Monday, October 31, 2016

Halloween Costumes in the Workplace, Truths You Can't Unlearn and Things You Can't Unsee

Life has overtaken my ability to write things lately. It's hard to be able to sit and write when you're constantly going to events, friends are taking you out, you've got fashion shows/rehearsals/houseguests/bugs to kill/work assignments/Song Pop 2 games and have decided "fuck it" for online dating and guys who make zero effort to spend time with you (well, anyone really).

Today, I wore my costume to work. I was Goth Bunny with emphasis on the "Goth" part. I figured it was something not requiring too much financial investment, I had the clothing for it and it was a means to reclaim a part of my past. At one point, I thought I was goth but it turns out that wasn't the case; sure, Vampire Boy was a goth/punk guy (so not full on "goth" in the true sense) but I never viewed myself as Cindy Sanders (the cheerleader from Freaks and Geeks) like Coney Island Guy did. I had some goth friends but I really came to the realization I wasn't a goth after being forced to go to my ex's sister's funeral a month and a half after my father's. Plus, I'm not nearly as pessimistic as I'd thought I was.

Nobody else had costuming except one judge and her staff; they are cool by definition for that. Other lawyers may be old farts but this woman refuses to become one, ever.

Remember, you're speaking of the woman who wore a tiara to school for a week as a high school senior to protest the draconian administration who refused to let anyone have fun at all. There were no senior pranks or senior skip days so I felt like my spirit was being stifled and didn't appreciate it. No one could nail me for wearing one b/c it wasn't banned in the dress code (which I also had issues with). Lots of people complimented me on it and found it fun. As my mother says, you have to make your own fun in life. This is one way I rebelled.

My mother also loves Halloween and dresses up for it to go trick or treating with the grandkids. I remember her wearing costumes to her jobs. I think something inside you is dead if you don't want to wear a costume on Halloween or have any day where you just get silly; you're what I consider a boring old fart & someone I have no interest in spending time with. I could have stayed married if I wanted to be around boring old farts.

I also wore my costume to a Halloween party and despite being covered and technically in proper court attire (long skirt, Lenore T-shirt, black coverup), I had to hit 2 guys at separate times for getting fresh. One also gave me a flower at random, another was a friend who danced with me and I felt like "How come you're not trying to meet ladies here? I've made it clear I have no romantic interest."

Don't you hate when your guy friends are cunt blocking you? This is why I will not take my law school friend out with me if I want to meet guys & don't trust him if he wanted me to be his wingwoman. He'd be sabotaging me in 2 seconds, I'm certain of it. Just a serious intuition I have.

It looks like my intuition is pretty good so far. I was right when I sensed he hated his old job & he didn't love his ex-girlfriend. My intuition says this guy has never made an emotional investment in a relationship. I spoke to his ex recently; she wanted to catch up & I hope she finds that better guy I know she's capable of getting who'll give her that investment. The guy I made the most investment in totally betrayed me but it's spooky that Psycho Boy outright told me way back when I put up walls and never let anyone in & I see my friend doing the same damn thing. I told him I of all people should not be the one telling him to stop doing that if he ever wants to find happiness in the romantic sense; seriously, I don't think I should have to have that conversation with anyone & if I am saying this, he ought to think hard about that.

I limit my emotional investment in people a lot, especially in dating and probably not in the healthiest of ways but I am aware of it and have tried to work on a balance so I'm not completely hard and can let go a little without feeling like I'm letting anyone think they can destroy me like my ex tried to. Fortunately, I'm not the only woman who's had guys abandon her and never make effort. I've just lost interest in online dating and that whole pursuit b/c I can't deal with the time wasting. I need a dude to actually be serious about hanging out with me & I'm not looking for marriage or meeting parents or anything big and scary. I also need a lot of time to feel comfortable and like someone is trustworthy along with being my intellectual and looks peer.

Though it seems even if you invest time in someone, they can still prove to be a big fat liar. This guy who'd helped me in 2 moves during my survival time was recently outed as an STD spreading, adultering con man. One woman he'd conned had known him from childhood & I thought of people I knew in childhood; I'd never see them being this way. It would be like my law school friend having a secret wife, children, an STD and a fiancee while sleeping with me and half of the straight girls in NYC. I'd wonder when he had time to do all that & how in God's name he got THAT shady considering he told me he wasn't the type to blackmail people with their secrets. I never got involved with the con artist since I just wasn't feeling it, he works in my industry (I have a strict policy against shitting where I eat) and I was seeing other dudes at that time. I was also honest about my situation unless I got forced to lie for survival, actually got a divorce vs. staying married and telling people I was separated/divorced when I wasn't and never dealt with any guy I didn't at least like as a human being even if he wasn't my physical type. That's part of my personal code.

Even when I was using guys for sex and liked the kindness, I did eventually fess up to that fact; no one got mad at me for it, which shocked me. I've met quite a few guys who have more of a female mentality than I do. I wondered if the reason I didn't get involved with this guy was my intuition saying not to somewhere really deep inside (since I never got creeper vibes), I was a better con artist or even amidst the hell that was my life in those days, some force was watching out for me. I felt pretty forsaken 2.5 years ago & really didn't know if I was going to live or die in the next few weeks or months.

Lots of stuff has been going on and a few truths have come up that I just can't unlearn: first off, the mystique of guys has worn off for me. Second, the facade of relationships and happy couples has also vanished for me. Even the cutest guy you meet has flaws and his ordinary moments and mundane tasks in his life. There's no magic world only the beautiful people live in where they are immune from sickness, pain, anger, sadness, guilt, joy or any other universal truths. They still have bed hair and stomach cramps and unpleasant habits you have to deal with; the question is do you want to deal with those. Take it from someone who's a member of that club.

I'm not sure if this is me being further along in life age wise or mentally (where I was always ahead anyway) or I've become really jaded but once you dated hotter guys, were married for years and see behind the curtain of the relationship of some "cute couple" that everyone idolizes, you can't unsee that stuff. You don't get to envy those people or believe their social media personas where it's all sunshine and roses. You don't get to believe they're exempt from the basic miseries of life or never have feelings.

This means when you bond with someone, you're bonding over the deeper connections. You realize a person is a whole person, not just the model or actor or career professional or hottie persona they present to the world at large & that if you put in an emotional investment, you know it's in the entire person (not just the persona or the parts you like about them). I've said for years that love is acceptance; if you can't accept the whole person, you can never really love him/her. It's just like loving and accepting yourself, another necessary condition to loving someone else.

That said, I have a lot of issues with the whole concept of "love" in a Romeo and Juliet sense. I never lived or died for anyone, including my ex-husband even in the happiest days of that relationship. Some days I'm still shocked I was able to love anyone in a romantic way considering my father fucked up that whole concept with his alcoholism. I didn't and don't feel like I have to be emotionally abused or treated badly to feel loved; I just feel like people who do that & claim to love me are big fat liars when they say they love me. I just don't trust someone who says "I love you" in a romantic sense. A total of now 6 guys have said that to me; I feel most of them said it in lust & the rest just wanted to manipulate me emotionally. None really accepted me the person for everything I am and everything I'm not.

A guy I just started seeing told me yesterday (while drunk) that he thinks he's falling in love with me. That spooks me some since I feel like I don't know him well enough to make that call. I also need a LOT of time to get to know someone, feel like I can trust them with the really deep shit (I'll talk about all sorts of stuff but there are things I'll never discuss and emotions I'll never express unless I'm really comfortable with someone & don't think they'll use that against me later) & that they care about me, value me, regard me. It's like "Are you going to ask me for exclusivity? Are you going to smother me? Do I need to be freaked out? What gives?"

I asked him about this today while he was sober (which he confirmed) and explained my isms. Another truth I can't unlearn: guys fall in love with me left & right. I'm not sure if I'm cursed or just seem to attract clingers. I've got to talk to a certain older lawyer friend about this one. Maybe he's got some views on the subject; maybe his girlfriend says "I love you" and he doesn't say it back like my law school friend did with his ex. Had my law school friend loved her, he'd have said that publicly & unabashedly. He'd have acted like a man in love & I knew from one private conversation he wasn't, having been in love myself before and knowing him so well.

My intuition also says if the law school friend pursued me, he'd probably end up falling for me as well & I don't think he'd be able to handle it at all (less so than me, who couldn't handle that and would feel like a scared rabbit in a corner since you can't use your tactics on guys with guy friends who were there for you in deep personal crises). One mutual friend has predicted marriage, which I'm not seeing at this point but I didn't see him being a man and setting his ex free to find a man who'd treasure her & give her the things she wants either. I figured we'd be at their wedding and I'd have to say something meaningful about how they weren't entering in love & were making a mockery of marriage as well as trying to bring innocent children into a lie. I would have had to say something so I could live with myself & told him outright if he wasn't happy, he needed to end it and not lead her on to later betray her like my ex betrayed me.

That guy is like an annoying younger brother I got stuck with & didn't really ask for but I feel like if I weren't around to knock him down a few notches or share some life truths, he'd end up even more screwed up. I've been told he'd miss me if I were gone; that felt good but I wish he'd told ME that. I actually do love him like the younger brother I don't have since that's something I can give to someone. He's never done true pursuit or put himself out there for me to decide if I could love him in a Romeo & Juliet sense. I can't make a guy care or bother with me so I'm not going to beg or demean myself to get any of them to do it, least of all this one. Plus I think he's the type who just wants what he can't have and that's a path which will only lead you to misery. Thanks, Bonnie Raitt. I was thinking of her song "I Can't Make You Love Me."

There are some lessons people have to learn on their own. You can speak once but you can't end someone's denial or change their life patterns. They have to see them and make effort to fix them. I think the con guy's wife, who is apparently aware of his misdeeds and hasn't left him or thrown him out while financially supporting his ass, could be in denial or believe the situation is fixable. It took me a long time to see what everyone else was saying about my ex. Denial and believing you can fix things in a marriage is a powerful emotional state. You don't want to believe what people say about your love but eventually, things happen and your vision gets clear. When you are awakened, you start to see what they told you all along & wonder why it took you so long to see it.

I can't unlearn that everything you see that's shiny about relationships and people is hiding some type of unpleasantness or weird habit or quirk or something shocking. I can't believe in fairy tales. I can't unsee the evidence of this guy I know being a scumbag & think to myself of how fortunate I was not to have gotten in deep enough to be a victim of that misery. I can't unhear the guy I just met saying that he thinks he's falling in love with me (something I'm not quite sure how to feel about since I've not answered the question in my head "could I spend my life with him?").

My first name means "advisor." I like to think people see me as one in various ways. It does no good to live hard times if you aren't sharing your knowledge and wisdom from surviving the storms. Perhaps I'm getting more zen with life?