated her with every fiber of my being.  I wanted nothing to do with her–which was problematic, of course, because she was me.  As hard as I ran, as much as I numbed out, as much as I tried to get away from her–I couldn’t.

That depressed me even more.

Hate.  it’s an ugly word, but it’s apropos in this situation.  I can’t tell you how much I raged against her, how much I tore her down and shredded her into tiny bits.   The demons in my head didn’t have to egg me on because I was a willing participant in her destruction.  I berated her physically, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally.  She couldn’t do anything right, and oh, how I hounded her with that truth every Damascus Fig moment of her existence.

Let me be brutally honest:  There was a time when I didn’t like a single thing about myself besides my intelligence.  I hated my face, my body, my indecisiveness, my low self-esteem, my freakishness, my skittishness, and everything in between.  I thought I was the biggest piece of shiitake on earth, and I didn’t think I deserved to live.

I abused myself physically in many ways because I just couldn’t express my disdain for myself deeply enough with mere thoughts and words.  Horrifying?  Yes, in retrospect.  At the time, I thought it only what I deserved.

When I look back at who I was twenty years ago, I don’t recognize that person.  I don’t know her or what she was thinking or how she thought.  Frankly, she and I would never have been friends.  And yet.  And yet.

That woman–girl, really, at that point took all the abuse I heaped upon her.   She took the mutilation, the dangerous sexcapades, the eating disorders, the exercise obsession, and she didn’t break down.  She did not have to go to the hospital–ever.

My body.  It’s sturdy.   I have never had a broken bone.  That’s pretty amazing given how little I actually cared for it over the years.

My mind.  It’s crazy, for sure, but it’s also creative, lively, and imaginative.

That abused girl dug in her heels, and she survived as best she could.  It wasn’t pretty or easy or healthy, to be sure, but she’s not dead.  Or rather, I’m not dead.  And, for that, she is to be thanked.

The thing is, though, the coping behaviors she developed that allowed her to survive this far are not healthy ones.  They are not coping behaviors that will allow me to do more than survive.  And, dingdang it, I want to do more than just survive each day.

Now, I can recognize the habits, thought patterns, and behaviors I employ that are outmoded.  It was my habit to constrict my world to make it as manageable and nonthreatening as possible.  I avoided personal conflict at all costs, and I worried endlessly about everything.  I put off doing things that were unpleasant or that could possibly be unpleasant, and I swallowed my anger.  I would hurt myself because I felt it unsafe to have any kind of argument with anyone else.  I would get on and off the diet train until I wrecked my body.  I hated myself, and I doubted that anyone could really love me.  I viewed myself as irrevocably broken.

I’ve started to slowly and painfully put an end to some of those bad coping mechanisms, but it’s never easy to change one’s core beliefs.  And, because I am the way I am, changing these beliefs results is me questioning and doubting myself even more.

It’s one step forward, a half step back for me.  Sometimes, it’s one step forward, two steps back, and then a huge leap forward.  My progress isn’t linear, and I get discouraged when I backslide–which seems to be so figging often.  I am not one to be patient with myself (another flaw), and then I spiral into a constant loop of self-disparagement.

It’s time to put a stop to that as well.  There’s not much I can do about my initial reaction to things, but I can do my dammedest (please note, not a swear) to stop the slide before it gets too bad.

I’ve put off writing this post and posting it because it’s very bittersweet to say goodbye to the old me.  I know that it’s best to let go of the broken, battered girl I used to be, but it’s hard to do so without wondering what I am going to be from here on out.   There’s a small part of me that doesn’t want to let her go because she was my identity for so long.  I have to be gentle with that part of me while simultaneously saying goodbye to my past.

I can’t change my past.  It’s a part of me, and it has definitely shaped who I am now.  However, I also can’t cling to it and pretend it’s all I’ll ever be.  I’ve done that for far too long.  In the last two years, I have changed by leaps and bounds, albeit in fits and starts.  Earlier on, I said I wouldn’t recognize the girl I was twenty years ago.  Hades, I don’t even recognize the woman I was five years ago.

I don’t know who I am, any more, but I know who I am not–her.  That broken, comatose girl.  That ruined, walking dead woman.  And so, it’s time for me to let them go.  As I do, I thank them for their service to me, and I truly hope they can now rest in peace.

*I gave up the swears for Lent in order to prep for my run to the Republican primaries for president.  At least I don’t have to stop lying.

This is the opening to her post:

I’ve never been raped.

Why?  Because I’m lucky.

Nothing more.  Nothing less.

Go read the rest of her piece right now because I’m going to be riffing on it in my own post.  Go on, read it.  I’ll wait.  Let me know when you’re done.

Back?  Good.

Unlike Emily, I am not a lucky one.  I have been in two situations in which I endured recurring rape.  Those of you who read my blog regularly know about it because I post about it from time to time.  The first time, it started when I was seven.  The second, I was 21 and in a foreign country.  Both seemed like they happened a life time ago, and yet, I still deal with the aftermaths and the ramifications to this day.

I started this post a few days ago, and I abandoned it.  Why?  Because I saw what happened in ee’s threads about rape, both at BJ and at ABL’s place.   I saw how the excuses started pouring in, the rationale, the apologia.  “Yeah, it’s terrible that she experienced that, but…”

No.  There is no fucking but at the end of that sentence.   No one deserves to be raped.  No one.  Not even if she* was in the wrong part of town late at night.  Not even if she accepted a drink from a guy and he slipped her a Roofie.  Not even if she was dressed in tight clothing.  Not even if she went home with a guy she didn’t know and then changed her mind.

No one deserves to be raped.  Ever.**

The second reason I abandoned this post is because I’m tired of talking about it even though both experiences have deeply affected me, and I still deal with the ramifications to this day.

When I sleep, I have to have a white noise machine on to block out the sounds.  I also wear earplugs, a mouth guard (because I grind my teeth), and an eye mask.  I sleep with a pillow over my eyes, and I pull the covers up to my nose.  When I am anywhere that is not my home or some place trusted, I have to be in a seat facing the door, and I cannot stand to have someone touch me without my permission or without me knowing the person is going to do it.  In a movie theatre, I have to be near the aisle.  I hate being hemmed in in any way.  I have a fucked-up sleep schedule in part because I prefer being awake in the night–when the bad shit happens.  When things get really bad, I sleep on the couch rather than my bed.  My cats love that because they aren’t allowed in my bedroom (I’m allergic).

If I see a rape scene in a movie and did not know it was coming, I immediately flash back to my own experiences.  It’s the same when I read about rape.  And, since I have an eidetic memory, I get all the sounds, sights, smells, feelings, bodily sensations, and tastes of what happened at the time.  When I read about the assault on Lara Logan, my body immediately tensed up, and I felt as if I were under attack.  My heart started racing, and my face flushed.  I can’t listen to rape jokes without flashing back on my experiences.  I may not experience the full memories each time, but with every joke, every account of rape, every depiction I see, my body immediately reacts as if I’m under attack.  Hell, when Representative Gifford was shot, I immediately went into a deep depression.  I could barely move for two days, and I couldn’t figure out why.  I felt stupid because I didn’t know her, and I didn’t want to appropriate her tragedy.  It was partly the PTSD, yes, but it was more.  When my therapist helped me realize why it affected me so, it was a relief, but it also made me realize just how much further I have to go in dealing with the ramifications of my rapes.   I have posted about it before, and you can look through my archives for more in-depth musings about how I have dealt (badly) with the rapes.

Rapes.  Plural.

Do you know what being raped does to you?  Or rather, did to me?  It smashed my soul.  I’m talking about the second experience as I still can’t really talk about the first very easily.  And, as I am cross-posting this at ABL’s place, I am even more careful in choosing my words.   In my case, it was a mixture of sex, cultural differences, and power.  This guy was a predator, and he knew that I was easy prey.  What I said didn’t matter.  What I wanted didn’t matter.  Who I was didn’t matter.  I was simply a receptacle for his sperm, and in that way, he mirrored my first abuser as well.

And, I believed him that I didn’t matter and that I was nothing more than a sperm-receptacle in part because of my first experience, so I stayed with him for as long as I was in the country.  I endured him threatening to kill himself if I left him, sex without condoms even though he visited prostitutes, and him telling me how many babies we would make together.  I was lucky in that I had gone to Thailand for a semester abroad, and I had a coming-home date.  Otherwise, who knows what would have become of me?  This was 19 years ago, and I can still remember it as if it happened yesterday.  No amount of stuffing it back stops the symptoms of PTSD from sprouting up all the goddamn fucking time.

The third reason I’ve put off finishing this post is because of something I touched upon earlier–all the blame and judging people do about victims of rape.  Within hours of reports of Lara Logan’s assault, people were opining that women weren’t fit to do the job, that she was pretty and blond in a savage country, so what could she expect, that she was a homewrecker who got what she deserved, and other ugly shit.  It’s a variant of,“She dresses like a slut. She deserves it.” “She’s in a man’s job. What does she expect?” “She said yes to him once, so it’s not really rape.” “Men can’t help it. They have needs.”

As a society, we are extremely unkind towards victims/survivors of rape.  We judge them in ways we wouldn’t dream of judging any other crime victims.  So, the woman is not only raped, she is taken apart yet again if she dares talk about being abused.  It’s no wonder that victims often times stay silent–who the hell wants to deal with being judged on top of dealing with the aftermaths of being assaulted/raped?

The biggest reason I haven’t finished the post before this, however, is because I didn’t want to make other people uncomfortable.  It’s hard to hear about someone being raped.  It’s not nearly as hard as being raped, but it’s hard.  What do you say to someone who recounts a horrific experience of abuse at the hands of her uncle, father, boyfriend, date, friend, stranger?   I have seen how people shift and look away when I bring up the subject.  And, to be fair, it’s not easy to work it into every day conversation.

All of this has kept me silent during the past week or so while my co-bloggers have been kicking butt on the issue of rape and taking names.  I have other issues going on right now, so I let it go.  I felt guilty, though, because I know that part of the problem of rape is that people don’t talk about it.   I also had to grapple with an unwelcome realization I had about myself while reading about all the anti-women bills the GOP wanted to pass (and did, in some cases, in the House).   They wanted to curb abortion funding (which only goes to rape in the first place and incest) only to women who’ve been ‘forcibly raped’*** along with a whole bunch of other batshitcrazy things.   Forcibly, meaning visible bruises.  My immediate response?   I would kill any man who tried to rape me before he could penetrate.  Me.  Who once said I would let someone kill me before I killed someone else.  But, you see, I cannot go through that again, and if I were to be raped and get pregnant and forced to have the child, that would be a living death, anyway.   It was not a nice realization, but it helped me see that I DO think I matter and fuck the Republicans for trying to negate that with their misogynistic bullshit.

While I was musing all this over in my head, I read this post by TNC.  In it, he talked about how victims/survivors of rape need to give up their privilege of privacy in order to make rape less shameful and secretive.  Only, he said it much better than I just paraphrased.  He was not advocating mandatory reporting (which I would not support), but he was saying that if we want to erase the stigma that surrounds rape, those of us who have gone through it must speak out about it.

I can’t recommend TNC enough.  He strictly moderates his threads, so we’re able to have thoughtful discussions that get heated and passionate, but never nasty.  Or, if they do, he cleans them up.  It’s because of this that several TNC commenters, male and female, felt safe enough to share their own experiences of sexual abuse/rape.   It was painful to read, but it was also powerful and empowering to know that so many cool people survived and even thrived from such horrific experiences.   I was sorrowful that so many people had experience something similar to what I went through, though.  I don’t want anyone to be a part of that club.

One of the worst things about being raped is feeling like you’re alone, broken, and worthless.  I felt guilty and thought it was my fault, and I thought it permanently ruined me.   I did many crazy things after being raped the second time, and I didn’t care if I died.  Hell, my soul was already dead, so I might as well make my body match my soul.   I was too chickenshit to kill myself, so I left it up to the fates.  If I died in a fiery car crash (as long as no one else was hurt)–so be it.  If I got run over by a bus–so be it.

I was dead inside, anyway.  I can’t emphasize this enough.  I was the walking undead after experience two ongoing rapes.   I didn’t want to live.

In a way, I was lucky because I didn’t die, even though it didn’t feel like it at the time.  I was also lucky because I have always enjoyed (consensual) sex.  I love it, and I find it very life-affirming.  It’s joyful, playful, and just a whole lotta damn fun.  In addition, I know there are really damn good men out there.  I haven’t written off the whole gender just because of my two really horrible experiences and the other incidences that every woman endures (groping, cat-calling, insinuations, insults).  I have loved good men, and I have men as friends who are very dear to me.  I am grateful that my negative experiences have not caused me to lose faith in all mankind.

After reading TNC’s post, I summoned up the nerve to finish this post.  Yet, something was still holding me back.  Then, I read this post by Emily (my co-blogger at ABL’s place) recounting the story of a woman’s rape.   The woman had sent it to Emily and consented for it to be published.  It was hard to read, but it made my decision for me.  I had to write my post, come hell or high water (most likely the former).

Today, I am in the best place I’ve been in my life.   That’s damning with faint praise because I was in a really shitty place even two years ago.  However, I realize that I have to face the past, which means talking about it, and find new ways to cope with the old, old wounds.  Tai chi is helping me tremendously with that, as are my friends who are fierce in their loyalty to me.   My cats are of immeasurable comfort to me, and I have a brother upon whom I can count.  I have my health, my writing and performing abilities, and I have my warped sense of humor.  I will be relying on all these to help me continue to survive, hopefully, to thrive.

I write this post because I cannot stay silent–not now when the GOP is waging war against women (well, everyone who is not them, really, but especially women), trying to cut off funding to Planned Parenthood (donate! I did.  And, stand with them, too.  I did that as well), and being jackholes in general.   I have a platform, two actually–my own place and ABL’s place–and I intend to use them to the best of my abilities.  I am just one voice, but I know how to scream.

Cross-posted at ABL’s place.

*For the sake of simplicity, I will be using the heterosexual norm of man as perp, woman as victim/survivor for the rest of this post.  I am fully aware that men are victims and that women are perps as well.

**If we want to discuss things a woman might be better off not doing, that’s a different kettle of fish.  It’s also one I am not going to tackle in this post.

***And some minors.  The bill was poorly-written, so it was hard to tell exactly which minors they wanted to protect.