If you love somebody, set them free

If you give someone advice, you should be prepared for them to take it.

Let's back up. After nearly a year of limited verbal communication with D (which was my decision) and several months since I last talked to him, we agreed to catch up over phone. I was hoping he'd say, "Wow, after spending a month fulltime with Jailbait, I realized how fucking annoying and immature she is." (Because all she talked about on Twitter was how lazy she was being, how much she was eating, and how wonderful her 'vacation' was.) Sadly, that was not the case.

"I'm at a crossroads in my life," D said. "I've been working for myself and living off my savings, and I can't do that anymore. I've been living this Peter Pan life for so long that I don't know what to do." 
Well, yeah, most of us couldn't do that in the first place. It doesn't help that your girlfriend also lives a similarly enchanted life funded by her parents.
"I need to find a job that excites me and makes me happy."
Heh. Don't we all?
"I just don't know what to do... I love New York so much, but I just spent the last month with Jailbait and it was AMAZING." [Shit.]

After a lukewarm ending to the conversation, I thought more about what he had said as I was trying to fall asleep. I then proceeded to write D an email the next morning, fully aware of the consequences it'd bring. Either he'd lash out and tell me to MYOFB (unlikely), he'd ignore me (highly likely), or he'd take it into consideration since he knew I was right (moderately likely).

Basically, I told D what most normal human adults do is have a hobby they care passionately about, and use their job to fulfill it. Not everyone is fortunate enough to have a job that makes them happy enough to not need a similarly engrossing hobby. 

I then laid it out: You need to make a decision. If you truly love this underage, barely-graduated-from-high-school chick, then get up and move to AZ for her. Don't keep on playing this bullshit LDR game that guys seem to love. It's not fair to her and if you don't want change your life for her, you need to let go and allow her to move on with her life. God knows she has enough time to do so by not having a job or going to college.

As much as I dislike Jailbait, I kind of empathize with her and feel like she deserves a decision. Granted, she's a tramp with Daddy issues as evidenced by her sinking her claws into him so quickly, but she's still a girl and I have at least that much in common with her.

I think Lauryn Hill sums it up pretty well:

"I know that you don't wanna hear my opinion
But there come many paths and you must choose one
And if you don't change then the rain soon come
See you might win some, but you just lost one..."

Anyway. A week or so goes by, I hear nothing, so out of curiosity I sent him two job posting links -- one for a position in NY, and another for one in AZ. He responds back with a "thank you," and "you're so nice and sweet to send me those," (he's a charmer, what can I say?), and that he made the decision to move to Arizona and was looking for jobs there.

Surprisingly enough, my heart didn't immediately plummet to my feet and no bucket of ice water was thrown over my shoulders. I kinda knew this was the path he'd take, but deep, deep down I was hoping he'd stay. However, I didn't go off and start crying. The fact that I didn't do so made me realize that maybe, just maybe, I'm actually getting over him.

I still feel sad, because I do love D, which is why I sent that first email telling him to get a move on it. If he keeps doing this long distance crap with her, then there'll always be a part of me that will hope that eventually he'll get sick of her and dump her skinny, tattooed ass. Now that he's made a commitment, I can try and extinguish this flickering torch I've been holding for him and finally move on.

*names and places have been changed

Anony-blog

I've started this blog because I found that I'm never able to convey what I feel on paper. At the same time, I'm a pretty conservative person and don't vocalize my feelings, yet knowing that someone out there may read them and empathize... well, knowing that makes me feel a little less alone.

I have a regular blog that's attached to my real identity, but I can't write anything personal on there because I don't want people to know about issues I'm going through. The majority of my old "journal" is full of frustrations relating to guys, and if I wrote about them on something that can be traced back to me... it'd piss people off. Venting about what crap I go through without fear of exposing those I'm friends or enemies with makes the process a lot more therapeutic.

Here's what you need to know about me. I'm a single girl in her late 20s, living in a metropolitan city. I have a great job that I love and make a decent amount of money. I have a sporting hobby that takes up a significant amount of time, and it's to the point of where it's affected my personal life because it takes up all my time. I struggle to find that balance of what makes me happy now and what will make me happy in the long term. I keep hoping that the "long term" part will eventually include a guy, but I seem to be really, really good at screwing things up.

I'm sure I'll write about "D," a guy I met last year. I fell for him, but didn't have the guts to tell him because the friendship was still new. I went away on a business trip, and after I returned, I find out he started "sort of seeing" a 20 year old girl who lives 1500 miles away. (He's in his 30s, by the way.) Instead of keeping my mouth shut, I ended up telling him I liked him, which he admitted to liking me as well... but it was too late. And, unfortunately for me, I tried my damnedest to cut off contact, but my stupid heart won't allow for it.

So. Maybe you can identify with me, maybe not. I'm tired of keeping it all bottled up inside and letting it eat away at me. I hope writing it down can help relieve some of that anger and sadness that seems to have moved in.