Last Post of 2007!

In 17 minutes the year will officially be over. I'm taking a lot of things with me and leaving a lot of things behind in the new year. Oh and in 17 minutes, I'll be 28. Happy birthday to me!! Hope everyone had a wonderful year, a fun filled and safe New Year's Eve and I hope that 2008 brings you everything 2007 didn't! It truly is a celebration bitches!!

Old habits die hard...

I don't know what it is, but it seems like every time I break things off with someone I like, old dudes that I don't really like that much start coming out of the wood works. It's as if they can smell when my attention is no longer aimed in one direction. And honestly, their timing couldn't be better because it ultimately feeds my bad habit. I work on an "out of sight, out of mind" basis when I need to get over someone and I am NOTORIOUS for using other men to help facilitate this. I don't use it when I've been seriously hurt...wait yes I do, or at least I have...but I've found that it works for me. It's a simple formula really; one guy tells me no, so I look for two...or three guys to tell me yes lol. I know that ultimately I'm just looking for validation and acceptance. And as much as I'd like it to be the case that what I tell myself and/or what my friends tell me is enough, It's not when I'm feeling the sting of rejection. After all, my friends are biased and so am I, but strange men? Not so much lol.

Today it dawned on me though; this technique has two MAJOR flaws. The first: while distracting myself with another man may help me forget about whoever I'm trying to get over, its also has the potential to keep a window open for their return. It's public enemy number one in my revolving door of a love life. I forget about them, the pain of heartbreak/sting of disappointment goes away, but I don't always let go completely. It's a HUGE problem since the ones who come back are generally the MAIN ones that need to be let go of forever and never seen again. Man talk about HEA-VY. The second flaw: if I don't find the right distraction, it just makes me think of the person even more. I have to be interested in a guy on his own merit not just because he's there for the time being. If I'm not interested, I start to think things like "I wish I was hearing this from him" or "That's exactly what I want to do, just not with you." It defeats the purpose.

I think this might be cause for a New Year's resolution lol.

I don't need to take some "me time" right now because honestly it wasn't THAT deep, but I do recognize that some of my behavior as of late stems from me feeling a bit dejected. I kind of went on auto pilot today and didn't realize what I was doing until it was almost too late. PLUS, I was INCREDIBLY HOR-NY which tends to be blinding in itself lol.

Natedogg has been sniffing around lately. I stopped talking to him for the most part back in early November and in one of our sporadic conversations since then, I mentioned that I had a new friend so he really fell back. I guess he got his Popeye on and ate some spinach today because he hit me up and was coming on STRONG. He has his moments and I usually shut him down, but not today. I entertained him a bit too much. I even encouraged something that I know I shouldn't have. He sent me a "picture" if ya know what I mean lol. I was not impressed in the least bit (Why would you send a pic of yourself semi-hard if your a grower not a shower and your trying to entice me? But I digress lol). He was talkin all kinds of wreckless about us getting it in and asking me what I wanted and what I would do to him and I let him! I even answered some of his questions! He started talking about making arrangements for us to hook up at the end of the week and get a hotel room. That's when I snapped out of it...well I snapped out of it when I got that disappointing pic, but this really brought me back to reality lol. I was like umm...dude hold up..."You can't get yourself together to take me out but you want me to meet you half way so we can get a room?" His response to that..."Oh of course we'll go somewhere near by and eat before anything pops off." WOW. GTFOH! I aint THAT horny and your pic wasn't that good. He even had the NERVE to tell me that we never decided on where we were going to go before. Umm...what about Shoe Heaven? I reminded him of his offer from months ago and he actually said he wasn't aware of a place around here called "Shoe Heaven". WOW. If you gonna lie, you should probably keep your lies straight smh. I was done. I'm in a selfish mood and I want to be serviced something lovely, but he doesn't even deserve that honor. Why I do this to myself, I don't even know.

At the same time, I was chatting with Prince Akeem. Remember him from months and months back? I haven't talked to him since about September because he started school and his time online has been really limited between that and working. Just to briefly refresh your memory, he's African, a grad student studying pharmacy stuff at Temple (that was so technical right? lol), he's got a daughter, his peoples got crazy loot...and he's MARRIED. Separated, but still married none the less. I don't think this has changed and I probably should have checked on the status of his divorce before I agreed to go to dinner with him. See months ago, I wouldn't even talk to him on the phone until his divorce was final. Today I was feeling myself and he was feeling me, so when he asked I said yes. Yeah I'm trippin. We're supposed to go out Friday. I don't even remember what he looks like but I figure if I started talking to him in the first place he can't be that bad. We'll see. Other than these two incidents, I've been pretty well behaved lol.

In other sightings...

The whiny guy that lives in North Carolina was in town for the holidays and wanted to hook up with me. I didn't avoid him or anything, but it just didn't happen. I'm not broken up about that one lol. I never talked to him after our last conversation. I guess he no longer wanted me to visit and no longer had something he wanted to talk to me about lol.

I received two calls in the same day from guys that I completely forgot about and never expected to hear from again. The first guy I met last year about this time. I never saw him after our initial meeting and I had no desire to. I wasn't interested enough to call him but I wasn't disinterested enough to dodge his phone calls. He was cool, but he was hella young and talking to him was like talking to a braggadocios little cousin with a foul mouth. He stopped calling me about 6 months ago but he called me today and was busting it up like we talk on the daily. Umm...whatever. I'm still not interested and I still don't believe you own a restaurant. Nope, not buying it.

The other guy that called me is someone that I met at church last August or so. A lady in the church told me that she wanted me to meet this young man who was a nice guy, in school and worked for Microsoft. My curiosity was piqued but I still gave her the side eye because I aint trust it. She was like "It's not a hook up, I just wanted you to meet him so he can see there are some nice young ladies in the church." I fell for the okie doke smh. Next Sunday he came to my church and she introduced us. I was ready to RUN in the other direction, but we were in church and I'm sure there's a scripture about running indoors lol. He was Steve Urkel reincarnated. I took solace in the fact that this wasn't a hook up when he started to talk my ear off and I couldn't get away. I finally was able to escape, but not without giving up all of my damn information. *sigh* I'm sure there's a scripture about not giving out fake numbers so I was stuck! I tried to give him just the home number because I never answered it, but dude ASKED for the cell AND my email address smh. I thought he was going to ask for my social security number too! And when I did talk to him, I found out that he lived at home, USED to go to community college, didn't work for Microsoft at all, but worked for a software STORE. PLUS he was like three years younger than me smh. That heffa!! I still haven't forgiven her for that one. I'm almost insulted that she thought I'd be interested but I digress. I ducked and dodged him like the PLAGUE! It didn't work either because he called RELENTLESSLY and even started showing up at my church on Sunday! I finally had to tell him that I was seeing someone and that things were getting pretty serious so I didn't think it was fair to keep talking to him because I would be in a relationship very soon. It wasn't a lie, but that relationship never panned out lol. That was about last September. Why he STILL has my number and felt compelled to use it is a mystery to me but I made sure I mentioned that I no longer reside in Philly and that I will very soon be moving to MD just in case he has any ideas lol. As far as he's concerned I don't do long distance romances lol.

None of them are exactly what I had in mind by way of a distraction so I need to do some housekeeping. I'm really not trying to bring old garbage into a new year. Prince Akeem seems the most promising (whew that man talks a sweet game) but as long as he's somebodies husband I'm keeping my distance. I'm leaving soon so none of this matters anyway.

Soundtrack of a Broken Heart

I’m not the biggest music person. I don’t have a gazillion CDs, I only listen to my iPod when I’m at the gym and unlike a lot of people, I actually like hearing the DJs on the radio in the morning and afternoon. I’m sometimes even bothered when they’re interrupted by a song, especially when it’s the crap that’s out now. When I’m getting over someone, however, I use music as a crutch. I think it’s hearing someone sing about something that I can relate to that grabs me. And it’s not always the words in the song that pull me in, sometimes it’s the spirit and the way the artist sings their heart out.

I linked to Breakdown by Mariah in a previous post because this song is old faithful for me. I listen to it on repeat until I get tired of hearing her sing whenever boys are being dumb lol. She talks about faking the funk after her man tells her he's no longer in love with her and although that’s not always my situation, I feel her pain when she sings:

And it seems they haven't got a clue
Of the pain that rejection is putting you through
Do you cling to your pride
And sing "I will survive"
Do you lash out and say "How dare you leave this way?"
Do you hold on in vain as they just slip away

Here are some other songs that have gotten me through in the past…


U Don’t Have To Love Me- Monifah



This is another one of my go to songs. I first discovered it on the eve of my 20th birthday when I was stood up by a guy I had been seeing for almost a year. He was so full of it, always had excuses and never came through when he said he would. Basically, he was a liar and I should have known better. There was no love here, but there was an intense like. I ended up home alone, laying in bed crying, drinking a bottle of Arbor Mist Strawberry White Zinfandel and listening to this song on repeat. I wasn’t cheated on like she sings about (at least I don't think so lol), but I was feeling the chorus deep in my soul lol. And these lines really sealed the deal:

Do you believe that what goes around comes around
Just you wait and see, cuz i'm not worried 'bout a thing anymore
It doesn't follow me, it doesn't follow me, can't you see it
I don't need ya, ever need
Cuz you don't, I said you
You don't have to love me anymore (you don't have to love me)

Ex-Factor-Lauryn Hill



There were many songs I used to help me through the 7 year black hole that was my involvement with my ex, AKA friend number 2, but Ex-Factor is definitely the most notable. I remember sitting in my bed room hearing it for the first time and thinking to myself something along the lines of “Reciprocity. I’m looking for some of that too.” I felt EVERY word of this song from:

It could all be so simple
But you'd rather make it hard
Loving you is like a battle
And we both end up with scars

To

See I know what we got to do
You let go and I'll let go too
'Cause no one's hurt me more than you
And no one ever will

When this song came out, the last two lines weren’t true but at one point in our involvement, that changed. Luckily (?) for him years later this honor was bestowed upon this next guy.


So Gone- Monica



I always turned the volume up as loud as it would go in my 93 Dodge Colt when this came on. The guy that I talked about in Tuesday’s post, the first “friend”, decided to have sex in my house and left me the evidence: A used condom. We weren’t together, but one of only two conditions I laid down for his stay with me was that he couldn’t have chicks in my house. I told him it was because I wasn’t completely over him. When I confronted him about it, he confessed to really liking this girl as if that made matters any better. Needless to say I was feeling EVERY WORD of this song, but this is what did it for me:

What she do I do I do betta
What she did to make you love her? (What did she do)?
Is it real or, Forever? Ohh (Is it real)?

Free Yourself



I was getting the GFB (gradual fall back) from C, the only guy I’ve ever been in love with (hind sight later revealed that it was an extreme case of infatuation lol). At first I was upset and then I was annoyed and then I got indignant. Free Yourself was my anthem. I’d sing with passion:

If you don't want me then don't talk to me
Hey, go ahead and free yourself
If you don't want me then don't talk to me
Go ahead to someone else

So here's my guide to musical catharsis: The Broken Relationship Edition lol. If I had to make a full CD of Broken Hearted Hits lol, every song I've mentioned already would be on it in addition to these songs below. Their messages vary so use them accordingly lol.

• Need encouragement and reassurance that there's light at the end of the tunnel? Blu has been there before and can talk you through it!
  I’ll Find a Way-Blu Cantrell
• Have to let go of someone and having trouble? Carl feels your pain!
  Emotional-Carl Thomas
• Got somebody running in and out of your life while your trying to get over them? Lisa understands that's a tricky situation!
  How Can I Ease The Pain-Lisa Fischer
• Stuck in a situation you know you need to get out of but you both seem to be foolishly holding on? Gladys and her Pips will school you!
  Neither One of Us-Gladys Knight and The Pips
• Feeling a little jealous, jaded, and just plain confused? Erykah knows what you're dealing with!
  Green Eyes-Erykah Badu
• Have you told all of your friends about the wonderful man you had only to have to come back and eat your words later? Neicy won't judge you cuz she did the same thing!
  Silly-Deniece Williams
• Not sure if saying "Goodbye" was the right decision? Aaron has a similar story to tell.
  Goodbye Love-Guy
• Find heartbreak a little embarrassing? Don't worry, you're not the only one wishing for rain.
  I Want to Go Outside in the Rain- The Dramatics

So there you have it. You know, I was fine when I started this entry, but listening to this music started to make me feel like a real Debbie Downer lol!!

WARNING: This music is supposed to be a release! If you are already over someone or in a generally good mood and not really thinking about your situation, don't listen to this all at once. You'll end up wanting to slit your wrist ROFL!!

The Aftermath: Day 3

I'm horny :(

The Aftermath: Day 2

I’m feeling good today. Better than yesterday and better than the day before. Progress is good. I only thought about him a couple times instead of all day. They were intrusive thoughts for the most part; you know the kind that comes from out of nowhere and in the middle of something totally unrelated. I was at my office holiday party and I started to feel sad for a second because I couldn’t go back to my desk and tell him all about it when it was over. It didn’t last long, but it stung. This morning I found myself wondering if I will EVER be able to completely let go of my feelings for him and only be his friend. I haven’t exactly been able to successfully accomplish this in the past. On three different occasions it blew up in my face and I no longer speak to any of those guys. The other times it happened I was the one who wanted the friendship. Ironically in the latter case, they didn’t want to be friends with me.

The first guy I met in high school. He was my “first love”. We were never officially boyfriend and girlfriend because he said he had to love a girl before giving her that title. Naturally we were only ever friends because this “love” never came and I stopped looking for it…or so I thought. I was 14 when it all started and it didn’t end until I was 23. We’d go through different spells of screwing like rabbits, just being cool with no sex and losing contact for over a year at times. Every now and then I’d want more from him than he was offering so I’d fall back. Even though I knew without a doubt that he wasn’t the kind of man I wanted in my life, it didn’t stop me from wanting him to want me. I was never into bad boys, I like swag not conjugals and commissary, but I was constantly looking for the love this man was never going to give me. It was this relationship that taught me no matter what you do; you can’t make a man love you. He also taught me that you can’t change a man. I finally cut ties for good after I found out he was selling drugs while living with me (why he was staying with me in the first place is a long story for another day). It was clear to me at that point that he was selfish and didn't respect me or our friendship so I was done. I put him out and stopped speaking to him. He called me a couple of years later after getting shot 9 times (no his name aint Curtiss Jackson lol) and told me that he realized if he died, I wouldn't have known about it and that bothered him. We played catch up and I never heard from him again.

The second guy you may remember from this post. I was his “friend” because that’s what he wanted. The times I tried to walk away, he was always there pulling me back in. He was selfish and my motivation for sticking around was wrong. Not a good combination. His romantic interest in me ebbed and flowed and whenever he felt like it, he’d steer things in one direction, I’d follow, and then he’d make a sudden U-turn often times leaving me feeling lost and stranded. I never wanted to be “just friends” but since that’s all he was offering, it’s what I settled for (“Settle” is such an ugly word isn’t it?). I couldn’t see it at the time but I hung around hoping that one day he would look up and see what I was trying to be for him and to him and things would be ok. When that day finally came (he told me that he realized that I only ever wanted to love and care for him) he STILL wasn’t trying to be with me. At that point it didn’t matter anyway. I’d taken such an emotional beating from him over the years that I couldn’t be his friend if I tried. I came to the conclusion that my friends never treat me the way he did and completely wrote him out of my life.

The third was The Dude and we know what happened there *rolls eyes*.

This time around, I am mad skeptical. I just don’t think it’s possible for me to do something I’ve never been able to do before. We don’t have an extensive history and there is no love, but that was the case in the beginning of my other “friendships” as well. And the similarities don’t end there. The fact of the matter is, I wanted one thing and they wanted another. I’ve either wanted a relationship or wanted to continue exploring the idea of a relationship while they wanted friendship on their terms. This time is no different. I don’t want to go down this road again; it’s a huge waste of time and is so draining. While I genuinely want to be his friend, I know my limitations. I know that I am unable to successfully compartmentalize my feelings so there is no use in trying. I can’t separate the romantic from the platonic as long as there is an inkling of interest there. I never fully loose interest in a man until I no longer want a relationship with him. Most of the time I only loose interest in a relationship when I’ve been really hurt. I haven’t been really hurt so, what does that mean for us? I don’t have many options. I could try and convince myself that this time will be different but you know how that whole line about insanity goes. While I value his friendship, I value my sanity more. I’m done compromising, settling and holding onto false hopes. I’ve done it before and it never worked to my benefit in the end only my detriment.

He’s always said he thinks we’ll be friends for life when everything is said and done, but I honestly think there are too many other feelings there for this to be possible, at least for me. He may be able to switch gears easily, but I’m not built like that. If I thought we could have a friendship completely devoid of flirting, double entandres and sexual innuendos, that would be one thing, but I know that’s not possible. It’s never been, not with me, not with him and not with any other man I’ve been intimate with. Hell, even my one platonic friend who I had sex with comes at me sideways from time to time. I have no reason to believe he will be any different and that kind of stuff fuels a fire in me that needs to be put out for the sake of the friendship. Add to that the extreme jealousy I’ll experience at the mere mention of another woman and it doesn’t even sound like something worth trying.

The bottom line is I don’t think we can be friends. I guess I have a decision to make.

This entry has been brought to you by Debra Cox and R.L.

How Daddy Got His Groove Back

So my dad comes to me last week and tells me that he’s going to have “company”…here we go again. This time she’s coming from out of the COUNTRY…London to be exact. He was really excited too. He ironed what he was going to wear to pick her up from the airport the night before lol. It was cute. Then he told me how old she was and I was troubled. She’s 33. Yup, only 5 years older than me. Say it with me now…EWWWW!! This chick could be my girlfriend!! We could go shopping together, trade stories about stupid boys and do each others hair!! Why is she interested in my 51 year old father?!

She’s supposed to be staying until Christmas or so. When he reminded me that she was coming Monday night, I suggested we straighten up but he said “Its fine. I’ll just have her do it. She’s a Nigerian girl, she won’t mind” *Enter MORTIFIED look >>here<<* All I could say was “Daddy!! NO!!!!” He said he was kidding, but he still got the side eye because all jokes are born in some level of truth. Folks talk all the time about how Nigerian men are NOTORIOUSLY chauvinistic and I can’t handle my daddy fitting that mold. I just pray he was really kidding, but if the dishes are done when I get home I’m going to have a problem, Imma be happy that I didn’t have to do them, but I’m going to be very disappointed lol. He did make sure his room was spotless though. He even bought new sheets and a comforter.

She got in late last night and I was surprised to see that she was actually really pretty. Not that I don’t think my dad can pull nice looking women, after all my mom and his soon to be ex-wife are both really pretty, I just don’t think of him as a man that anyone would be interested in. He’s my DADDY for Pete’s Sake lol!! He shouldn’t be dating or sexing or macking or pimpin. He should be sitting in a rocker looking out the window wearing a cardigan complaining about the loud kids playing in the street. That’s how I like to think of him lol. I promise if I hear a single moan, sigh or creak of the bed, I’m getting up and driving to Philly to stay with Kat or Big Vern. I can’t take it!

Oh, and the “shape” is back in the office tucked away behind the futon. I hope it stays there the entire time she’s visiting…

EDIT: When I got home last night, the dishes were done...SMH

The Aftermath: Day 1

Whenever I’m in this place, this place of separation and adjustment, I become really introspective. Sometimes to my own detriment because there is a fine line between taking responsibility for your part in things and completely absolving the other person of responsibility for their actions. Right now I’m struggling with this one. I know we were both as wrong as Souljah Boy's “rap career” but I feel like he took the emergency brake off, and I pushed the car down the hill causing the real damage.

I’m ashamed of the way I acted this weekend. Its spilled milk, but I can’t help crying (in a metaphorical sense). I’ve been obsessively thinking about how I should have handled it and how things would have been different “if”. The more I think about it the more I feel the need to apologize and apologize and apologize some more as if once wasn’t enough. I was talking to Kat about this, and she gave me some really good insight. She said the reason I’m so bothered by it and he was able to turn it around on me so easily, is because I pride myself on how I handle things. She’s absolutely right. I try not to get overly emotional or lash out in a way that men expect from a “typical” woman. I was so far removed from that this weekend. Kat says I’m entitled to those moments every now and then, but I’d rather not have them at all. (Uggghhh!! He just logged into Yahoo…this is hard)

Even though this isn’t the main reason things are the way they are right now, I can’t help but wish things would have “ended” on a better note. I find it necessary to keep reminding myself that this is what I wanted in the first place. I was going to tell him that I wanted to fall back on Friday night. It was the main reason I wanted to see him….ok, who are we kidding, the sex was the MAIN reason (damn those winter droughts), but talking to him was right under that lol. This was all supposed to happen on my own terms not his or ours...call me selfish. It would have made detaching myself a lot easier. If I wanted to send a text message letting him know how hard this is for me and that I miss him I could do that and not feel like I was crawling back on all fours or playing myself. I could have taken a more gradual approach instead of going cold turkey. I can't do that right now without swallowing my pride and quite frankly I don't like the aftertaste.

So last night, Kat being the wonderful friend that she is, took me to dinner and bought me shoes!!! I felt a million times better after that. Whenever things go crazy with a boy and I’m really disappointed, I buy a pair of shoes and it takes the edge off. Retail therapy is the best! I’m doing pretty good this year because it’s almost over and these are my only pair of “Boys Are Dumb” shoes lol. Check em’ out…

Shoes make everything right as rain lol.

All things considered, I’m good. I can honestly say today is much better than yesterday and tomorrow will be even better. But dammit if I don't miss him right now.

*Turns up the volume*

Friends: Rachel and Ross Style

I guess it’s only fitting that this be my 100^th post because I am right back where I started when I wrote my very first entry. Sorry for the extra long post, but think of it as an extended episode of No Sex in the City lol.

I had the most hellish weekend EVER. I went to MD and DC this past weekend to talk to a recruiter about finding a job, look at some apartments and see The Friend. You may have guessed by now that the move to Atlanta is off and I am now looking to move to Da Urrea as folks call it. Kat is no longer looking at schools in GA, and she may not even start school this year. I never wanted to go that far on a solo mission so enter plan B. I’ve always liked the DC area and I tried to move there last year but it didn’t pan out. The opportunities in my field there are abundant and I am in desperate need for a change of scenery. Since I have already given up my apartment and moved in with my dad, this was definitely perfect timing. I’m no longer interested in living in DC (good Lawd that city needs a coat of paint), so MD is where I plan to settle down for a little while.

I’d spoken with The Friend about spending the night Friday since he had things to do with the rest of his weekend. The plan was for him to go to practice, go to the club and show his face because it was his friend’s birthday and then give me a call when he was on his way home. According to him he would be there by 10 or 11pm. I was hanging with Thic and his wife so that wasn’t a problem. Unfortunately, on my way down, my car started to make what I could only describe as a death rattle when I hit the brakes so I was really worried about driving it around without getting it looked at. I sent him a text letting him know he might have to come and get me because my car was jacked and he said OK.

About 10:00 or so, I text him asking if he was almost done. He hadn’t made it to the club yet. 12am rolls around and now I’m impatient, annoyed, sensitive…and drunk. I called him and didn’t get an answer but I got a text back stating simply “I can’t make it.” So now my car is falling apart, I have to impose on my friends who had not planned on me staying since I already told them I didn’t need to and he’s canceling on me…via text. Needless to say, I was not a happy camper. We had a text exchange where I really wasn’t the nice eloquent slow to anger Mahogany we all know and love. To be honest, I was kind of a raging bitch…and it didn’t stop Friday night. That was me all weekend. However, he didn’t make matters better because his approach really was to basically “carry me” as they say in those parts. He didn’t explain why he couldn’t make it, didn’t tell me he would make it up to me, he didn’t say any of the things that could have diffused the situation. He just pretty much didn’t call me. Talk about throwing kerosene on an already raging fire.

Oh, and to back track…Thursday night we were talking on the phone, making jokes about married couples making new friends on the internet when he says, “Speaking of friends…” He then went on to tell me that he slept with his ex the previous weekend and that he felt like he needed to tell me that because with me coming down and the likelihood of things jumping off between us, he felt like he’d be hiding something if he didn’t let me know. He said he didn’t want it to be a situation where I had sex with him and I might have chosen not to had I known. Now believe it or not, I didn’t really care. I was actually kinda impressed that he told me because he didn’t have to tell me anything. I had always assumed they were still sleeping together because when I first met him they were. And if it wasn’t her, I assumed it was somebody else because we live in two different states and he’s not my man. He’s free to do whatever and whomever he wants. I never asked him if he was sleeping with anyone because I have a strict “Don’t ask. Don’t tell” policy when it comes to questions with answers I might not like. The surprising info to me was finding out that he hadn’t slept with anyone since me until her. Go figure.

The actual problem came about when he started to talk about the fact that he still has feelings for her and he goes back and forth between wanting to be with her and not wanting to be bothered at all. Umm…O.K. Now this may not be new information because from jump, they were teetering on commitment, but the fact that I was actually hearing it from his lips was a wake up call. I told him this wasn’t good for me at all. I needed to think about what I want and where I want to be because I’m not trying to get blind sided by them getting back together and just be assed out. I even asked why she suddenly went from the “friend” to the “ex” and he said she’s always been the ex, and nothing changed. His referring to her as his “friend” was in direct relation to something I said. It didn’t make sense because there is a definite difference in the way he talks about her now, but he hadn’t even realized it. We got off the phone a short time later and I had some thinking to do. I decided it was best for both of us if we just took a step back until I moved to MD. It would allow him some space to sort out his feelings and me a cushion just in case they got back together. I wanted to tell him this on Friday night and have one last passionate hoorah (winter droughts SUCK) before cutting off communication with him completely for a little while.

Now back to this weekend…

I was pretty much PO’d the entire time I was down there. My car cost I spent 455 bucks on my car. The dealership didn’t tighten my back tire after they looked at it and a bolt was missing so that could have been really ugly and I almost had to wait until Monday to get it fixed. So now it’s Sunday. I’m BROKE, sensitive, annoyed, feeling neglected and HORNY…a veritable Molotov cocktail of emotions. We’d texted back a forth a few times and none of them were pleasant exchanges. I finally decided that I just didn’t want to be angry with him anymore when I was driving home and I tried to extend the olive branch. I asked him to call me so I could explain to him where I was coming from. I didn’t hear from him until this morning on IM.

Needless to say at this point I was OVER it. I had three restless nights of sleep and even shed a tear of frustration this morning. You didn’t know your girl was so sensitive did ya? Lol Everything that happened this weekend felt like a direct contradiction to what I thought I knew about him and about us. This same man who said he cared about me and about my feelings gave me his ass to kiss all weekend. I just couldn’t understand it. Our exchange was of the finger pointing variety. His thing was, I came at him sideways and I had no reason or right to. My thing was you handled the situation wrong and should have explained to me what was going on. He said he told me that he had a lot on his plate and that my attitude was unwarranted because I knew this. Not true. He never made it clear that our plans were tentative. He even told me that he could have seen me on Sunday, but since I was mad he didn’t feel like dealing with me. Fair enough. I admitted I was wrong, I even apologized for coming at him the way I did. But I asked him how right was he for escalating the situation when he could have diffused it with a simple explanation?

There were a lot of things said that I either can’t remember or don’t care to repeat. I ended up feeling like the asshole because he put his actions all on me. In his words, “Different actions get different reactions”...what ever happened to being the bigger person? Am I the only person who still tries to do this from time to time? He suggested we take a step back before we aren’t even friends when the smoke clears. I didn’t think it was that deep because I stopped being mad once I knew why he canceled, but I took that as my que to let him know that I wanted to fall back completely until I was in MD because I realized that I do value our friendship. But this “thing” we’re in isn’t going anywhere and if we are going to salvage any type of friendship outside of it, I need some space. He said he wasn’t talking about cutting communication completely but if that’s what needs to happen in order for us to be what we need to be to one another, which is friends, then so be it. So, we are officially on a break. It’s sad and the next week or so is going to be a hard adjustment, but it’s not the end of the world. I’ll get over it. I’ve done it before.

I guess this is full circle because once again I am single with no prospects.

Brazilian Toast

My dad made my lil sister and brother French toast the other morning. You wanna know what he put in it? Goya Adobo seasoning and crushed red pepper flakes. SMH. That' s just nasty. As a matter of fact, that's not French toast, that' s more like Brazilian toast or something. He had the nerve to tell me had I been up, I would have tasted it and liked it and that it's just food. Ummm...I don't think so. My little sister said it wasn't good and that she just put a whole lot of syrup on it and ate it. That's pretty nasty too.

Whatever Happened to Her Anyway?

Tracie Mae asked what ever happened to pseudo girlfriend. Well…she's now officially the ex-girlfriend.

We never really talked about her and he barely ever mentioned her name. The last time I asked about her and what was going on between them was months ago. At that point they were still cool, talking and seeing one another. I have a general "Don't ask questions that may have answers you won't like" policy so I just kept it moving and never asked again. I did however tell him to let me know the minute his relationship status changed because I wasn’t trying to REALLY be a home wrecker lol.

Right before we saw each other for the first time, he said something about a friend of his saying that she wouldn't do something for him because she wasn't sure they would even be friends next year. He has a lot of female friends (insert eye roll) so I paid it no mind. The second time we saw one another, he was telling me about a disagreement that he had with this same friend so I finally asked who the hell he was talking about and found out it was her. I connected three or four dots but didn't jump to any conclusions and once again KIM.

He referred to her as his ex for the first time last week. He told me he had a job interview at his ex's company and talked about how she didn't want him to go. I had no idea at this point that he was talking about her, so I started giving him advice and telling him that she probably still has feelings for him and doesn’t want to see his face everyday lol. I then asked how long ago they broke up and his response was “A while ago, but we were still kicking it.” At this point I started doing some math but before I drew any conclusions, he told me it was her.

Umm…so…yeah…that’s what happened to her. Now, I’d be lying if I said I’m not curious about why she’s suddenly the “ex-girlfriend” and not the friend. I don’t know any particulars and I think I may ask one day, but I’m not sure I care. Does that make me a bad person lol? I mean part of me thinks that she was always the girlfriend, but I have no proof so…I guess I’ll just take his word for it. He’s never lied to me before (that I know of) so I’ll just let sleeping dogs lie.

The Friend…The Final Chapter

He told me to look at his actions and I did. I looked at his actions in the past and I looked at his current actions and I was bothered because they were different. His words had always been a reflection of his actions until lately. He was telling me that nothing changed, yet his actions were screaming that nothing was the same. Even after our conversation, there were days where he didn’t call and days that we didn’t speak. I talked to a couple male friends about my feelings and according to them the prognosis wasn’t good. I heard everything from “He’s being a typical man. Yall had sex and now he’s no longer interested” to “It was all game.” I was conflicted. Believing them meant I had to go against everything I knew about him and I just couldn’t do it. At the same time, their words stayed in my head. That coupled with my original thoughts led me to believe that I wasn’t overreacting and that I was probably in the middle of the dreaded GFB: Gradual Fall Back.

I don’t think there is anything worse in the world of dating than the GFB. And not only for the obvious reason of someone you like losing interest in you and working to purposely make you lose interest in them or completely disappear. I hate it because I’m just way to impatient for the BS. Don’t decrease the amount you call or come around in an effort to condition me to not see you or talk to you, just say you aint feelin me anymore and KIM. I prefer not to draw it out and waste energy trying to figure out what’s going on. I’ve never really been one for speculation so whenever possible, I like to get my answers straight from the horses mouth. Once again, I wrote an email lol. I could have called, but I’m just so much better at explaining and expressing myself when I can edit lol. Here’s an excerpt:

If actions do indeed speak louder than words, what are you saying to me right now?

Last week I put all my cards on the table. I told you how I was feeling and what I was thinking. You then told me nothing has changed and said actions speak louder than words...but pretty much continued in the same vain that made me feel some type of way in the first place. In all fairness you have called a couple times despite the fact that it was late. We've also had a couple IM conversations despite the fact that you're busy at work. I appreciate your effort and every time I talk to you I feel better about the situation but then later that day or the next day I don't hear from you and the silence is deafening.

…I'm having trouble believing this can all be attributed to limited time at work and an earlier bed time because the solution seems so simple to me; call earlier than you used to, before you get tired and fall asleep. But since that's not what's been happening, I have to listen to what your actions are saying. I'm hearing: "I'm trying to fall back". Maybe we got closer than you were trying to get, maybe you got what you wanted and no longer care about a connection, maybe you just lost interest, maybe you want to change the nature of our friendship, maybe I'm imagining things, maybe, maybe, maybe…I don't know. I don't really care. I just know I don't wanna keep going like this.

The rest of the email was me telling him if it’s truly the case that nothing has changed then his actions in the future needed to better reflect that. I also said if he was trying to gradually fall back then he needed to just bounce because I just don’t have the energy to let this whole thing be dragged out.

When I called him later that night, he hadn’t read my email. He ended up reading it while I was on the phone and talk about awkward lol! He started off by saying that he could see where I was coming from and could see how I could be thinking some of the things I wrote, but at the same time he doesn’t agree. He told me that if he was trying to fall back I'd know. He said he doesn't even know how to gradually fall back. He went on to explain that he’s not a phone person (he’s told me this before, but it was nullified by the fact that he was always on the phone with me) and that his own mother has to tell him to call her. I had to let him know that the whole “Misery loves company” thing doesn’t work with me. We aren’t talking about other people we are only talking about me. When I mentioned that things seemed to only change after we had sex, he told me it wasn’t that we had sex, it’s that we met. We are no longer getting to know one another and the anticipation leading up to seeing one another was gone now. He said that he doesn’t know anyone who talks to someone that they see on a regular every single day. I had to remind him that we don’t see one another on the regular…DUH! I told him all we have is phone and online conversations. Once they’re gone then what the hell is left?

It wasn’t a battle. It wasn’t a struggle. Neither one of us was trying to make the other agree. No one raised their voice or got angry. It was a simple discussion. It was in fact the most civilized discussion I’ve EVER had with a man about the way I feel in my LIFE. I spent most of the conversation laughing. I even found it funny when he made fun of me and my penchant for lengthy emails lol. At one point he said “We’ll be having this conversation again next week because you think after this things will be like they were in week two and I can’t give you that.” I had to let him know that week two was never what I was after. I know things change; I’d be scared if they never did. My issue was just the amount of change that seemed to be happening and when it happened. Now that we understand one another I’m good. He’s not a phone person and I am. I had to tell him that there needed to be some middle ground though because I’m not willing to just swallow it and be assed out of what I want in favor of what he wants. He admitted that it was kinda selfish of him and said he would try to be more attentive to my needs. Problem solved!

I didn’t escape that conversation completely unscathed though. He pointed out a few things to me that I hadn’t realized. Like the fact I don’t call him AT ALL (I can count the number of times I’ve called him on one hand). The fact that since he gets in before me I used to always say good morning to him when I logged on. He also pointed out the fact that we did talk like everyday since I wrote that last email, it just wasn’t always in the same form lol. Yeah so ya girl had a lil memory lapse and tend to over think pretty much everything…OOPS!! ROFL!! In my defense, I don’t call because he’s always busy so there’s no point in me calling if he’s gonna tell me he has to call me back. I just wait for his day to wind down and for him to reach out to me. Once things started to change and I thought he was losing interest, I wasn’t about to start calling him if he didn’t want to be bothered. Nope. Not gonna happen. I stopped IM’ing him in the morning because once again, if he’s busy at work I didn’t want to bother him. I admit that I started to act defensively once I thought things were about to end so while I did think about initiating contact more often, my main concern was not playing myself going after someone that didn’t want to be bothered. When I explained all of this to him, can you believe this knee grow turned my OWN WORDS back around on me? He said, “But I thought you said that communication is the only thing we have and if we don’t have that then we don’t have anything. Why wouldn’t you just try before you got all worked up.” Aint that some ish? Knee grow actually LISTENS?! WOW lol.

Anywho, all is well now. I may even see him next weekend. YAY!!!

The Friend…An Update Part 3

Things have been…different…in the time since we met face to face. Our all day back and forth had been slowly fading away due to the demands of work before I even went to see him and afterwards it pretty much grinded to a halt. This I understood; gotta make the doughnuts. Our phone conversations that normally lasted until the wee hours of the morning began to get shorter and shorter. This I understood; aint much new to talk about. Eventually he went from calling me everyday to missing a day or two here and there. This I wasn’t understanding at all.

A month ago, I could count the number of times I hadn’t heard his voice before falling asleep on one hand and I knew the reason behind each time. Suddenly, I needed two hands and maybe a couple of toes. Add that to the almost extinct online communication and the dwindling level of phone conversation when we actually did talk, and my mind began running wild. I couldn’t stop myself from looking for a reason to regret my decision to have sex with him, so I was watching everything that happened between us like a hawk. I was constantly yo-yoing between thinking I was overreacting and thinking I had very valid concerns. Every time I talked to him it would put my mind at ease and it felt as if nothing was wrong…until I didn’t hear from him at night or he’d be online all day and not say a single word to me. This is light years away from where we used to be and while I expected us to fall into a comfortable rhythm, this wasn’t it.

I decided to send him an email (yall know I stay emailing knee grows lol) and let him know that I was bothered by our staccato communication as of late and that I no longer felt special. As bgood put it, “it’s nice to be wanted and not tolerated” and I was definitely feeling the latter. Most importantly, I asked for reassurance that everything was cool. The next day, he IM’d me walking on egg shells asking me if I was ok lol. I told him that I was cool and that there was no need to tip toe around me. I wasn’t angry or about to explode, I just wanted to get all of that off my chest…*sigh* big mistake. He took that to mean that there was no need to talk about it and didn’t say a thing about the email in the few lines of chat we had all day. I initially thought that maybe he was waiting to talk to me on the phone to bring it up since he can’t really chat at work, but then he didn’t call me that night and I was HEATED!

The next day, I IM’d him telling him that I wasn’t sure what to say. He told me not to be mad because he fell asleep. It was too late. The ensuing conversation wasn’t the stuff of romance novels on ANY level lol. I’m not sure how to describe his attitude and tone, but it wasn’t the most comforting. Basically, he said that he thought the issue had been resolved and the fact that he talked to me throughout the day was evidence enough that nothing has changed. Umm…no. Sorry, I missed that memo. I told him while I appreciate his effort; I asked specifically for words because that’s what I needed at that time. He then hit me with the whole “Actions speak louder than words” line…grrrrrrr. How the hell was I supposed to know his actions were a direct result of my email when he didn’t even address it? I didn’t know he was going back and forth to his desk to talk to me. And quite frankly, it wasn’t as if we had a full blown conversation. It was empty chatter that barely registered with me to be honest.

So, I decided to let it go. I wasn’t crazy about the WAY he handled it, but since he did handle it, and he was telling me that nothing has changed, I preferred not to harp on it and look at his actions in the future like he suggested. And that’s exactly what I did for the next week…