sueeeus

I’m beginning to unravel and better understand certain things about myself.  I’m naturally forgiving.  I don’t hold resentments and grudges.  I think I used to.  I must have.  Maybe it’s something that develops with age.  Maybe it takes a certain maturity to face oneself in the mirror and take responsibility for all things.  Things didn’t happen to me.  Life is a compilation of experiences, and those experiences have to do with choices I’ve made along the way.  Sure, they intersect with choices that others have made along the way as well.  But I”m the captain of my own ship.  I don’t have to react to anybody.  I can choose my course.

Maybe it’s more simple than maturity.  Maybe it’s just sheer exhaustion.  One reaches a point, swimming against the current, so to speak, when one can no longer go on.  So we just stop fighting, start treading water, and simply try to stay afloat.  Maybe it’s just survival.

Whatever it is, I am glad to let bygones be bygones.  There is peace in doing so.

In all of this, however, I recognize the need for vigilance.  Forgiveness is one thing, but it’s also critically important to learn from one’s mistakes and not go on repeating them, time and time again.

I’m in a healing mode.  I don’t know what the future holds.  I don’t know much of anything.  I do know that the life I’m leading consumes my emotional, mental and physical resources.  Treading water, staying afloat, is all that I can do right now.  One day at a time.  One step at a time.  One minute at a time. I’m doing what I need to do.

I will say this.  I love being a mother.  Love, love, love.  I may be barely afloat, but when I think of my kids, I feel a smile steal over my face.

How I love them!

They are my everything.

1. Maybe it’s because of the weather.
2. Maybe it’s because the holidays are approaching.
3. Maybe it’s because of life changes.
4. Maybe it’s because of shifting hormones.
5. Maybe it’s because of the commute.
6. Maybe it’s because of the job.
7. Maybe it’s because of politics.
8. Maybe it’s because of other people’s children.
9. Maybe it’s because of my children.
10. Maybe it’s because of school.
11. Maybe it’s because of the economy.
12. Maybe it’s because of the struggles my friends are going through.
13. Maybe it’s because of the struggles that I am going through.
14. Maybe it’s because I’m getting older.
15. Maybe it’s because October 27th came and went and I’m missing my brother.
16. Maybe it’s because I see my brother in my nephew.
17. Maybe it’s because I wonder how my nephew is, without his dad.
18. Maybe it’s because I’m missing my family.
19. Maybe it’s because my kids have been sick.
20. Maybe it’s because I’m sick now.
21. Maybe it’s because I didn’t offer work to any of the people waiting outside Home Depot, hoping for some work.
22. Maybe it’s because I said I wouldn’t help the guy standing outside the grocery store who asked me for food.
23. Maybe it’s because he walked away while I scrounged through my groceries for things I could give him.
24. Maybe it’s because I didn’t follow him and give them to him because I was late to pick up my kids.
25. Maybe it’s because I wonder why a healthy looking young adult is standing outside a store asking for food.
26. Maybe it’s because I wonder about the young couple who are working the intersection near my office.
27. Maybe it’s because I wonder why they have decent clothes and a different outfit every day.
28. Maybe it’s because I feel guilty for being judgmental.
29. Maybe it’s because there was a dead mouse in the toilet.
30. Maybe it’s because there were mouse droppings in the house.
31. Maybe it’s because I heard some scraping sounds near a heater vent.
32. Maybe it’s because it’s dark when I go to work.
33. Maybe it’s because it’s dark when I get home.
34. Maybe it’s because I miss my mom.
35. Maybe it’s because I miss my sisters.
36. Maybe it’s because I miss our family get-togethers.
37. Maybe it’s because so many of my nephews and nieces are already grown.
38. Maybe it’s because some of my nephews and nieces have kids of their own whom I’ve never met.
39. Maybe it’s because so many of my friends are retiring.
40. Maybe it’s because my kids melt down frequently.
41. Maybe it’s because of the struggles I see other parents  have with their kids.
42. Maybe it’s because I’m weary.
43. Maybe it’s because of the daily homework struggle.
44. Maybe it’s because of the challenge of managing childhood defiance.
45. Maybe it’s because I’m healing.
46. Maybe it’s because of technology overload.
47. Maybe it’s because of sensory overload.
48. Maybe it’s because the house is never clean for longer than 3 minutes.
49. Maybe it’s because the laundry never ends.
50. Maybe it’s just because I’m me, living the normal life that I live, and pretty much everyone is going through something similar.

shades of blue

Poppy held to her decision and severed all ties with George.  One day, when she’s had sufficient time to heal, she may mourn him properly, but at this stage, she just doesn’t have the mental or emotional capacity.  Steve arrived abruptly, with George’s sudden departure.  It’s all been quite a shock, really.  Poppy and Steve have been getting to know one another, as cohabitants do.  I wouldn’t call it a romance, by any stretch of any imagination.  It’s more like an arrangement. Of necessity.  Oh sure, she did jump into forever with him.  And she really does want to have a long and comfortable relationship with him.  Happily ever after, in fact.   Right now, however, it’s either sink or swim, and sinking is hardly an option.

In one sense, Poppy’s been very stable.  Oh, occasionally something will happen and she will have a momentary lapse of sanity in which she behaves erratically, but those moments are few and generally last no more than an hour. In general, she’s been feeling very good.

That being said, life with Steve has been a cautious, tip-toeing dance, for the first few weeks.  Steve seems to be a sensitive sort, and has his own idiosyncrasies.  For instance, he does not like to be rushed.  How can I say that, in such a way as to express it properly?  He.  Does.  NOT.  Like.  To.  Be.  Rushed.  And he’s a bit of a moody, broody sort.  So he likes to handle certain things on his own terms, and as long as one complies with his terms, there is harmony in the land.  Okay, so be it.  This is part of learning to live together.  Everyone’s got their own personal boundaries that need to be respected.  Steve, bless  his soul, is very clear about expressing his boundaries.  Poppy could stand to take a page from that book.

As the weeks progress, Poppy has also begun to notice that there may be some areas in which Steve and George are very similar.  She’s choosing not to overreact to this knowledge, but to take heed and reflect on it.  The last thing she wants is to encourage any of these tendencies.  So she’s keeping a close watch on this Steve character.  Watching him like a hawk, even.

~*~*~*~

Installment 2 of the Poppy Saga.

Characters:
Poppy the pancreas.
George who likes to gorge.
Steve the sleeve.

~*~*~*~

It’s been just about 4 weeks since surgery, and I’m doing very well.  The first 2 weeks are liquids only, and the next two weeks are soft foods.  It’s a bit challenging, learning to eat anew.  It’s probably similar to what babies go through, as they are learning to eat.  Things like the size of  each bite and how much it must be chewed before swallowing are critically important.  The steri-strips have finally worn off the incision sites, and the scars remaining are slight.  I’ve had a bit of a struggle with waves of depression, off and on.  I also notice that I tire easily, and I’ve been respecting this by allowing myself to rest when I need it.

I will say this much.  I loathe (ab.so.lute.ly loaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaathe) protein powder.  When I’ve finished the tub that I have, I will never buy another.  Ever.  EVER.

That being said, it’s such a relief, not to be hungry!  It’s also a tremendous delight to look at a small portion of food and know that it can and will be filling and fulfilling (although obtaining sufficient nutritional intake is definitely a challenge).  All in all, it’s a very exciting journey.  I feel liberated, and I am looking forward to finding and restoring bits and pieces of myself that have been lost through the years, as I progress through this excavation.

I hope to do a better job than all the king’s horses and all the king’s men did with Humpty Dumpty.

Poppy and George have been together for a long time. Forever, even.  They got along well enough when they were younger, but as the years passed, they lost touch of each others’ needs.  It’s not unheard of…

George is pretty much a self-centered bastard.  He’s generally ignorant of Poppy’s ups and downs.  Granted, her ups and downs are far more pronounced as the years go by.  Oh, sure, every once in a while he says he’ll do better, be better, turn over a new leaf, and he he may do a fine  job of being on his best behavior for a while.  But only for a while.  It never lasts, and bit by bit, they find themselves back in that desert place where neither can tolerate each other.  George wants to do what George wants to do.  Poppy reacts.  It’s not that Poppy wants to react.  It’s just that her defenses have eroded after so many years of hiding behind the issues.  She starts to feel better when George plays nice, and she starts to think that everything is just swell, and things are getting back to the way they used to be, back when they were young.  But it doesn’t take long for reality to slap her in the face.  Because sooner or later, George will fall back into his selfish ways.

I don’t know why that is.  It just is.  I don’t think George wants to be a self-centered bastard.  I think he would want to be better, in a perfect world.  There are probably a million factors that contribute to the entity that George has become.  A lifetime of factors.

It’s complicated.

Be that as it may, George is George.  Poppy is Poppy.  It’s clear that something has to change, or nothing ever will.  They will continue living a marginal existence until they do each other in.  Literally.

It’s a scary choice, in many ways, for many reasons, but Poppy has decided that George has got to go.  Poppy has  high  hopes that she will be able to find her stable place again, that she will feel good all the time, and that she will find her old self.  She hopes that she will no longer feel like she’s wasting her life, but instead like she’s embracing and living her life.  Loving her life!

It may seem harsh to send George packing, but at this point, it’s the only solution.  This limbo has been going on for over twenty years.  It will continue another twenty years if nothing changes, or if they don’t kill each other in the process.

Goodbye George.

She wonders if she will be so fickle as not to ever miss him or regret that she made him go.  She can hardly think about it, though.  It’s just too much.

~*~*~*~

Installment 1 of the Poppy Plight.

Characters:
Poppy the pancreas.
George who likes to gorge.
Steve the sleeve.

~*~*~*~

So I’m preparing for bariatric surgery.  I start my pre-op liquid diet on Friday (4 Oct 2013).  This is not a trigger decision.  I’ve contemplated it for YEARS and after much research and thought have decided to move ahead with it.  Surgery is 14 Oct 2013.  I will have the better part of my stomach removed, leaving all my digestive plumbing intact.  This is called a Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy (VSG).  This surgery will allow me to eat, but not overeat.  My body will still  absorb the nutrients I ingest.  I’m very much looking forward to feeling satisfied after eating a normal amount of food.  I stumbled across a blog in which a ‘sleever’ named her sleeve, and thought that was clever.  Also, putting character names to my organs helps me inject a little humor, or at least look at it from another angle.  Because it’s scary.  And it’s permanent.  So I thought it might help me as I embark on this journey.  Although weight and self image factor heavily toward this decision, the driving factor is the fact that I can no longer play the ignorance card regarding diabetes.  I have it.  It’s very clear that my pancreas is not functioning as it should, and that my blood sugar control is erratic.  I have proven to myself that it can be controlled, but I have also to be honest with myself and know that I fall to the same patterns, no matter how vigilant I am, or for how long.  Eventually I slip back.  Hello, my name is George.  I’m on a life-changing journey.  I’m taking steps to make dramatic and permanent changes to improve my life.  This is one of those steps.  So goodbye, George.  It’s time for you to go.

I am finding my way.  I realize that I’ve been repeating various patterns throughout my life — patterns with relationships, patterns with self esteem, patterns in general.  Bit by ever so slowly bit, I am making progress.

Some things about me are always changing.  My hopes and dreams today may not be the same hopes and dreams I had yesterday, a month ago, a year ago, five years ago, or twenty years ago.  I am the same, insomuch as the core of who I am remains the core of who I am.  But what I want for my life, or what I think I want for my life, is an abstract concept that remains in constant flux and has yet to take form.

I love my country home.  There are so many trees surrounding me.  It’s peaceful here.  While it’s a bit frightening to be so far from the security of family and conveniences, it’s tranquil and private and comfortable.  I hope we learn to weather the winters well.  Last season was uncharacteristically mild, so I don’t know what to expect for a representative winter.

I’m battling with some anxiety, recently.  I’m not sure if it’s the gloomy weather (rain, drizzle, more rain, lightning, thunder, rain, and more rain), if I’m picking up on someone else’s anxiety, or if it’s something inside of me.  Most likely it’s some combination of all of these things.

I sat outside on the balcony for a few minutes.  It’s such a treat to sit outside and breathe the outdoor air, with the comfort and luxury of a roof over my head.  I was quite content until I discovered a huge spider, some sort of larvae, and a large empty cocoon tucked into one of the lounge cushions.  I’m not particularly interested in sharing my space with creatures of that nature.  Just prior to that, as I was semi reclined with a cup of tea, the image of Jabba the Hutt flashed through my mind.  It’s always interesting to me, how one’s self-image can be so far from one’s true image.  I *know* I look nothing like Jabba the Hutt, but for some reason, I felt as though that is how I looked.  I’m fairly certain that it’s because I was feeling gross after making some poor food choices (i.e., ramen noodle soup).

There are so many changes taking place at work.  People who I’ve known for decades are retiring.  Others have passed away.  Massive organizational restructuring is underway, but there is very little being said about it.

I think I’m going through a life storm right now, and all I can do is try to hold on as best I can, keep my head above water, and take deep breaths.  I don’t want to swim against the tide, and I don’t want to drown.

Womp.  There it is.

Actually, that brings something else to mind, in which I might have found some additional closure.  I discovered that an ex from long ago is playing guitar in a Neil Diamond cover band, of all things.  That relationship ended badly, and of all the relationships I’ve had in life, that is the only one for which no friendship remained once the dust settled.  I have absolutely no interest in contacting him, but I am glad to know that  he seems to have made some sort of life for himself.  It’s taken a very long time for me to forgive myself for the years that I spent with him.

It can’t be all, so it has to be nothing.

I get it.

there I was, peacefully enjoying some ice cream, when...

I knew this day was coming.  I just didn’t know when.  Or how things would transpire.  But I really ought not be surprised.  And indeed, I am not.  It’s not how I would have liked things to go, but I guess it’s how I knew they would go[1].

I feel numb.  Probably it’s not the best time to try to write, in the heat of the moment, as it were.  Then again, the heat of the moment is when the emotions are raw, so maybe it is a good time to try to get things out.  Perhaps I can go through them later and make more sense of things.  Or learn something, at least.

He said that I am selfish and that I am a user.  I can’t recall much more than that.  My mind sort of goes blank.  I remember just looking at him like a deer with it’s eyes caught in the headlights.  I couldn’t find words to convey anything that he could hear.  Maybe I am selfish.  Maybe I am a user.  Certainly in his perspective I am, and I’m not going to try to defend myself for another’s hurtful opinion.  It’s his opinion.  Those are his feelings.  They belong to him.  Am I selfish?  I guess so.  Because I chose myself and my kids over him.  What he doesn’t understand is that I have to choose myself.  For my kids.  I don’t know how to balance life with him.  The way things were when we first met aren’t a true representation of the me who I need to be.  I put that person aside for way too long.  It’s unfortunate that he is the one caught in the crossfire, when I finally decide to take a stand for myself.  The woman he met two years ago was the woman he wanted me to be, not the woman I am.

I can’t explain that to him in terms that he will understand.  I hardly know the woman I am.  I want to get to know her, though.  Staying in a relationship that is out of balance is unfair to him.  He’s waiting for me to be who I am not.  I can’t let him do that, because I am who I am.  He is who he is.  I love him.  But we don’t fit.

I hope  he finds someone with whom he fits.  Someone he can laugh with, cry with, love with and be with.  Someone good for him.

[1] …I guess I didn’t know how things would go…

He said he was going to erase me from his life, and indeed, he is.  He said he would hate me.  He said that nobody has ever hurt him the way that I have, or as much as I have.  He said he wanted to go out and “f!#& a bunch of girls”.  He didn’t say goodbye.  He returned all the gifts I ever gave him (at least those he could find in the last 20 minutes).  I didn’t expect that.

So that is how it is.

I’m tired.  This day has been coming for some time.  I wish it didn’t hurt either of us.  But it did.  And it does.

I’m very sorry, and I hope that he will forgive me.  Not that I want to be forgiven for having the courage to be myself, but forgiven for hurting him along the way.

[2] …words spoken from a place of hurt…  i.e., the morning after

“Next time you decide to f&$# someone over, try picking someone who hasn’t already been f&#*ed over.”

“Take all your s$#t and go buy somebody else with it. It doesn’t mean s#!t to me.  You can’t buy me.”

(…but I sent him a text message later and said he could come get his stuff if he decided he wanted it…  …and it’s (mostly) gone.  With the exception of the pictures and cards, which are strewn dramatically and ceremoniously all over the shop floor.)

[3] …the morning after the morning after…

He apologized for the behavior and things said from the place of hurt.

How’s that for a title?

I had quite a bit more stuff written here, blah blah blah, but I think the title pretty much sums it  up.

a bit morbid, yet a bit brilliant, and a bit apropos as well

Recently I had dinner with a friend.  It was nice to have some grown up time.  I sort of feel like I over-talked.  It’s such a rare occasion, to spend any one-on-one time with another adult woman.  She’s also a relatively new friend.  Most of my friends have been friends for decades and we have history together so that when we talk, I don’t feel like I over-share.  Or rather, I feel comfortable sharing.    I don’t worry too much about over-sharing on my blog(s).  I have three of them, so that I can unload to various degrees with each one.  This blog is my tried and true, but I’m too cowardly to be completely raw and honest with or about certain things.  I have a separate blog for that.  I don’t bother with stats, so I don’t know how many people read that drivel.  I also have an intermediate blog, which is a bit more anonymous than this one.  I  had intentions for that one to be a real ‘break through’ venue, in which I actually made some progress with the issues I cycle through.  It’s just more of the same drivel, though.  If I were brave, I’d just merge the three here, where people who I know In Real Life can either roll their eyes or share their lovely words of friendship, camaraderie and encouragement.

I met this friend while church hopping last year.  I call myself a Christian, but I don’t call myself a religious Christian.  I struggle sometimes with the social expectations of labeling oneself as a Christian.  If you’re a [good] Christian, you should go to church.  If you’re a [good] Christian, you should tithe.  If you’re a [good] Christian you should marry, stay married, not get divorced, and of course if you are not married, you should not indulge in the lusts of the flesh.  Ahem.  I’m clearly not a [good] Christian.

walking the line

I tend to be of the mind that all that is my business, and it’s between me and God, and not a matter for a congregation.  Maybe part of the struggle I face is that the needles of Catholic guilt are deeply rooted within me.  I’m predispositioned to be on guard and feel as though I’m on trial.

There was a time in this rocky relationship when D said (also based on counsel from his church going friends) that God was not blessing our relationship because we weren’t married and we were having sex.  Fine, I told him back then.  I’ll be supportive of his convictions and abstain.  It never lasted, however, and he may try to say it’s because of me, but I’ll maintain that it was not.  I think he’s only interested in abstinence if marriage is on the table and the abstinence has a finite [and short] limit.  Since marriage is not on the table, the prospect of ongoing abstinence is quickly discarded.  I don’t know why I’m even writing about this.  There’s not a whole lot of crazy action going on around here anyway.

I suppose it’s because of something my friend said.  She’s since tried to assure me that she didn’t mean to be judgmental or religious, and she hopes that she didn’t jeopardize our friendship by saying such.  It was just a comment about valuing myself, and honoring myself, and that being physically intimate with someone while unmarried is a disservice to my heart and to my self.  I think there was also the bit about sin and going against God’s will sprinkled in there somewhere.

I actually agree with the aspects of valuing and honoring oneself, and respecting oneself enough to make solid and sound boundaries.  I also recognize how being casual with one’s holy of holies can certainly be a disservice to one’s heart and very self.  The struggle is the marriage bit.  It’s been a struggle for most of my life.  I’ve wanted to be well married for most of my life, but the opportunity didn’t present itself when I was young, and when my biological clock was thundering loudly, I took matters into my own hands and made a poor marriage decision.  Granted, I’ve chosen not to hold any regrets for that decision, because I am blessed to be the mother of two very fine boys.  I am, however, counted among the masses of the divorced.  Now I have a broken family, and perhaps in an ideal world there would be an opportunity to marry well.  I don’t want to just marry.  I want to marry well.  Or not at all.  Therein is my quandary.  I am in a relationship.  It is rocky.  I don’t know where or how it will go, but I don’t see marriage when I look into my crystal ball.

I’m on a path of rediscovery and awakening.  I’m working on unearthing myself from where I’ve been buried for most of my adult life.  I’m taking care of me, in very small steps.  I can’t imagine being a wife, because I can’t imagine a husband.  This is all stuff that rips D’s heart, and I can hardly have a conversation with him about it. I don’t want to hurt him.  None of this has anything to do with him.  I’m not rejecting him.  I’m choosing me.

I don’t think that being serially monogamous has been that destructive to my soul.  Yes, with each relationship there has been fallout.  I’ve had to pick up the pieces of my fragmented heart and patch them back together.  Scar tissue is strong, though!  This grisly tough battle scarred heart is still beating.  Will I become celibate if this relationship ends?  Probably.  Am I ready to be celibate now?  Maybe.  If we were happier in this relationship, then definitely not.  But we’re not all that happy.  So I don’t know.  Maybe.

Where does all this leave me now?  Sinner or not, I am a child of God.  I know that  his love for me is greater than my love for my own children.  What I am going through are the growing pains of life, and I am making and learning from my mistakes, just as my own children are making and learning from their own mistakes.

be still my bleeding heart

My life has been a road of many twists and turns.  The paths I’ve traipsed over the past few years have led me to face some of the most arduous challenges of my life.  I’ve made hasty, monumental decisions.  I’ve put myself into difficult situations.  Backed myself into corners.  Wasted time, wasted money, wasted emotions, wasted life itself.  I could say, “Hello, my name is Regret.”  But I won’t.  No, because I’ve been thinking about the wasted time, the wasted money, the wasted emotions.

I’ve been thinking about the ripples.  All the ways that lives have changed because of the roads I’ve traversed.  Good things come!  Good things happen!  It’s absolutely concrete.  While I could say that I wish I never wasted so much of my life chasing a mythical love, and I might wish I’d never said those two fateful words (“I do”), I have two vibrant and beautiful testaments to the perfection of that journey right before me.  Every day I am blessed by the wonder of these two human beings entrusted to my care.  And they would not be, had I not walked down that particular path.  And since then, for all the painful twists and turns that follow divorce, I can see how other people’s lives have changed for the better, all because our lives intersected at some point along that path.  This isn’t to say that I take credit for anything; it’s only to say that providence allowed me to be in a particular place at a particular moment in which I could (and did) do something that would (and did) help another.

It’s real.  It’s tangible. I can name names.

A child in Bali.  A village in Cambodia.  A single mother with two young children.  A battered wife.  A young mother with four children.  A woman.  A family.  A man (or two, or three, or seven, not that anyone’s counting).  If I even start to dwell on why or how I am here , in this country house so far from the madding crowd, I can turn my thoughts to any one of these people and quiet my anxious heart.  I don’t care how much money is gone.  I don’t care how many days, months, years have passed.  I don’t care how many tears I’ve cried.  Lives have changed!  Even one of these would be well worth any of the suffering I’ve put myself through.  I won’t dwell on the pain.  I won’t entertain regret.

True, I’ve been losing myself all along the way, bit by bit, so that I don’t even recognize myself any more.  I do wish I’d been vigilant from the start and given my self greater care.  I’m recognizing this now, and slowly but surely I am taking steps to restore myself to my self.  I’m going through the fire.  The refiner’s fire.  I’m going to be shiny and bright, when I get back to me.

Hello, my name is Hope.

I’m glad for this journey.

I wonder at what point in my life I became a be-yotch.  My boyfriend says that I am.  (Sometimes.)  I generally don’t think of myself in those terms, but I was looking through pictures of myself recently, and the face looking back at me doesn’t look all that nice.  I’m not quite sure how I’d describe her.  She doesn’t look very happy.  The smile doesn’t look very convincing.  If there’s a smile at all, that is.  I scrolled through my Facebook pictures, months, years back, looking for a reflection of happiness.  There are some photos where I’m snuggling with my kiddos.  Those photos show the me that I think I am.  So many photos I thought were pretty when I posted them now look empty and frayed.

He often says that I’m mean to him.  It always baffles me that he feels that way. He says that I should be nicer.  Again, I’m baffled.  Well, maybe not so much.  I’m finding myself once again at a distance, behind a safety wall that continues to grow.  So I suppose it’s not a stretch to say that I should be nicer.  I would very likely be nicer if I weren’t hiding behind that wall.

I would like to figure out how to stand tall with no walls.  To move about freely.  This is who I am.  I am standing here, in this space, right now.  This is where I am.  I can be here.

Ugh.  I’m so exhausting!

I had a dream last night in which I was single, and was attending some sort of work-related social function.  It may have just been a lunch break.  I was seated at a round table with two guys.  We are all professionals, but I’m not sure their respective fields, but they are friends.  One guy is doing most of the talking.  We are having some sort of conversation, but he is doing most of the talking.  He’s very smart (or at least he talks a good game), and he’s not bad looking either.  We’re wrapping things up, and I say to him, “You’re smart.  You’re young.  You’re cute.  I like you.”  I thought I was complimenting  him and letting him know I’d be interested in seeing him again.  I followed it up with, “Normally I’m not so direct and so succinct, but I’ve got so much to do and have to be going…”   …his response took me by complete surprise.  He was offended and said that the way I spoke to him was abusive.  I was remorseful for my abruptness.  The thoughts that spun through my mind were along the lines of regret that what I said had ruined any chances I might have had for a future with that guy.

Crazy.

Now that I write it out, clearly it’s a rehash of my boyfriend’s sentiments.  And mine too, I suppose.