2002-05-06 time?
Closure

It always strikes me as an odd beauty of life how you can be at the end of love, yet feel hopeful and romantic about that same person.

S and I talked last night, long and hard. I told her every horrible thing I thought of her, every idea of how I saw her, how I saw her as selfish, self-absorbed, utilitarian and cold in dealing with me, all the conclusions I came to in the past month. I don't think I've ever seen anyone be so hurt, but still consider what I was saying...I kept looking into her eyes, seeing her mind work triple-time, trying to figure out if I was right, if she really was as cold and selfish as I claimed. That, I think, is what made me break down my resolve, watching the remorse spread across her, the understanding of what I'd been going through and how much of the situation I didn't understand.

She said that she fell out of love with me, in that way that you still care deeply for someone, but that being part of that couple isn't the right relationship for you. (Interesting that "falling out of love" is something that happens to couples, but that love is something you can have for anyone.) You want different things from that person (a la Azucena) and need other things that you can't get while being in a committed relationship with that person (in her case, taking care of herself, having the distance to appreciate me without resenting me, pursuing her own life -- dating other people, keeping her circle of life expanding and changing).

I was getting unhappy with her by January anyway, I remember. Not because of anything I could pin down, but neither of us were taking care of ourselves. I wasn't writing, wasn't even being creative. We were spending all of time watching movies, talking, eating, and fucking. While that doesn't sound so bad, it ate up all of our time and left us spent; the comfort of being together overrode our desire to satisfy our own needs separately. She had to get out, and I knew I did -- hell, I said that when she broke up with me -- but while it was the right thing to do, I didn't understand why it was happening, and it didn't get through until now.

But last night we came to a sort of peace, a mutual understanding of where we both are and where we've been...most of all, how we're going to be. Lovers, friends, little else.

I realized (and by extension, made her realize) how hard this time has been BECAUSE I don't have much else going on in my life. She has a fair group of friends, roommates, a family she's close with, a whole wide support network. Me? My family is strained so hard at the moment, my roommates are moving away and I'm trying to move into a new life, and my support network is tiny. I'm panicking a lot, and for the most part, feeling alone. That makes me clutch, cling, exaggerate and freak out.

But at least I can put my mind to rest about this. Taking some comfort from understanding how S feels about me, that above all else, she is my friend and will be there for me (if not as a lover)...that suddenly makes this easier.

There was also this odd element of hope between us -- something I brought up, which I saw in her eyes she had thought of also -- that if we rearrange our lives in order to be strong and together enough, if we go away from each other the way that we have been (to a degree), we might sometime be right for each other in the way we couldn't be now, taking care of ourselves, having our lives full and vibrant and sustainable in the face of deeper involvement. I don't think we'd ever be a great couple, but I think we'll always, eventually, be great friends, lovers if/when the spacetime is right. (And it didn't take a few years to figure this out, like it did with Azucena.)

Christ, have I ever heard of a short entry? Apparently not.