The abyss of the unsure future, that is. I'm at an age where I feel my mortality, the counting down of the days I have on this earth. It makes me concerned how many of those days will be wasted on loneliness, on having no one to share my life with - or no one who really appreciates and respects me. I pray daily for someone to come into my life who I can respect, desire, appreciate, cherish, trust, be proud of, care for in all the best ways…and who feels the same about me. To have and to hold. Who can promise he won't make me feel the knife in my back ever again, and can back it up with a lasting commitment to making sure we are safe and secure in each other.
Jacob and I had a particularly good day, about a week ago. We went shopping together, and it was great fun. He's been feeling his femininity lately, and I do enjoy being able to support that for him. I'd missed shopping together like that.
Then there's the dating world. A day or so after The Split, I got one of my regular calls from Bear. This time, when the inevitable question came, I had a different answer.
"Are you available?" he asked.
"Yes," I said.
Pause. "Are you putting me on?"
"No, I'm available," I said.
He started to cry. He'd been praying for five years for that answer, and he'd finally gotten it. He is working 9,000 miles away in Saudi Arabia, but he promised to begin "courting" me in earnest. And thus, he did.
We arranged times to talk via Skype, generally twice a day. We'd be at opposite ends of our day, but would catch up on our respective days or nights then. On weekends, we could talk more. Sometimes for hours.
He'd say sweet things, but I'd have to rein him in sometimes. For instance, asking what I thought our wedding would be like was pushing me a little too hard, too fast. He'd been thinking about this for five years, and I'd been on the wagon for about five minutes.
He made plans to come see me over his Christmas vacation in the states. He's spend Christmas with his family, then come out to see me for New Year's. I had a New Year's date :o)
Then, little red flags started coming up.
For example, one night, I explained why I don't go to church. I won't go into that here, just yet. I couple of days later, he said he saw that as something he could "fix." I stopped him there: I don't need to be fixed. I've made the decisions I have for a reason, and I don't need someone else to push me into what they think I should be doing.
Another time, I mentioned wearing my pink jeans. "I'm not being seen with you in public in pink jeans," he said.
"Then you can stay the fuck home," I said.
He started emailing me offensive, sexist jokes. He's actually say in the email that he knew I'd be upset by it. I asked him why he'd send me something he knew would upset me, and his response was to get mad at me for being "sharp tongued."
Anyone who knows me, also knows that I love Doctor Who. One day, he asked me, "What kind of doctor is he? A people doctor? An animal doctor?"
I chuckled a little and decided it would be fun to introduce him to the Doctor. I said, "No, he's a time-traveling alien. It's a long-running show, since 1962. Each time they get a new actor for the Doctor, he 'regenerates' into someone new."
I knew this would invite a multitude of questions, but I wasn't quite prepared for the one he threw at me. "Have they ever made him gay?" he asked. "Because they like to push things like that, you know."
I was a little speechless. WTF?
As I said, Jacob and I have remained friends. The didn't sit well with Bear. He told me one day that when I spend time with Jacob, it made him want to "put a fist through the wall." He said I wasn't to spend time with him anymore. When I said he didn't get to tell me that, he said it would be okay, if I was never alone with him.
No, you don't get to tell me what to do. Controlling me is not an option.
All the while, he tells me that he loves me more than anything, every day. I've heard that before, so I wait to see how it's backed up….
One day, he sends me money. Wired it to me via Western Union. It was money I needed to get my daughter home for Christmas, so it really was quite touching. "It's a gift from me," he said. "We need never speak of it again because I don't want anything in return. No matter what happens, that was a gift to you." He wouldn't let me refuse it. Either I picked it up or it went to waste. I can't stand letting anything go to waste, particularly money. It was a mistake to take it, I'm sure, but I really needed to get my daughter home, too. My need to see her won out.
My mistake was immediately evident. His demeanor with me changed. His conversations took on a crude tone. He started talking about what "The Girls" would like from him - referring to my breasts as though they were a separate entity from me.
I'm sorry, but if you want to be intimate with me, I'm a whole package. My worth is not in my chest.
Then other phrases cropped up, like "I want to eat at the Y." I thought he was being sweet once when he talked about how he'd make breakfast for me, until he said, "Yeah, I have a special breakfast sausage for you."
What a sweet talker, right? Like the boys' locker room in a middle school.
One day, I was worrying over a situation with my son. I was really pretty upset. I told him all about it and his response was to tell me he wanted to hear me masturbate on the phone for him. Instead, I stopped the conversation.
He later apologized for his adolescent behavior, but I was done. DONE.
The next time he started in about "The Girls," I asked if he could please not talk about sex every time we talked. It wasn't appropriate, and there was much more to me than that. I'd been thinking about what to say, and I said it kindly. I was hoping to get through to him and make a change.
He got quiet. He said he wasn't feeling so great anymore, so he'd call me later. Apparently, standing up for myself wasn't a response he expected.
Or respected. I didn't hear from him for three days. Then, I get an email. He tells me that I must have responded to him like that because I'm not over Jacob. He said I was sharp-tongued to tell him to back off about The Girls. And he said a couple of other things that I really couldn't make sense of - literally, an indecipherable string of words. Very weird.
With that, he walked away. Good riddance, actually. If standing up for myself is not permitted, then away with you. You have to be able to handle me as an individual. I'm not to be trifled with.
So, that was weeks ago. I've deleted everything associated with him. Then New Year's Day….
I receive an email from him. The only content was a picture - of him in front of a local restaurant. HERE. In my home town.
Creepazoid.
I responded, "Why did you send me this?"
He replied, "For the record….I showed up. On the road to Denver now."
Me: "Showed up for what? This is really creepy."
Bear: "Sorry I sent it now. Message received. Email eradiated. On the road again."
Eradiated?? Is that even a word?
I can't begin to express how glad I am that he works 9,000 miles away.
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