Disassociation

4:08 pm – listening to: falling up "falling in"

I haven’t heard this song in years…and I’m not exaggerating. I probably haven’t listened to it since 2006 or 2007.

Okay, let’s do this.

I’ve seen Rachel almost every day since we started talking nearly a month ago and it’s been great. Well, she asked me yesterday what I want to do for my birthday that’s in 25 days. I haven’t thought about it and I don’t really know what I’ve been doing. We went to the restaurant at the airport last year, but it was just 5 of us. Usually, I have a family get-together and then a party-type gathering for friends. I’m thinking I may do that this year. So, I made a list of who I wanted to be where (fam v. friend) and I included that I don’t want to go anywhere major on the 4th (my birthday is the 6th which is a Monday so I’ll probably celebrate over the weekend) And she asked why. And I answered honestly…I didn’t want to be driving and basically I didn’t want to risk another bad day.

Well, in the car, she tells me that I have to disassociate. Which, I fully agree. There are a few things that I have let ruin something I like. Example: I loved Les Mis, but I absolutely despise it because cuntbag basically flirted with Rachel the ENTIRE time. Except for dinner afterward. And even then, I could have been so mad I didn’t pick up on it. I mean, she put her hand on Rachel’s thigh. And she "claimed" she didn’t mean to throw whatever at Rachel’s boobs…I’m not a dumbass, despite what everyone seemed to think. I saw lots of things going on but I didn’t say anything for the sake of keeping the peace. And at that time, it wasn’t worth a fight because it was only days before Rachel and I broke up. It just simply wasn’t a battle I could win so I didn’t show up. I was preparing for losing Rachel instead. Anyway. Back to present time. I have to disassociate. I may never like Maroon 5 again, which sucks, but I just cannot listen to ANY of their songs and not think of everything cuntbag and I talked about and how she pretended to be my friend and made me comfortable. Against all my intuition, I told her things I shouldn’t have. Things I’m sure she probably tried to use with Rachel. I don’t care. It’s in the past.

And that’s the point. The accident is in the past. It doesn’t define me. It’s a pivotal point in my life without question, but it does not define the person that I am today. When I make a decision, I don’t say "what would I have done prior to the accident?" It’s okay to remember, it’s not okay to hold on. I haven’t really dealt with that. I haven’t truly processed that and lived by it like I said I was. I realize that the past is the past and I can’t change it. I just…this time last year, I know one thing: I was preparing to give Rachel my great grandmother’s ring. That’s all I can tell you. I don’t know who I was, I don’t know what else was going on in my life other than that specific happening. And I know I was a wreck. I was all in. Ready for the ultimate commitment for the rest of my life. And a year later…it’s all different. And that’s what’s hard. Reconciling what was with what is. It’s always been my problem. I don’t let go of things.

My mom was surprised to find out that I am a vindictive person. It’s not a finer quality I possess and it’s not one I show very often. I internalize my revenge and I generally just wait for karma to catch up. I’m also a very petty person. Why would I give cuntbag the power over me to ruin movies and eating establishments and memories that really aren’t hers to control? Because I’m petty and I hate her. Hate is a strong word, I know I know…but I have come up with at least 20 ways to get back at her. But I’m a "good person" and never follow through. Mainly because she lives with a good friend of mine and I don’t want Erika to deal with the repercussions of my actions. And cuntbag isn’t worth my energy and effort to make her life a living hell. She does a damn good job of ruining things on her own and I need to just let her destructiveness take its course and be thankful I got out before I got fucked over. Did I mention she wanted to move in with me…? I nipped that in the bud after Rachel and I broke up. I basically told her that if (but I meant when) she starts dating Rachel, they couldn’t hang out at our place together. She was "offended" that I would even think such a thing. Really? Because I’m PRETTY sure that you are a delusional psychopath who took drunken comments out of context and whatever sexual encounters happened as a committed relationship. But no, she’d never date Rachel.

With my birthday being so close, the year anniversary of the accident is about 3 weeks away and I want to be over it. I want to leave it where it is. I realize that I lost a lot and I’ve come to terms with the fact that I have holes in my memory. That there are a lot of events that people remember and they’re going to say "Do you remember…" and I’m just going to nod and say yes. And if they laugh, I’ll fake it. Because I don’t. And not everything comes back to me after I’ve been told. I guess what makes it hard to deal with this time around is the fact that more than my personality and mind are different, my entire life is different. I’ve got no job, I’m not dating Rachel anymore, I’m hanging out with different people…I’m just more than "not the same person." I’m living a different life than I had anticipated.

And it dawned on me as I was driving today (I had to clear my mind so I drove around for about an hour) that there is a parallel between Rachel and me vs her grandparents. Her grandpa…his mind doesn’t work all the time. Alzheimer’s will do that. So I can find a relation. My mind doesn’t always work and it’s not for lack of trying to remember, it’s not for lack of some memories coming back…there’s just something wrong with my brain and it erased things. With Rachel and her grandma…gma’s body doesn’t work like it should. Rachel’s back to the point where she has pain in her shoulders and her hands don’t always do what her brain tells them to do. It’s kinda like we’re back in June/July when she needed injections. I don’t always like finding parallels with her grandparents, but that one just stuck with me during my drive.

She went through it, too. She was in the accident and she was there in the aftermath and she picked up every piece she could. I honestly can’t imagine what it must have been like to walk in and see the look on my face she she asked "Do you know who I am?" I know what look I had…I know that even though she was really concerned and glad I was okay, I saw the pain behind her eyes. That’s one thing that has never changed about us. My face will always tell you what I’m thinking. I realllllly have to work on that. And her eyes will always tell me what’s really going on. When she’s in pain and playing it off, I see it in her eyes. When she’s upset but won’t talk about it, I see it in her eyes. She reads my face like a book, I read her eyes like the same book.

I may not wear my heart on my sleeve anymore, I may not be as emotionally open as I was before, I may not be as sensitive as I was before…but it works for me now. I’m more confident and I don’t need praise or reassurance nearly as much as I did. Yeah, I’m still honest. I told Rach that I was falling in love with her and th

at I fight it because I don’t want to fuck up what we have. There’s no label, there’s no conditions. We are what we are and we are both amazingly happy with it. And…she’s not emotionally available. She’s not ready for a relationship. As for me…I know I’m not looking for a relationship. I want to be with her as much now as I did a year ago. I sincerely hope that I end up with her…in our rocking chairs, on the front porch watching the sunset. I’ve never let go of that. But…I’m not eager or desperate to get there. One day at a time…and we don’t even really take that. Here’s a typical day: I start waking her up at 7am and we text until she gets to work. We text on her break at 1115am. We eat lunch together and say "talk to you at four". We text on her break at 4pm. She calls me between 603 and 605pm when she’s driving home. When she gets home, we text and play games until it’s bed time. At that point, we both get comfortable and we fall asleep. Most of the time, I’m in bed acting like she’s there with me. She’s on the couch at her house holding her pillow like it’s me. It starts over the next day. There’s that little expectation of "okay, we’ll talk at this given time" but for the mot part, we aren’t planning future events together. I see her almost every weekend because we have a mutual friend, Sweezy, who loves to hang out with us. So, Saturday nights, Rachel stays over. Not a big deal. Someone said we’re friends with benefits and I have to reject that because friends with benefits usually fail. One person ends up falling for the other person and someone gets hurt. Well…I see the connection, but we are best friends above everything else in the universe and yes, the sex is amazing, but it’s deeper. Even if she and I were to never ever have sex again, I think she’d still be coming over and staying the night. I’m just happy to have her around again. We don’t say "I love you" much, we don’t hold hands a whole lot, we don’t kiss every day. We don’t really act like we’re in a relationship and even if we are, neither of us are ready to admit it.

I need her to disassociate…I need her help. She was in the accident, she was there, she witnessed my downfall and she built me back up. She’s seen me drive since and she knows I still don’t like intersections. But I can’t let an accident on May 4, 2012 ruin every other May 4th to come. Tina, a friend of mine who literally got me through work for three weeks after our break up, told me that I’d have to learn to disassociate after Rachel gave me the ring back. I was stuck in it being Rachel’s ring. And it is…it will always be her ring because she’s the only person I’ve ever wanted to give a ring to and have it mean forever. And she’s the only one I’ve given anything so important to. Fact is…it’s my ring. I decide who wears it. Who is worthy to wear it and call it theirs. And, I hope that there will come a day where it’s on Rachel’s finger again. We made a pact: if we are both single on March 25, 2026, we would get married.

I can’t see into the future…as much as I’d like to. But I deserve to be happy in the now. And that means disassociating things that make me happy from people who don’t. It means taking back the control I’ve given people who have no place in my life and finding a way to make something positive work for me. Instead of being mad at Les Mis and not wanting to see it again, I’d really like to see it again. I may buy it at some point. Cuntbag’s presence in my life turned out to make me a much more resilient person, I’m more confident than I ever was with Rachel, I’ve leaned to love myself wholly and completely. I’ve been compelled to do things I was too scared to do, just so I could say that nobody brought me down. That I rose from the ashes as the most glorious (and attractive) phoenix this world has ever seen. And that is exactly what I’m going to keep on doing.