He's just not that into me. I think.

So I'm 98% sure that Philip has moved on, but not 100% sure.  I was out of town for a month, but I got back 2 weeks ago, and he keeps talking on the phone, but he hasn't asked me out  (And I did ask him out--for his birthday, but he had plans.) He also seems to be initiating calls less often--I have to text him first.

I feel in this really awkward situation.

a) I told him I wasn't seeing other people just because I didn't have the energy for it about 2 months ago.  (Interestingly, he took his ad off collarme about a month ago and it isn't back on.  It is possible he he is seeing someone else, or just busy with something else, or blue.)

b) I also told him that if he did something that would really "fuck things us" I would talk to him about it before I broke up.

c) But, I feel like talking to him about it is high maintenance and silly.  I feel like he is telling me "go away" and so I'm inclined to just go away, but it feels passive aggressive to start seeing other people sort of behind his back.  What to do, what to do what to do....

Last week, I figured I'd give him till the weekend, but then he said "I'm super busy this week--we'll get together next week."  So now I'm sort of giving him till this weekend.

I've also started to lose interest.  3 weeks ago, he didn't call me for 3 or 4 days after I texted him.  (I was travelling a lot in an area that I didn't have cell phone coverage or time, so while I was away, I'd just text him "I've got coverage and time today" and he'd always call that evening and we'd talk for a couple of hours.  I really didn't mind doing that while I was super-busy and travelling, but it didn't occur to me that would become the foundation of our communication.  Anyway, 3 weeks ago, I was SO sad and blue, and then he called, apologized for being out of touch and said he'd been blue and didn't want it to rub off on me.

I don't know if I'm naive for thinking this is mixed signals, or if I should just accept that he's not that into me and move on.  There's a lot I liked about him.  But I'm starting to forget what all that was...

Cat fight

Off Topic: Every few years, I try to spend a few days with my aunt.  I know that she gets hurt by my cavalier attitude towards her.  So this week was the attempt for 2010-2015.  I suppose I'll try again in 5 years.

There are three issues with my aunt, only one of which is interesting.  The first is that she isn't very kind or empathetic.  She can be generous, but she doesn't really think about how her behaviour will hit others.  She wants to be smarter than me about everything and has a tendency to put down my experiences and knowledge.  (She also gets angry and then dismissive when I talk about things she doesn't know and don't predict the limits of her knowledge.  She was pissed that I talked about a friend getting in trouble at work for threatening to go to "H.R."  She didn't know what HR was, thought it was rude that I would use an abbreviation that is obviously some West Coast slang that I should just know that no one else would know and then  when I tried to explain it cut me off by saying "I really don't care."  The second issue is that she gets into all sorts of conspiracy theories, so I just don't listen to her political ideas and that hurts her feelings terribly (even as she acknowledges that she never fact checks her own ideas).

The third issue though, I think, is interesting and that has to do with the role of women in families.  I don't know if this is just my family, but I think it is possibly in many families.  My aunt, like me, is a plump, single woman with a J.D.  Once her younger brother (my father) was married, she was marginalized, and I felt the same thing happening in my own family.  She has been very competitive with me, in ways that she will never win.  (For example, she has never passed the bar and thus has never been able to work as a lawyer. I passed on the first try and got relatively stable work, although there have been hiccups.  She is often trying to make her work as important as my work, and I'm sure on one level it is, but no one gets a JD to basically do paralegal work, and she's often putting me down as a way of lifting herself up).  My family (my parents and siblings) is really the only family she has and there are times it feels like there's room for only one spinster in the family and so she is trying to dislodge me to claim that small space.

More importantly though, is that my dad, until recently, did not respect her.  As a result, when he saw me doing things that reminded him of her, he drilled it out of me.  I probably share a quarter of her DNA, but we definitely have things in common.  However, while she revels in it, I do all I can to avoid those traits.  For example, we both collect things and like stuff.  I have an entire cabinet of the same pattern of china my Grandma had, and I use it all the time. I LOVE it.  My aunt has 5 different kids of china, of her great grandmother's patterns and various others she has picked up along the way.  They are stacked in the table in the guest room, all over the kitchen and in various places in the dining room.  I have this incredibly strong reaction to this eccentricities, far more than a normal person would.  In fact, my aunt drives me more crazy than just about anyone I know because so many of my similarities with her were drilled out of me with so much criticism.  I put a lot of energy into policing my own behavior.  I was honestly raised with her as an example of what not to be.  I would probably be more like her if my dad hadn't been so critical of me.  And here she is, blithely living her own life, as she should, not self-conscious about behavior I'd never allow in myself because it makes her happy.  And it drives me crazy!

Such a bizarre day.  I'm in Boston--I have work things next week, but I flew out early to see people.

My aunt still has a lot of anger towards her dad, and stars talking to me about dominance and submission.  She believes that love can only develop where there is no submission and dominance and that love is the willingness to relinquish dominance or can grow when submission isn't expected.  She talked about how a guy was being dominant with her and her body recognized that as love. I tried to enter the conversation, talking about ballroom dancing, but it really didn't work.

Then I had lunch with Nate.  I dated Nate in the mid-90s when we were both in our early 20s.  He was the first man that ever tied me up and has gone on to have sex, I would estimate, with hundreds of women.  We flirted.  We talked openly about sex.  He asked if he should flirt with me, and I said something like "flirting is fun, but I'm sort of involved with someone."  He asked if I was submissive or dominant and I looked at him, rather shocked, since he tied me up and not vice-versa.  He spoke about having to keep himself from grabbing my hair.  He made it clear that he would love to have a fling, since knows what he is doing know. (Interestingly, he is friends with the guy from college (even though he and I went to different colleges) who put the eyeliner on my eye, which probably remains the single most erotically charged moment of my fully clothed life--the two met at Burning Man!).  If Nate and I lived in the same town, or even the same coast (and if Philip weren't in the picture) it could be really fun to have a fling there.  It was nice to talk openly about sex in that way.  He had me order ice-creams for both of us and then said "good girl" and asked if good girl was good. And when I was leaving he did grab my hair.  But he didn't kiss me, although it came pretty close. I do have to admit that many of my cells were dancing when I was with Nate.  I totally got why we dated!

My aunt no longer dates.  She is absolutely opposed to anything that might be 'submission.'  I don't think she realizes, though, that avoiding 'submission' to anyone is actually dominating the conversation.  It isn't a give and take with her.  It is all her way, all the time!  Meanwhile, a couple of hours with Nate and it was hard to think long-term; I have no intention of spending a night with him because my little emotions get involved.  But he knew exactly how to lead, how to dominate.  (If he had known then what he knows now, I might never have left Boston.)

Madeleines

Watching the crumbs fall' I'm  deeply sad

I put on a sundress today that I haven't worn since I was in Europe with MaxEarnest last summer.  I didn't think anything of it, until I was doing laundry and had this rush of memories.  I miss MaxEarnest SO much today!

Intellectually, I know we can't give each other what the other wants.  But I just miss him in my bones.  I have a box of his clothes and took out a shirt and smelled it.  I couldn't smell anything.  I don't remember what he smells like.  But I remember what he feels like. I miss him so much!

I know I will always love MaxEarnest.  He is part of my life.  And I'm sure eventually I will meet a man that touches me as deeply as MaxEarnest and it will be less painful.  But I know if I could want different things in long run, I would be packing my bags to go see MaxEarnest right now and that is so very painful to bear.  Right now, I wish I could be a different enough person that he and I could be each other's partners.  I know we can't.  But the crumbs fall and I tumble after them.

Philip and I have now been going out for almost 2 months and we haven't slept together (and both of us are traveling over the next month, so we're not sleeping together this month either).

My head says this is just fine, but my heart wonders if this is OK.  Today Philip and I had a date very much like John and I use to.  We met in the same spot, wandered through the same stretch of park along the water, got a drink at a place John and I had been a dozen times and then got dinner. 

That said, there were some major differences.  

We did kiss quite a bit.  John and I never french kissed and Philip and I do.

John had said that something was missing, it wasn't yet soup. This made me more and more insecure, as we'd spend maybe 12 hours a week together, we'd talk about spending our lives together, and yet I felt like there was something so wrong with me (and I assumed it was my looks).  Philip has said "I'm so to open up."  And, of course, he's said, multiple times "I don't want to fuck this up."  When I'm with Philip, and not thinking about it, I have a confidence that I never had with John.

John said he didn't want to hurt me.  That was incredibly important to him.  As if that were possible.  He somehow thought if we didn't have sex until we were engaged, I would get hurt.  Philip has said "I'm going to fuck up."  He knows that humans hurt each other in relationships.  I've warned him that dad is a shrink and if I get my feelings hurt, I will want to talk about it.

Philip and I were talking about how much I like my house and I mentioned how amazing my neighbors are.  I started talking about people, especially directly across the street and also down the block, but that, overall, there are the kindest people and there is a real sense of community. Philip interrupts me to say "I think you are a huge part of that--you really take care of other people and..." I interrupted him to say that I'd never had this community before. (I wish I hadn't interrupted him--I'd love to have heard the rest of the comment.)  But it was one of many little things that really make me think he is beginning to really care deeply for me.

That said, I hope we have sex before Labor day!

Sub Space

Philip wanted to know if I had sub space, what it was and how I got there.  (Sure.  Easy!)

But we were talking about it, and I think I figured it out.

For me, I want to not think for "sub space" but if I stop feeling too, then it ends up moving from "sub space" (good) to 'victim space' (bad).  It is the difference of me experiencing kink to me feeling abused.  The Ex made me not feel.  It was too much.  It hurt, so I numbed out and sex because something I had to endure

So for me, sub space:

• I want to feel protected.
• I want to not have responsibilities (other than obeying.  I'm fine with obeying)
• Restraints and blindfolds are very simple ways for me to get there.
• Liminality does the same thing.  When I can't easily label a sensation, then I tend to stop trying.  BUT if I can easily label it as pain, I withdraw.  (Interestingly, I've never enjoyed receiving oral sex, and I think it is the flip side of the same thing. I'm supposed to enjoy this. I don't enjoy it all that much and I feel like I'm doing something wrong.  Receiving Oral sex is like drinking vanilla extract.  I love cooking with vanilla. It is my favorite spice, but it is a spice, not the only ingredient!)
• I think role playing would be too, but I've never been with someone who likes role playing.  But I like playing a character and I think that would give my active brain something to do, so I could surrender pretty easily that way.

It is interesting that Philip, who comes across as a bit of a smart-aleck, has been as introspective about kink as he has.  

Dualities and Identity

So I'm actually in NYC this week on business and I went to hear Molly Weatherfield read from Carrie's Story and it was bizarre.  Worlds collide!  I'm used to, at kinky things, being the hippie girl that doesn't fit in (although I don't think I dress like a hippie) and there, I was the kinky one!  It was a feminist/socialist bookstore and nearly everyone there looked like the people I grew up with.  Birkenstocks, not stilettos.

Molly's real name is Pam, and she's totally cool with that.  (Of course, it says so on her web page, so it isn't exactly a shock that she is open about it.)  And it is clearly fantasy for her, which was a bit of a shock for me.

And the bookstore was great--the sort of place where I could find information about the systemic destruction of the communities of my clients.  Next time I'm in NYC, I'm totally getting coffee and spending an afternoon browsing.  (It is a socialist collective run by volunteers!)

I felt so awkward.  More awkward than I have at any kink thing for ages.  Am I Connie or my other name?  I actually gave her my real name, and I realize, she's the first woman that has been at all aware of the dualities.

Joss Whedon gave a great graduation speech, where he said:

You have, which is a rare thing, the ability and the responsibility to listen to the dissent in yourself. To at least give it the floor. Because it is the key, not only to consciousness, but to real growth. To accept duality is to earn identity, and identity is something that you are constantly earning. It is not just “who you are,” it is a process that you must be active in.

So I guess my worlds colliding is really just earning identity.  But it is highly disconcerting!