Crash and Burn
Wednesday, August 27th, 2008
Unwittingly, I found myself rehearsing The Speech in the shower this morning. I guess without ever really making a conscious decision about it, I’ve decided to end it with North Shore.
He does mean well; picking me up from the airport, bringing me flowers, always calling and keeping in touch when he travels (which is every week). But…he’s not very affectionate. He never hugs me, he rarely touches me, and oddly, he never kisses me outside of the bedroom unless it’s as a greeting or a good bye. In contrast, I am actually the affectionate one, which is a complete reversal from Kit and I- not that the imbalance there was any better or even preferable to me.
I totally suck at this. I’ve only ever ended a handful of relationships and I never seem to be completely certain about it. More often than not, I’ve gone back. But my initial instinct has always proven the right one.
The thing is, when there’s nothing really wrong, it’s difficult to find a reason to not be with a person- at least for me- especially when you know they’re kind of a catch. So it goes with North Shore.
A mutual friend of ours told me as we were about to go on our first date that “he means well.” At the time, I was perplexed by what she said because she wouldn’t or couldn’t explain. But now I totally get it.
He does mean well; picking me up from the airport, bringing me flowers, always calling and keeping in touch when he travels (which is every week). But…he’s not very affectionate. He never hugs me, he rarely touches me, and oddly, he never kisses me outside of the bedroom unless it’s as a greeting or a good bye. In contrast, I am actually the affectionate one, which is a complete reversal from Kit and I- not that the imbalance there was any better or even preferable to me.
I think the thing that bothers me the most though (more than having next to nothing in common) is how he acted when I had a horrible nightmare and woke up crying. He seemed entirely put out by it and immediately rolled over and went back to sleep without any attempt to comfort me.
Maybe that’s immature of me to put such an emphasis on it, but I think it speaks to a larger issue here, which is that I don’t feel I’ll get what I need based on what I’m getting now. And it’s not something I’m going to demand or ask for- it just isn’t there. Despite all his good intentions.
All of your reasons for doing this are sound and right. It’s funny how often we’re happy to push aside our intuition and rely on someone elses.
And just because nothing is necessarily wrong, doesn’t mean it’s right either. My greatest fear is being stuck in a ‘just because’ relationship. You deserve more.
Um, yeah. He should have comforted you when you were upset. He sounds emotionally detached. I dated an emotionally detached guy for three years and, while we didn’t have screaming fights and we generally got along really well, I was always unhappy because I felt like he was my roommate.
Get out. Now!
I totally choked. There I was on the couch, and there he was asking me what’s up.
FUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I ended up feeling guilty because he’d literally just walked in the door from New Mexico. So I played with my hair and diverted further questioning by suggesting we drink some 312.
Now it looms over the freaking holiday weekend. Grrrrrrr……….