relationships

Two Six Seven

I told O this morning that I think I’m falling in love with him.

His response? That he hopes I’ll still go to London, and that it won’t be a reason that I’ll stay. I told him that it won’t be, but also that I’m not going to live my life on hold in the meantime.

I’m not going to find reasons that will make me feel better about the way he responded. I think that it’s obvious he doesn’t feel the same, and that’s okay – if he’ll eventually feel the same later on. The scary part of him telling me that I still need to go to London regardless is that it seems to suggest that he may never feel the same. Maybe he’s just with me because he knows there is no future, that he’s safe from being committed because I can’t honestly expect that.

I went into this knowing that I would very likely be leaving next year, and I’m fully aware of the potential heartbreak that I might have to deal with if that happens. But I still want a meaningful relationship, even if we know that there is a potential end date. I want to date as if the future didn’t exist, and now is all we had.

This idea of moving to London next year looms over my life and casts a shadow on everything that I want to do. It makes me feel like I should put my life on hold, that this is just an interim period before I leave. I resent that. I’m here now, and I want to live in this present.

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Two Six Six

I’m typing this, slight drunk, at a party of my boyfriend’s friend. This time last year my boyfriend at the time was breaking up with me. I couldn’t believe it at the time, so confused about why he would leave me when we were so good together. Now I can’t believe I’m in another relationship. Life is strange.

Two Four Two

At lunch with O today, I asked him – do you still like me? He nodded and reached across the table to hold my hands. I told him that recently it felt like he didn’t want to spend that much time with me. He told me that he’d just been feeling really tired. I said I could understand that, and that’s where the conversation ended.

I know that this conversation doesn’t sound like much but I do believe him, and maybe that willingness to trust will come back as gullibility and bite me one day, but what can you do really? I think in relationships you have to trust that the other person is being honest with you.

What I’m learning is that he is an introvert and that because of this, he operates vastly different to me. I am an extrovert, I really like spending time with people and I make room in my life for this. With O, I think he enjoys his own time and the limited energy he has is usually taken over by his flatmates because they’re always there, in his space.

To be honest, we are each other’s longest relationships and neither of us really know what we’re doing. I want him to be more communicative but the reality is that he’s still learning the ropes of what it means to be in a meaningful relationship too, so there’s gotta be grace for that, just as there needs to be grace for things that I do which I’m still learning.

At the moment, I know that he still likes me, that he still wants to spend time with me, and that’s enough for now.

Two Four One

Today has been less productive… and more anxiety filled instead.

It’s the same stuff – I feel like O isn’t making much of an effort to see me, doesn’t seem to be that bothered about it, which makes me feel shit and wonder if he’s losing interest, I project that fear and the insidious cycle continues. Talking about it with my counsellor today, I know that I need to just talk to him about it but I’m terrified that he’ll confirm my fears. It’s happened before. A few years ago, I was seeing this guy and felt him become more apathetic and blasé about us. When I brought it up with him, he said “oh yeah, I think you’re right”. Dingus, didn’t even know his own feelings until I told him.

What if the same happens this time? I don’t want me and O to come to an end 😦

I did bring it up briefly with O today (over text though, so doesn’t feel like a proper conversation). I said that I felt like we hardly saw each other anymore (it’s true, we only see each other once or twice a week at the moment). He replied saying that he knows he’s been pretty useless and he’s sorry about that, something about not sleeping well making him tired.

I hope he’s being honest. I’m scared he’s not.

I like him a lot, and I’m so terrified that he doesn’t feel the same way.

Is it better to live in ignorance and this continuous anxiety around whether or not he still likes me? Or is it better to know the truth, for better or worse?

Two Three Five

I’ve been writing an essay on Wordsworth and the role of memories. My thesis statement is around how our memories heighten all our senses and we experience that moment in time so much more vividly and romantically in our mind than it actually is in reality.

In thinking about seeing J yesterday, I feel that thesis resonate. He looked dull- so ordinary, so.. beige. My memory made him out to be this incredibly shiny person. He’s not. He’s an ordinary human being. There is a level of liberation in realising that.

Thank you Wordsworth.

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Gah, I actually saw J today. I was sitting in the window seat at a cafe, drinking my coffee when he walked by. We made eye contact so I’m pretty sure he saw me too, then I looked away before we acknowledged each other.

I feel… okay? This is what I text my friend earlier today-

…It was strange, I felt a dissociation between my present self and my past self. I felt surprised and a slight tinge of sadness but I don’t think those are present feelings. It’s like my present self is empathising with a past self or like my body was reverting to an old habit of feeling that way towards him. When I saw him I thought he looked very ordinary, like any other human being walking down the road but it’s the knowing he wasn’t an ordinary person to me at some stage in my past that I’m sad for.

So this is where I’m at. My present self is okay. I know that all I’m feeling are just remnants of what I once felt but that’s still sad, remembering how much I loved him and how deeply I felt that loss. I’m in a different place now, I don’t love him anymore. That’s good! That’s growth.

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Just now, I was looking up a word on my Dictionary.com app and an ad popped up. One of the guys looked really familiar and then I realised it was W – J’s best friend.

I really hate being reminded of him, because then I remember again all that’s lost. Even after all this time, even with the knowledge of how things panned out, I stand by the legitimacy of what I felt. The magnetism was real. But we are also human beings, we play along to the rules of external forces. Timing wasn’t right for us, and life be like that sometimes.

Two Two Two

I’m thinking about how this time last year, I was excited to meet J for the first time. We had matched on Bumble and our conversation was so promising about the connection we could, and did, have. I remember feeling so giddy and nervous about having coffee with him, knowing already that there was a good chance we would be a good fit. I was right. And then I was wrong. We were good. And then we were not good.

I’m thinking about how happy I am with O, the way he makes me laugh, how smooth his chest felt against my cheek this morning. I’m thinking about how different O and J are, and how different our relationships are. It’s not that I’m happier now with O, than I was with J, or vice versa. The two just can’t be compared. They’re so different. There is something to be said about commitment and how that is romantic in itself. When someone wants to be with you, cares about what you want and listens to what you have to say – that is something really special. That makes me feel giddy about my relationship with O. I feel heard with him. I feel him try be a good boyfriend. I feel his commitment to us and our relationship.