22 September

Here is everything that I sent to my notify in the past couple of days:

Sun 21 September 1.27a:

Yeah, it hasn't been the best of all possible days. At 12.30p I got an email from Omar. He had broken up with his boyfriend, because he realized that he did not love him, and that I had helped him to realize this. But apparently, he doesn't love me either. My pit crew was gone, Cynthia and Fran were at a church retreat, Tracing went to Barbados this morning, Helene was not at home, Moira had her cell off, Kate had her cell off, Mo wasn't answering, it was all ashes.

I had a matinee, a rehearsal and an evening show to run the box office for, and I had all of this inside of me. I was quite late for the matinee, I didn't leave the house until 1.22p, and could not understand what had happened to the time. I was in shock, I know. I got to the theatre, did the matinee, told no-one. Then I went to my rehearsal, got there early, and stood out on the street. Peter Rabbit came along, saw me and said, "You don't look happy, is something wrong?" and I burst into tears! It was very dramatic, weeping on the pavement in his arms.

I told him all about it, and after rehearsal I told Kelly all about it, and they both said the same things, that maybe he would change his mind, that maybe things would be different. These are not helpful things to say to a person who wants to believe them. It's not as if I don't know that he is changeable as the tide--he's a weather vane, he changes his mind whenever the wind blows. You can't change it for him, all you can do is wait for him to change it himself. He is completely capable of changing his mind, and I cannot depend on it. I must let him go, and if he finds his way back to me, I must let that happen. But I cannot expect it to.

Then I had the evening show, then came home. He had emailed me again, answering my email back. He was really quite kind, he really does love me, he wants us to be part of each other's lives, but we cannot be together. And you cannot argue with someone who says that they aren't in love with you, you cannot say, "You are too!" Even when they have given you every indication of being in love with you for the past year.

Tracing called me from Barbados tonight and Cynthia called me from wherever her retreat is. (addendum-Sunday morning, Dawn called me from Italy and talked to me for half an hour, which was incredibly sweet of her) My pit crew was checking in. Tracing told me that I had to let go completely, but not to give up hope. To be prepared to lose him, to have lost him, but not to despair. Not to expect him to come back, but to let him do so.

She also reminded me that I had said that the only thing I needed to be happy was the knowledge that he was alive and in the world, and that I had said, "O, yeah, throw my words in my face!" Because of course I didn't mean it! He has to be alive and in the world and with me! I also love the fact that I talked him into realizing that his boyfriend was no good for him, but didn't manage to make him realize that I am good for him. Somehow I slipped up, my powers of persuasion are apparently limited.

Cynthia said that she found it bizarre that his problem was that he wasn't in love with me, because he had always made it quite clear that he was, it had never occurred to her that that was any kind of a problem. Yeah, it never occurred to me either.

The funniest thing was that I had sent him my entry for tomorrow, I told him that I wasn't pleading with him, but that I had told our story and that it belonged to him too, and I wanted him to read it if he chose to. And I read the entry to Cynthia and told her that I had sent it to him, and she said, "Well, that works about the whole alive and in the world but miserable without you thing, because when he reads that, he's going to feel like shit!" Good. It shouldn't be just me.

I regret nothing, though. I regret nothing that I have done or said, I left nothing unsaid that I wish I had. I would have done nothing differently, and if it didn't work out, I cannot fault myself for leaving any stone unturned.

Sun 21 September 9.43a:

Well, I just cried until I threw up. Fortunately, since I have not eaten, there wasn't anything in particular to throw up, though you wouldn't know that from my body. Meaning that it was enthusiastically throwing up no matter what was or wasn't coming out. Which is less upsetting and makes for less cleanup. Makes the question of whether to eat or not this morning rather moot.

In a way, it's good that nobody is home, because that means that I can scream at the top of my lungs, as I was doing in my hysterics that led to the throwing up, without startling the children, without having anyone rush down to comfort me. There is no comforting me, and I don't want to have to pretend to be comforted in order to make the comforter feel as though they are doing something useful.

I may end up on the Eliza heartbreak diet. "How do you look so great?" "My life fell apart, thanks for asking!"

Here's the poem running through my head:

Convalescent

How shall I wail, that wasn't meant for weeping?
Love has run and left me, oh, what then?
Dream, then, I must, who never can be sleeping;
What if I should meet Love, once again?

What if I met him, walking on the highway?
Let him see how lightly I should care.
He'd travel his way, I would follow my way;
Hum a little song, and pass him there.

What if at night, beneath a sky of ashes,
He should seek my doorstep, pale with need?
There could he lie, and dry would be my lashes;
Let him stop his noise, and let me read.

Oh, but I'm gay, that's better off without him;
Would he'd come and see me, laughing here.
Lord! Don't I know I'd have my arms about him,
Crying to him, "Oh, come in, my dear!"

-Dorothy Parker

Sunday 21 September 11.54a:

I don't want to feel this way. But on the other hand, I don't want to not feel this way. I would rather be hurt than to look back on this and think, "Yes, I remember when I used to feel this way, I remember when I used to love Omar." I don't want to be thinking back and remember the me that I am now and feel sorry for me, but it was so long ago and everything is different. I would rather hurt forever than feel better and not love him.

Monday 22 September 1.48a:

Okay, I'm better now. Just so you know. We had rehearsal today, and afterwards, he and I walked 60 blocks together down to his house, and we talked, and it was nice. We walked 40 blocks without mentioning us, but talking about the other big changes that he has made, then we started talking about us. And we started holding hands. I was like, "Hey, I lasted 40 blocks before holding your hand, that's better than I thought I would!"

We talked and talked, and he's really trying to work out his life and himself, he said he can make other people happy but not himself, and he has to find that, he has to find his way. And I was telling him how awful it has been, but not to make him feel bad, just not to pretend that it was anything else. And we were able to talk about things, real things, and we were really close. Just like always.

I told him that I didn't know how to just be friends, that I would have to follow his lead, that we would have the relationship that he wanted--and not in an "Anything you want is okay by me, honey," kind of way because I have literally no idea how to work this, I don't know what's too little and what's too much, so we'll do what he wants.

And when we got to his house, we went and sat out on the benches in front of the building, and he put his arm around me and I put my head on his shoulder and we held hands and talked and kissed goodbye several times and I thought...okay. Being apart is exactly like being together, only without any chance of sex.

And I don't need anyone to tell me that it was a bad idea, but I was really happy. I can do this, I can have this relationship like this. For now. It was the fear of not touching that was one of the worst parts. I would like to make it really clear, I do not want any emails about what a bad idea it is to blur these lines, I am well aware, but it's what I want.

Mon 22 September 11.19a:

Here's another reason that I am being very bad. I am not eating. Yes yes, I told you before that the whole not eating thing was good because of the whole crying until I threw up thing, but I'm not doing that anymore and I'm still not eating.

You all know I'm am ex-anorectic, right? I'm sure that I've mentioned it. It never got really bad, I never was bulimic, I never was hospitalized, and I got myself out of it when I realized that my relationship to food was incredibly unhealthy, but at a point when I was in college I was under 120 lbs and still thought I was fat. And that weight is ridiculous for me--I'm 5' 10 1/2" and have a frame like a linebacker's, huge shoulders, huge rib cage.

Anyway, yes, I put in some good solid not-eating time when I was in college. And the thing with not eating, well, it's really great. It's like I quit drinking and I am now, years later, sipping a scotch and it tastes so good. Well, not eating feels soooooo good, you feel really strong, really in control. And right now, my life is so out of my control that not eating is something that I can handle.

So it's not like I don't know that it's bad, and it's not like I don't know why I'm doing it, but goddamn, I like it way too much not to do it. For a couple of days. No longer, really. Just a taste, that's all I want. I'm not one of those "anorexia is good" freaks, I don't plan on getting all into it again, that was twenty years ago for crying out loud.

Interestingly, I looked up anorectic in the dictionary, and under the definitions were, "1. Marked by loss of appetite. 2. Suppressing or causing loss of appetite," and I was thinking that whoever wrote that doesn't know a thing about anorexia, there ain't no loss of appetite involved, baby. You lose nothing, you control it.

Also, I bought a pack of cigarettes yesterday. I figure if I'm not eating and I'm not sleeping, I'm going to fucking be smoking. No chance of that catching on, though, I smoked half the pack yesterday, which was swell, and not eating makes more sense when you're smoking, but besides the fact that I have no intention of starting smoking again in earnest, that pack of cigarettes cost me $6.85! And I'm not doing that more than once, let me tell you that.

So yeah, I'm being really bad, but I'm feeling pretty good.

So that's where I am right now, things are peculiar, but I'm feeling pretty good.

One interesting thing. We were talking about how my friends were checking in and so forth, and he said, "How did they all know?" "I told them!" and he looked at me and said, "You are very naughty, you tell everyone everything!" and he told me a little story. Apparently, his daughter called him recently, really upset, and said, "Did you sleep with Kymm?" Because she knows the girl that Melissa did a show with, and I don't know if somebody said something or if somebody read something, but it worked its way back to her and she told him.

It's not as though he doesn't know about this page, it's not as though he doesn't know that I write about him, and it's not as though just about every single thing I have written about him isn't something that I've told him, so it's not like it's full of secrets, but I don't think that he quite realizes the consequences of an on-line journal.

He said that at first he was a little perturbed that it had gotten back to his daughter, but then he said that he would have been one hell of a hypocrite if he had told me not to tell anyone that we had slept together, especially after we went out with my friends on my birthday and everyone saw how happy we were together and how close, after that how could he want me to keep silent? I said that it was his life too, and that he would have had every right to tell me to keep his personal life private, but he said no, that he started it, that he made love to me, and it wasn't for him to say who I couldn't tell. But it was weird to be lectured by his daughter.

So I just want to say this to Omar's daughter and her friend and anyone else who is reading this, if this was how you found out. I put my life out here, and I am aware of the consequences of that action, but my relationship with your father is not your business, at all. You are his child, and whomever he chooses to sleep with, whether it's me or anyone else, hasn't anything to do with you, let alone the fact that whomever I choose to sleep with is not your business.

I like you, very much, I've always thought that you rather liked me, but my relationship with Omar is mine, is ours, in whatever direction it goes, and it is not for you to say what that direction is.

Today's horoscope:
Someone is just too curious. Good manners are a welcome excuse to turn down the intensity. Follow an unexpected course to throw others off your trail. You might even like what you suddenly find yourself doing.

One year ago today:
It took me several tries to swallow it, but I managed to keep it down, and learned a valuable lesson in the process. If you know it's funny, either don't eat, or eat something that will easily wash off the cat. Jello. Something like that.

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Last Updated Mon 22 September 12:30:09 2003