Day 0581

When I look into the faces of people who are pretending to themselves they are happy, this is what I think:
How sad. How tiring. How do you do that? Maybe I could try it?
Because where that series of thoughts always leads me is: does it matter if you’re only pretending? Is it necessary to a Good Life to be trying to fix things that aren’t right, to be striving to right wrongs?
Which, like all neural roads in my self obsessed brain leads to: would life be Happy if I only pretended not to see the hypocrites and liars?
If I pretended not to mind Halfman’s unapologized-for treatment of me, would I genuinely be happier or would I descend to his level?
If I were (God forbid) married to Halfman and pretended he hadn’t broken our vows in a long, drawn out, deliberate maelstrom of deceit, would I live with a smile in my heart? Or would I face the world with a thin smile on my lips and misery in my red rimmed, sleepless eyes?
Is happiness any good if it’s only as deep as they say beauty is? Or can both be enjoyed with just your skin?

Day 0479

I can be terribly demanding on the whole ‘always tell the truth’ thing.
But I’m yet to be convinced that’s a bad thing.
From the trivial to the most complex the desire to construct a lie only really comes to me when I’m uncomfortable or ashamed about a choice I’ve made or an action I’ve taken.
I use that as a warning sign.
I’m not better than anyone – I feel the desire to run from hard things by lying. Of course I do.
But when I get that internal panicky feeling I interpret it as a sign I need to rethink the decision I’m wanting to lie about.
If I don’t have the courage of my decisions or the confidence to admit when I’ve steered myself or others wrong, I suppose lies would be The Option.
This is brought to mind not by Halfman (breakthrough?) that Dark Prince of The Lie, but by something at work.
In a nutshell, the boss agreed to a decision but has told me he’s going to lie about it if a certain group asks why we’ve done what we’re doing. To me that just says: you’re not comfortable with the decision. Have the respect to change the decision or stand by it, but don’t lie.
I certainly won’t be backing him up if I get asked about it.
Life’s too short to lose your values at work over other people’s weak characters.

Days 0468 & 0469

I had a paradigm shift – an important one – as I drove in on my daily commute this morning.

There I was, negotiating the 4WDs and dreaming of a nice coffee when DING!
As in ‘DING bat, how could it take 43 years to get to realise something so simple!’

I’ve long lived by the maxim: Treat others the way you want to be treated.

But the maxim actually is: Treat others the way you expect to be treated.
The two things are wholly different in a totally essential way.

The first puts me where I’ve always been: not expecting to be treated well, just wanting it like crazy and giving people too much latitude to not fulfill my wishes.

Because wishes are dreams after all, not realities. Not something you really ever expect to happen.

But the second version; the one where I expect people to treat me at least as well as I treat them gives me a line where I can say ‘No, you can’t treat me like that. This is not an equal relationship.’

I know Halfman examples are getting a wee bit tiresome (especially for me), but he did provide me with a huge and rich amount of fodder for greater understanding of the arseholery of males.

So allow me to contrast two situations:
Situation 1: Halfman is unable to do something for me because of the difficulty of the situation. I could have humiliated him then, if I’d wanted. I could have told him he needed to step up etc, but I didn’t. I thought: how would I feel in his shoes (or bare feet as they were at that moment). And I went with compassion: ‘There are a million things going on here, I understand if you can’t give yourself to me 100% right now. I will give you my empathy and care because you are deserving of it.’ He was grateful, I think.

Situation 2: Three months into our relationship, I questioned Halfman about something he did that seemed like it was less than honest with me and because he appeared not to be acting ‘separated from the spouseish’. This was when he reacted by telling me he had to ‘do this his way’.

And I felt terrible. Absolutely terrible that I’d questioned him when he had promised to be honest with me and it was a difficult situation and he was working hard to do the best he could and … blah blah blah.

We met up briefly the next day because I needed to see him in the flesh and see his face as we chatted about this exchange.

This is when he said to me that I was ‘better than that’. By which he meant I was better than the person who had questioned his honesty the day before when I’d seen photos of him and his estranged spouse float onto the internet as they frolicked among the white wallabies and leeches of their weekend away together.

That phrase has made me angry for ages now.

And today my paradigm shift made realise clearly why. This is when he should have treated me the way I treated him. He should have said: Goodness me, don’t worry about it. This is a tricky and difficult situation for both of us, not just me. You’ve been patient and generous and kind and I will be the same with you.

In fact, today I can see that this isn’t just what he should have said, but what I deserved to have said.

It sounds a small change in perspective really, but to me, it is a quantum shift. Long may it remain.

Days 0394 & 0395

Tenderness and kindness. I know clearly now that’s what I’m looking for. With passion and humour thrown in.
I seem to have such a thing for guys who hold themselves back, whose passion is a secret to everyone but me.
That must be about my ego, I think. So time to branch out, to see if I can find one who wears his heart openly, whose eyes sparkle not just for me but for the whole day.
If I could patchwork together all the various beautiful bits of boys I’ve known, I’d have a mixed-metaphor decoupage of a remarkable human. But it would still be missing that bit: openness. That bit that I contribute over and over again.
I don’t want to wake up in yet another relationship to realise all the passion, the tenderness, the gentleness is generated by me. I want to see what happens when my openness and straightforwardness combines with that of another.
The challenge will be to find one like that.
And an even bigger challenge: to leave behind the ones that aren’t.

Days 0355 & 0356

I’m incapable of playing hard to get.
That’s not to say I’m ‘easy’ in any sense of the word. I may be quiet but I’m difficult and complicated.
And I’m lazy.
Playing relationship games just looks like too much hard work to me.
And when I like someone, and respect them (which is a key part of the liking), it’s just not possible to pretend otherwise.
I remember remarking on that to Halfman: how I didn’t exactly play hard to get when he revealed his feelings to me. Instead I told him how I felt and where my known lines were, the kind of treatment I expected and how I would treat him.
He guffawed when I said the thing about not playing hard to get. I assume that was because it was so obviously true. I thought too that he seemed used to women playing games with him and was surprised to find one who was so transparent.
Perhaps that made me boring or an easy mark for him? Who knows.
I’ve had friends tell me my lack of game playing leaves me too open. That I expose the real me too easily and that is what makes me vulnerable and perhaps why, the couple of times men have really gouged out my heart, it hits me so hard.
Because I have no defenses up in preparation.
Now, the real question I have is:
Is that ‘just me’ and an ok way to be? Or do I need to manufacture a defensive, shut down layer to be kinder to myself?

Day 0236

I love love love forcing people to say things bluntly when they are trying to skirt around them.

I get an inordinate and possibly very wrong sense of joy out of it, even when the eventual bluntness if directed at me and my wondrousness.

As all sad, ponderous stories do, it started with a boy. A 17-year-old boy, in fact, who was immature even for that age.

He wanted me to ‘get the message’ by ‘implication’ that he didn’t want to be my boyf any more, rather than spit the words out of his mouth.

That made me grumpy. Even though this was my first boyf – my first encounter with that odd perplexity of genes and hormones – I knew EXACTLY what he was doing.

And took amazing pleasure in forcing him into a place where I could say to him: ‘So, what’s going on?’

He ummed and ahhhhd in a way that would make every uncomfortable male who has ever had to confess to anything feel proud.

And then he finally said it. And I said ‘thank you. That is all.’

And went upon my merry way. It is so much easier to deal in certainties than to be buoyed along on the swells of hope and avoidance.

So much kinder.

So, herewith, some advice for man-boys everywhere.

You don’t have to be cruel to be kind – that’s just silly.

But you do have to be honest. And respectful.

You might want to write that one down, Halfman, if you haven’t already. It’s not charming: it’s offensive. It’s not ‘breaking it gently’: it’s being a coward.

Days 0130 & 0131

If there is one thing I can sense in someone I know well, it is a lie. I can feel it travel in a frisson over my skin. It is light and electric and feels very, very wrong. I am really a tremendous lie detector – at least when it comes to males. I find women are smarter and harder to read in this context.

What I’m not good at is listening to that lie detector.

The typical situation sees me detect the lie in an exchange such as this:

Me: What’s up? Something is different. What are you thinking?

Him: Nothing. (Quick move to touch me and show there is no distance)

My brain: Oh, no he’s just touched me. All is well. I’m a neurotic idiot, aren’t I? What is my problem? He’s lovely. I know he wouldn’t lie. *sigh*

And on I go into certain decrepitude. If not of body, at least of heart.

Does the ‘him’ in this scenario then wander along thinking: Phew! Got away with it!

Or does he not even notice he’s lied?

Day 0117

I am wrestling with something that isn’t entirely man related tonight. It is this: is it always The Right Thing to tell someone when they need to lift their game?
I tend to put it into my own context where I would so much rather know I have food on my face or that I’ve stuffed up or am causing friction than have everyone around me know and never say a word. That doesn’t mean it’s easy to hear those things, but it’s so much easier to change and get over them or decide not to change while being aware of the consequences.
I call it the Bra Strap Measure. I once had a CEO who was always being so caring and telling me she wanted honesty and would return the favour. But I discovered, after sitting through an hour long meeting with her, that one of my bra straps had snapped and the thing had crawled up out of my sleeve at the shoulder and was sticking up. I thought about how she had stared at that while talking to me for so long and knew the work day was only partly over. And yet she said nothing – not even a whisper on the way out.
I knew in my gut that I couldn’t trust her. And in that case I turned out to be right.
Is this a good measure of someone’s honesty and respect for me?

Day 0088

I have so many weaknesses. But the very biggest among them is how I cannot deal with lies. I know people tell them all day, every day. And most of the time they come from a good place – a place of wanting to avoid unnecessary hurt. But I have never been able to deal with untruth in a way that resembles anything other than total emotional devastation. I think Truth is simply the one thing I depend on to get me through each day. As if I need one certainty, one thing I can take for granted so I can have more room in my head for dealing with all the other this life throws at me.
As a result, the times the truth has been turned upside down on me, I have toppled as well. I simply don’t understand how people can live while lying? I don’t mean I never tell a white lie or that I never avoid things, but I do expect and assume the truth on the big things: especially where the truth has explicitly been asked for.
I wish so much that this didn’t matter to me. Seems like life would have been a whole lot easier the past seven months if it hadn’t. I have come so very close to the bottom because of it: so utterly shattered into a million pieces, I can feel the hurt and tears well now even just thinking of it.
Somehow being lied to makes me feel so very small.

The right ones

‘Being honest may not get you a lot of friends but it will get you the right ones’

John Lennon