Moving...

I'm moving again!

Not house this time...blog.

Things are feeling different. I'm feeling different.

So follow me if you like...underneath the butterflies...

Girlfriends.

It has never really bothered me that I have guy friends and not girl friends. It’s not like I’ve never had bestie girlies, but the girls have always come and go. They’ll be the girls I work with, the girls I have classes with, the girls I went to school with…but they will invariably depart my daily life when the means for our friendship ends. New semester, change of jobs, leaving school, leaving town.

My best friend from late primary school and I have been friends forever, and when we talk, everything flops right into place and it’s like the tides haven’t been ebbing for seven years. Thing is though, we hardly ever talk. Her grandfather died last year and at the funeral I felt a loss. Not only the loss of him, but the loss of her. I could hug her parents, hug her brothers, squeeze the squishy arm of her grandmother. I could hug her tight and wipe her tears, but there was a distance that affected me. A distance that told me that as much as we feel solid in our bi-yearly contact, things are different now.

We were always joined by birthdays if nothing else. We had them in the same month and we’d celebrate together. 16ths, 18ths…21sts. That was the last big one and it’s like something ended there. This July we’ll both be turning 25, and our lives and what I’d like to still call a friendship, are vastly different now. I don’t know if it was the scope of different towns, different career choices or different family situations. I don’t know where it’s changed, but it has.

The best girl from my high school years has been on a boat for the last year. She came home for a few weeks and we hardly caught up. It was hard when she left last year, being just about the only girl I’d have regular somewhat girlie chatty contact with. I actually cried. I don’t know if it was that I got used to not having her there or didn’t want to have three weeks of dancing stupidly on tables only to have it disappear again…but we didn’t even speak in the three days before she left again.

Then there was B. A pill-popping, ditzy, dancey girl who I loved to death. We were inseparable for quite some time. We were each the other’s confidant. For what happened between us, I blamed myself. See, the beauty of guy friends is that they can’t betray you with the guy you like…or love. It happened with my first love and I’d let it happen again.

Today I got to thinking that this inability I have to hold on close to girlfriends is not quite as okay as I’d always thought.

I don’t know if it is the age thing with a very real quarter life crisis breathing down my neck, but I feel alone. It has never been a bad thing, but this year I’ve been kind of mourning the lack of girlfriends, and at times it’s not just feeling alone…it’s lonely.

R, N and I are having dinner tomorrow night, and this afternoon I just randomly called an old school girlfriend of ours. The way she answered the phone made me instantly smile, and I think that is where this is coming from. I missed her. We were muck-up buddies in school. There were times when we’d egg cars, throw water bombs from balconies, put woopy cushions on the teachers chair (yes, even in high school…woopy cushions are pretty funny, you gotta admit). We’d get drunk together, hide behind buildings and share a naughty cigarette, and one time had midori shots before art class, where we were ultra-creative and rather giggly.

Anyway, she’s coming tomorrow night and I can’t wait to see her. I want a girl to talk boys with. I want a girl to back me up in conversations with N and R, because at coffee this morning I was standing alone on topics of sex and relationships. I want a girl’s opinion and a girl’s advice. I want a girl to make a real comment on my shoes, not just have my mate screw up his nose and say ‘they look so uncomfortable…do you want to borrow some thongs?’ I want to tell her about my boy. Point him out across the restaurant. I want to make some stupid chick joke and have someone laugh.

I love my boys to death, and I know they love me. They constantly spout lines like ‘Of course your boyfriend knows he’s on a winner…who wouldn’t?’ and ‘You smell good’. Today R actually told me he was going to call my Mum and ask her why I’d lost so much weight. He actually scolded me, with furrows between his brow. From a guy, that’s big. I wouldn’t trade them or their love for the world, but I just want something different as well. I think one of the holes in my swiss cheese life has been this. I’m trying to get more wholly happy again, and this is at least an attempt, if not a start.

Because I know he's hurting...

This is where I went from there...

I was awoken from my sleep last night by J. It wasn’t late by any means, and he’d not long finished work. But after the devastating soccer morning, Tuesday was early to bed night for most Aussies I reckon.

Anyway. He called to say he’s sorry. Sorry because he knows he’s not been treating me the way he should. He’s been distant, not all there. I’ve been getting frustrated. Hurt, and the other night…angry. Me, angry. Last week I told him that if I felt like he was half-arsed, I just wasn’t going to bother. I need to know and feel that I am wanted. I deserve that.

He said he wasn’t making excuses, but he’d been having a tough time with his daughter (by this, I take it to mean with the mother). She’d been on holidays, it’d been unsettled, and I know that his time with her is his most precious. His dad was killed 10 years ago, and he still hasn’t dealt with it. I knew he’d be funny at this time of year, I just didn’t know how much it affected him until recently. It’s something he doesn’t really talk about.

I know he needs to work on this stuff alone, I understand. And I’m grateful that I know now that it hasn’t been me! I guess we all have our issues, and my weeks of neuroticism were mine. These are his.

So I wrote…

I don’t know much about loss. I’ve lost people I’ve loved, but I’ve never lost a parent. I know that in a week it will be 10 years since your father died, and I can see how much it hurts you every day. For a 17 year old boy to lose the man in his life without a chance to say thankyou or goodbye would be a horrible thing. I obviously didn’t know your father. But I know that he’s still around somewhere. The people we love and need don’t leave us, even if they go away. He’s still here in you.

Your father raised you to be the person you are and he would be so proud of the amazing man and father you have become. Your daughter is the luckiest girl in the world to have you as her dad and I can only hope that my daughter one day will be half as lucky, and that she will have a bond with her father that I never really knew. Your father instilled such values in you that are rare in so many people today. You know about life. About love. About family.

J, you are so special in so many ways. Your strength and independence, confidence and worldliness stump me every day. You are a man of so much character and so much life experience, and I feel so fortunate to be a part of your life. Your father raised the guy I’ve fallen in love with, so in my book, he must’ve been a bit of alright.

I know that you’ve got 27 years of life behind you that I will never be a part of. But I hope that in time I will become a part of your future, because you possess every quality I want in a partner. I know that in the beginning we were like lovesick crazy teens. I know we’ve already had some tough times in our individual life bubbles. I know that bubbles can stick together though, and I feel that ours can.

When we found each other, I think we both became calm. Happy in a way that had eluded us both for a while, and I don’t think that is something that will go away. You’ve taught me so much, about life and love, and even though there are other things going on right now, I know we can ride it out.

I want you to know that I am here for you, for anything you want or need. I’m not going anywhere, because this is where I feel right. As close as I was to walking the other night, I just wasn’t ready to let it go. You are too much to lose and I will be in this until I have nothing left. I feel blessed to be with you. Some days I can’t believe it took me so long, but then I guess it wouldn’t have been so beautiful or lasting. Most days I just can’t believe you’re mine. I just can’t imagine my life without you right now.

I love the man that you are. Everyone who knows you is better off for having you in their life and that is the man that your father moulded. Baby, he is with you every step of the way and he is sharing your life with you, just from afar. There will be a day when you will meet him again, and even though that day could be a hundred years from now, it will be soon enough. And I have no doubt that he will tell you just how proud he is of the way you lived your life. Who wouldn’t be?

I didn’t know men like you existed, and you exist as you are because of your father.

You can be sad, you can be hurt, you can cry buckets of tears or punch holes in walls. Just know that it’s not the end of your father’s influence on your life and you will never ever be alone, and at the end of the day, he did his job well…and he knew you’d be okay.

I love you more than I thought possible.

Auburn*

I forgot.

In all my years of singledom, I forgot all the goodness that relationships possess. In the first few months of coupled bliss I forgot all the badness. I forgot just how fucking hard relationships are. I forgot how insane and stupid things can get when your life is all wrapped up around another and I forgot how the little things become big things which become mammoth things. With J, I forgot all about pain. I forgot how boys can hurt you, how loneliness and yearning makes you ache and how love can break your heart.

I forgot about the inherent dramas, which I hate. I forgot that it’s not all peaches and cream. I forgot that hand in hand with the good times come horrible times. Times that leave you unable to eat…unable to sleep. Times that have you looking at your phone, willing it to sing. Times that make you want to smash your phone against a concrete pavement. Times when the effort seems way too much, when you feel in it alone, or not at all.

Times when your mother asks you if anything is wrong because you’ve lost too much weight, and only then do you notice just how loose your clothes are. Times when the only place you fit is on the toilet floor, head in the bowl, throwing up everything, which is nothing, and thinking to yourself…I forgot how much love hurts. I forgot about the stupid fights which explode from nowhere, then ebb away almost as quickly.

I love J. I love what we have. But the moments like this in the last two weeks have made me realise that it won’t stay honeymooney forever. Last night I wanted to walk away. I nearly left, nearly put the key in his letter box and drove away. But I stopped…not what I wanted. I know it’s just turbulence. And I know that we’ll be in this until we have no feelings left. I’m just fucked if I know where to go from here.

Smiling.

Today, things are good. I'm smiling. Like Trueborn. Like I have a magnificent secret.

But minus the weekend work I've become such a nanna that I'm now hankering for our guests to leave so that I can go to bed. Is this normal? I thought the partying and dancing me would return with free weekends, but now I'm just like "Oooh yeah...more sleep..." Loser. Yeah. I know.

A swiss cheese life...

Ten minutes of mind blankness looking at a flashing cursor, not knowing where on earth to start. I have not written in two months. I have not written ANYTHING in two months. I think that’s where my problem starts. Writing for me is such an outlet. It’s the best friend mirror reflective ear that I just don’t have.

I have been living, sleeping breathing J. It was blissful, perfect. When I quit work he had holidays, so I still had him every waking second. Then he went back to work, and I got bored. Bitter and bored, not a good combination. My life is half as full as it was before, and it’s been utterly crazy. R and Bo have upped and left town (fuckers) and my life has slowly been starting to look more and more like swiss cheese. Little holes. Little on their own, but when one hole becomes three or four holes, shit feels different.

J, being the constant-slash-reliant in my life, copped it. Most, nay, ALL of it. I don’t know anyone more insecure than me. And one night my insecurities topped themselves with regard to his ex-wife (wife actually, they’re not divorced yet) which has been the biggest relationship hurdle I have ever had to deal with. But they have a child and I have been 100% supportive (the kid is adorable…seriously, he has good genes for future reference) and I know that is a part of his life that just doesn’t concern me right now. Anyway.

The last two weeks have been shit and Monday brought on a complete reassessment. Since he went back to work, I’ve been moody, empty and insecure which completely sabotaged us. We got so wrapped up in ‘it’ and each other, that we’ve kind of ignored ourselves. Realistically, we just aren’t going to spend every night together now that we aren’t going home from work together. I’ve moved house AGAIN and being half an hour away is actually a bitch if he’s working til 11pm. Like either of us wants to drive that distance now just to sleep.

I’ve been sick…sick enough to lose a few kilos which is great…how shallow is that? I need a new job because my weekends are now so BORING! I mean, I could go out, start dancing and partying again…but…I don’t know…I have not had weekends to myself for as long as I can remember. Can I even dance anymore? Scary much.

I was so scared, still am a bit, that I might lose him. I love him like crazy and he the absolute best thing that has happened to me in so long. Everything about him is just what I want. We fit…minus the last two neurotic weeks of course. Honestly, I would marry him tomorrow if the bastard wasn’t married already! When I thought it was over (Monday, argument, sobbing with complete disregard for running mascara) I…I don’t even know how to describe…trust me to fuck up the one amazing thing in my life…

The next few weeks will be hard. The make or break. I’m fucking terrified.

The shit hath hit-eth the fan-eth.

I have been reprimanded re: workplace relationship. J and I got to a point of security where we were ready to let people know that we were together, so we didn’t have to hide anything, and now it’s all on.

To cut an insanely long story short, all of management are currently fucking or dating other staff. Here begins the hypocrisy.

J and I were upfront, honest. For close to three months, we have had this thing going and the ONLY people who knew were people who we had told. No-one knew, because at work we are totally professional. Completely 100% professional.

Now they know that there is a relationship there, they don’t want us working together. Only one of the owners (moreso his girlfriend) has a problem with us being together. Like they have any right when we have absolutely proven that it in no way affects our work.

Anyway. I got sent home from work last night because “we don’t you to be here while J is here”. Or tomorrow. But by Friday you will need to apologise to this person, that person, prove this, prove that…crawl up our arses to keep your job basically. We need you back for the weekend.

So.

They can get fucked. I am absolutely employable and I deserve much much better than this shit. They can’t sack me because they know they can’t do without me. So by trying to prove some kind of point, they have just really proven my unreplaceability. I know that’s not a word…bare with me. D cannot run the bar without me. He has completely fucked himself over. And if he didn’t have the balls to stand up for that, then he’s not worth working with anyway.

I got drunk and cried for hours until J rescued me from the pub last night. He took me to get ice-cream and cuddled me til I fell asleep. I couldn’t sleep a wink though, and my puffy eyes while teaching this morning would’ve looked a sight. (Lucky I used that conjunctivitis excuse last week hey Buggy!)

But wait…there’s more…

J, sous chef, just resigned. He carries the kitchen and they know it. His staff will frogmarch out that door behind him, and they know it. By allowing one of the management couples to create fucking Mt Everest out of a molehill they have just right royally screwed themselves.

I know people. If I want it, I will have a job somewhere else by Friday. They need me, I don’t need them.

They need us. But they had a problem with “us” even though we were upfront and honest about it. Regardless of what happens with us as a couple...Separately, we are neither of us prepared to work for people who lack the management and personal skills of addressing issues properly…the bitching, backstabbing, manipulating and downright lying about other staff is just pathetic. It looks like a couple’s revolt, but it’s not. If it were, that’s what they made it anyway.

What will this do to J and I? I don’t know. But I guess it can only make us stronger. I hope so, because I’m not prepared to kiss J goodbye just yet.