On Saturday I had a much-needed day to myself. I finished one sleeve on my Central Park Hoodie, watched an episode of Buffy and Slumdog Millionaire (yeah I hadn't seen it) and cleaned my apartment. I did the usual things, such as laundry, cleaning the guinea pig cage, and scrubbing the bathtub. Then I got into a cleaning frenzy and started reorganizing my bedroom. I found a bunch of stuff to either give away or throw away, and it felt really good to cut down on the clutter in my life.
Also, in the wake of the derby girl's sudden injury and death, I decided to go through all my files. It's terrible to think about, but I wanted them to be at least somewhat neat in case anyone had to go through them. I shredded a ton of old bills and things that I no longer needed to save.
In all this cleaning I came across some things that made me sad and nostalgic. There was stuff from old boyfriends and reminders of long-gone guinea pigs. My ex-non-bf didn't give me a lot of presents, but he did give me a lot of useful things. For example, he'd say "I have an extra pair of swimming goggles, you can have one," or "I have tons of bar towels, you can keep a couple." It's stuff that I can't bear to throw away or stick in a box, because they're not dried flowers or love notes or anything. But that leaves me open to risking unexpectedly coming across something in the back of my closet and having my heart clench for a minute. I am proud of myself though, because I did manage to put a few of those things in the giveaway pile. Not everything, but I'm hoping that next time I do a big cleaning I'll be in a place where I can give more of it away.
One thing I found that was especially hard was a slip of paper I where I had written some nice things he had said to me that I didn't want to forget:
- If anyone understands me right now, it's you.
- Have I told you that you look pretty today?
- This is what I was waiting for--someone to eat Thanksgiving dinner with (after I brought him leftovers from dinner with my family).
- These are the last 20 minutes we'll spend together this week (he was going to be working all weekend).
- I want to be the main guy in your life (note that this was main guy, NOT boyfriend).
At first I was really sad, remembering the times where we were happy and he was into being with me. Where did the good go? Why couldn't he love me? But after I thought about it and journaled, I realized that the reason I had written those things down was because I was hanging on to any crumbs I could get. Because he would never commit, I had to savor what little he did give me. With CG, I never feel like I have to do that. He doesn't give me crumbs, he gives me whole freaking sandwiches!!
(P.S. I just want to be clear that I love CG dearly and he is the one I want to be with. The only reason I'm writing about ex-non-bf is because he seriously wounded me and I'm not quite healed, but it gets better every day. There is no way in hell I want to be with him now.)
I think that sometimes we are willing to settle for less than we deserve because we don't know something better is out there. I recommend putting all of the boy stuff in a sealed box--that's what I did with SCL's stuff.
ReplyDeleteThanks, yeah in my case I think it was that he had a spell on me and knew how to manipulate me to keep me interested. I know now that I definitely deserved better.
ReplyDeleteYes, I really need to box up all his stuff. That is an excellent idea.