bluecastle

I can't help but read this and see you taking on way too much responsibility here, internalizing his judgements as fact. No, it was not cool to lie, but look at your reason for lying: you feared his reaction, his potential interpretation of that contact. That is what you need to pay attention to, assuming you want a relationship where being yourself is not going to disturb another self. Seems you'd already assumed you needed to hide, edit, and shave down parts of who you are to accommodate this man's anxieties—not a good place to be with someone you hardly know. But when you re-initiated contact with your ex, after the breakup, you didn't know he had cancer, correct? Sounds to me like you just missed your friend, were reclaiming who you were—who you are—and then discovered this awful news about him. Just think you want to keep that in perspective here... If you want to reevaluate this friendship, or friendships with exes—great. But do it for you, not for someone you hardly know. Yes, it complicates things, as others have noted. But so do political and religious views, ideas about having kids, dreams of where to live, and so on. Changing all this to accommodate the potential of a relationship is different from authentic personal growth. Seems this brief time with this one man has blurred that line a bit, in your spirit. Take this has a good time to explore those lines on your own, for future connections. Good points, good chemistry: you will find this with many, many people. Think of it as reason to keep exploring, not a reason to start bending into shapes that aren't actually you.

Sounds like you've got a great perspective on this. Dig in a bit—without judgement—and you'll find some places in yourself to get intimate with so they don't get exploited by others. My read on this? Your ex, your friendship: none of that was actually an issue. He'd have found something else to get hung up on, as it seems he found plenty: what you watched on TV, how you communicated with a co-worker, and so on. We all have insecurities, and relationships invariably pour some kerosene on them. But his? They're so volatile that even a drop of kerosene creates a fire. Hurt people, as the saying goes, hurt people. He is that. This was that.

Sorry about all this. I can't help but wonder if, in writing all that down, you can feel that you're describing a relationship that did not work for either of you in so many ways—the sort of thing that no amount of ruminating and rationalizing can salvage. And I'm wondering if you can find some peace in that simple assessment of the past 10 months, away from the weeds of exes, cancer, and all that. But, to wade into those weeds... Multiple breakups in less than a year? Pretty bad sign, right there, regardless of the specifics. As for the specifics? Well, it seems this guy is rigid and insecure in ways that are, frankly, a bit frightening. Stir in the double standard—him staying in touch with an ex, you forbidden to, his calling communicating with someone with cancer "cheating" even though you were not even in a relationship—and you've got enough finely enriched human dysfunction to power a nuclear reactor. Per your writing, which is full of warmth and generosity that he is probably immune to appreciating, he still jumps off the page as a human being to steer clear from. Big lesson here, as I see it? You've got a great, unique friendship with someone you were once romantically involved with. That's a part of you that you shouldn't feel ashamed off, or made to feel ashamed of, so perhaps this is a moment to explore a hard question: why were you so quick to let that go? Will some people not be cool/comfortable with that friendship? Certainly. Those people, many of whom will be wonderful in countless ways, are not for you. Give yourself some time to shore up those boundaries in you, so they can guide you in future relationships, and you'll be able to look back on this complicated, painful time as one that helped sharpen the compass to point you toward the type of sustained connection you're after. All of which is to say: no, you're not remotely selfish or unreasonable to want to be friends with this ex, cancer or not. This man is never going to grasp that, no different than a person who will never grasp quantum physics. To think that he might—well, that would be unreasonable, and would put your self on a path where it would likely start feeling very lost very quickly, consumed by the selfishness of another.

So what you're saying, basically, is that you are going to continue to deceive him in order to see if he's deceitful? Doesn't sound like a recipe for anything more than strife from these seats. He lied to you, yes. Not cool, red flag, and so on. But I do think it's worth owning that the lie you extracted from him began with a lie (by omission) of your own. Hard to hold the moral high ground when you're "testing" someone's capacity for dishonesty by being dishonest, and now considering doubling down on that approach. In your shoes, right now, I'd step back and take a deep breath. If I had talked to you 3.5 months ago, would you have told me your ideal boyfriend is a dude who looks at and engages in internet thirst traps? Would you have told me that your ideal relationship is one in which you build connection and safety through deception, testing, and trap setting? If the answer to those questions is "Yes!" proceed; if it's something different, listen to that voice. As others have noted, it's trying to tell you something.

Big hugs, bolt, and so sorry to hear about this. Was in similar shoes to yours a few years back, writing about it here, and can still recall the sharp melancholy and confusion. Crushing stuff. Whatever choices you make, and whenever you make them, remember that you've shared so much wonderful space together and given her a wonderful life. That's all forever.

Personally, I think the moment we start thinking in such sweeping generalizations—that men are/need/should be x, that women are/need/should be y—we are stripping away so much vital connective tissue as to sabotage a relationship before it even exists. Humans are wonderfully multi-dimensional, nuanced, surprising, gloriously contradictory, always evolving in ways big and small. Why squeeze another, or yourself, into a box so small that it risks suffocating those many wonderful dimensions? Sounds like a recipe for exhaustion, stagnancy over growth, among other things. People, at least from what I've seen, much prefer to be people than to play roles, hence the common refrains of those coming out of relationships: "I feel I lost myself somewhere along the way..." My few cents.

So happy for you, Sera. I had my first shot last week, next one 5/4. The moment that needle went into my arm I just wept: with relief, with sorrow for everyone, with profound appreciation for the scientists who toiled to make that thing at record pace. Didn't quite realize how much I was keeping in, in order to stay steady through these hard, hard days. Congrats again.

Right back at you, itsallgrand. Wishing you all the best, always.

Oh, reinvent—sorry to hear you're feeling so down. A year in and I think the weight of this, of carrying it, is really starting to take a toll in different ways. Or maybe I'm just trying to say: I see your feelings and can relate to many.

Lost! Just want to belatedly join the chorus in saying congrats, congrats, congrats. These transitional moments in life are often when we get to taste some new and richer flavors, or so I've found. In terms of your questions? I come at this from a curious angle, in that my professional life is pretty unorthodox. Long stretches without work, lots of time roaming the house in a robe, to the point where an alien observer might think I've been retired for a while. As much as I want to talk here about routine—I have one, or ones, and am always carving out little micro routines to stay centered or find my way back to center—I really think it's a great moment to just be open to not quite knowing how to fill time. Let itches surface, scratch them. I know I've found a lot of value in being able to sit for long stretches with "I don't know" the dominant theme in my head, without reacting too intensely. Going from your posting here, you've got something special in your core. It's going to let you know what you need, as you adjust. In short, maybe right this second the thing to embrace is the wind, and being in it. You've earned that. But selfishly? I think you need a computer to stay tethered to this community. Wink emoji.

Sending all the healing vibes to you and yours, Sherry. Hang in there.

Can certainly feel that way! Then again, speaking only for myself, it kind of felt that way before Covid. I think it has to do with how much information we now have access to, but without having the same kind of trusted gatekeepers and authorities we once did. No more major papers, no more evening news, at least not in the way those things once existed. Now we have a free-for-all of "news" feeds, endless scrolls programmed to reinforce whatever belief system we ascribe to for a few seconds: astrology, crystals, conspiracies, deities, and on and on, to the point where distrust and paranoia are mistaken for intelligence and logic. So rather than finding comfort in asking questions and listening to experts—professors, doctors, scientists, journalists, etc.—many now find comfort in proclaiming themselves experts, in having all the answers, posting those answers ad nasueum to keep their own doubts at bay. This was the state of things, roughly, before the pandemic: a strange, tragic little fire with Covid acting like an accelerant. My few cents.

Just a note to say I'll be sending good vibes your way, reinvent. Takes a lot of gumption to know your limits, and to carve out a place of safety. That's something to celebrate these days, and all days, even when it changes the tenor of holiday celebrations.

Just saw the latest updates on this journal, and am sending healing vibes your way.

Sorry about all that, reinvent. Have had many, many moments like that since the start of this whole thing. I'm feeling particularly skittish these days, by my standards, wanting to see how things shake out after the holiday, with another holiday on the horizon. Glad to hear you and S are on the same page. Internet hugs.

Sending warm thoughts your way, reinvent.

Thanks for the kind words, everyone, about my father. Love the sentiment, reinvent, about this being a time for reevaluation. This is just the way I see the world—and, no matter what the world throws at me, it flexes—but I'm not without some optimism that many good things, or good shifts in spirit, are coming out of this. Do we see the fruits of all that in the spring, or is for others to see in the future? I'm okay with both those outcomes. Sorry about the meh, joyless state, Sera. Years ago, during a very dark spell in my life, someone told me to find one small thing that brings joy, focus on it, and let it expand. Fortune cookie talk, I know, but I find it works from time to time. Down day today, for me, but I saw some parrots fly overhead not long ago—a thing that happens in Los Angeles: former pet birds, or some such, that have made a life for themselves here. They always make me smile, that adaptability: they're not supposed to be here, but there they are. I'm letting that expand, so I'll share it here.

Holiday plans all canceled as of this morning. The plan was optimistic, perhaps naive, involving air travel and carved out when the numbers were moving in a different direction than they are today. But it's just not the time, one of those unavoidable truths that brings relief to accept, if of a melancholy variety familiar to so many these days. In other news, my father's experience with Covid was mild, manageable, best I understand it. I think he is back at work, whatever his work is. Good to know. Strange to find comfort in being able to drift back into our long-established mode of quasi-estrangement, but the comfort it real. Hugs to all.

Surreal experience two days ago. My father called me, which would be roughly the 11th time that has happened since I was 15. Long story there, largely accepted as one of those forever emotional conditions that are treatable, not curable—a lousy hand I think I've played decently. He was in a buoyant mood. Two days earlier, he wanted me to know, he had tested positive for Covid-19. He was adamant that he was fine, a-okay. I believe him. I've seen him twice in a decade. He let me know that my cousin also had it, and has since been very weak, seems to be struggling cognitively. Cousin is my age, 41. Personal trainer. We grew up like brothers—our fathers lived together after their divorces—until one too many bombs were built and detonated by the family that created a lot of shrapnel of estrangement. I've seen him 2-3 times in 20 years, last time when he was on a break from a tour in Iraq. I texted him when I got the news, didn't hear back. Sending good vibes. He got a tougher hand as a kid than I did. Guess I'm just sharing this to share it, and maybe release a touch of the strange numbness of it all.

Feeling you, and for you, reinvent.

We have two or three lemon trees, a lime tree, the pomegranate tree, the kumquats. A few tomato plants. Lots of loquat trees around the neighborhood, so we have fun with those when they bloom. Found a random guava tree a year ago up the block—planted who knows when, by who knows who, on a public stretch of sidewalk. Neighbors next door have plums and peaches and figs, which we're free to take whenever, as our citrus is free to whoever knows about it and wants to go back and spruce up a salad or cocktail. It is kind of illicit what can grow here—everything, more or less. A friend of mine grows corn in his backyard, along with chard, eccentric peppers, who knows what else. Our attempt at an avocado tree, however, was a bust. Can't win 'em all.

Read this and smiled. Then went to the backyard and—somewhat miraculously—found a ripe pomegranate on the tree that an animal hadn't found first. Tomatoes, too, were ready for picking. Chopped up some kale, roasted some almonds, crumbled some feta—lunch!

Sorry about all that. Mystifying, isn't it? And yet so very common. You're a woman, so I'm going to risk coming across as an assumptive caveman and say that you've likely spent time, directly or indirectly, hearing men (with wives, with daughters) dismiss the frustrations of women about matters like, I don't know, wanting equal opportunity, equal respect, equal pay. Think a similar social-psychological mechanism is at play. Not to get too deep, but I think it's about, at least in part, the way we metabolize trauma. Whether we are the inflictors of trauma or the traumatized, it's something to reckon with. Ideally, the reckoning is about accepting the reality of trauma, and then making adjustments to nullify what led to it ignorer to create a less traumatic future. But often the response is to normalize it—a coping mechanism that perpetuates trauma by making the traumatized perpetrators. Some riffing that probably doesn't help as much as a graceful unfollow, to keep the head and heart both open and protected. Glad to hear you're finding the right balance on those fronts.

I hear you, and am very, very sorry for your losses. Not religious myself either, but am a big believer in human creativity and ingenuity. I'm awfully angry and confused at a lot of what's happening today—feelings that are pretty standard for me, if more acute at present—but I suppose the more dominant feeling is something like hope. Was reading about the Black Plague a few days ago, and how it gave way to the Renaissance. Abstract stuff, one could say, but those too were just people, just like us, adapting to the unimaginable with some serious panache. But, most importantly: I'm very sorry for the rollercoaster you find yourself riding. Hang on tight.

Been thinking about this a bit. Very true. So I guess the question becomes—and this is a question that won't get answered next week, but probably over the next year or ten of fifty—is: What happens to our consciousness, collectively, now that this new matter is lodged there, not leaving on any of our preferred timetables, and destined to alter the equilibrium? To sound less abstract, here are things I wonder about (alongside all the nitty-gritty fears and logistical concerns) these days: Will office culture change, on the other side of this, becoming less stridently 9-5 and more flexible? Will less office space lead to more affordable housing? Will more affordable housing lead to less desperation and ire? Will more flexible work schedules lead to more intentionality in how people spend the precious currency of their time? Will people choose partners, say, so relationship harmony is not dependent, as I think it is in some cases, on spending as little time with another person as possible? Will people become a bit more conscious about what they eat, given that this virus is the product of a meat industrial complex? When the "little things" are all that can be savored for a good stretch—not weeks, not months, but longer—do they come to get reclassified, collectively, as the "big things"? Do we start to build systems that cultivate those little things, rather than push them to the periphery? I go surfing most days, a habit unaffected by this moment. One thing I love about it? The ocean, the waves, they are relentless: they just keep coming and they have exactly zero interest in me, my aspirations in riding them, whatever is on my mind when I go out there, to say nothing of how we billions of humans are fairing at any given moment in time. They are created by faraway storms and yanked my way by the gravitational pull of the moon, which is absolute insanity, both poetic and hard science. Figuring out how to ride them is the forever pursuit: sometimes sweet, sometimes scary. This moment, I think, is kind of like that, for all of us.