This Fish Needs A Bicycle

honesty is

***I often write entries that I do not post. They're drafts that never make it here because they fit neither the style nor the voice that readers are used to. But today, I felt like being a bit different.***

I rarely write anything honest here anymore.

Not that it isn't all true, because it is -- down to the last word of each silly conversation -- factual. But it all lacks the raw, disturbing honesty I used to spill out into cyberspace. Maybe because I haven't felt so raw in the last six months. Packing J up into a neat little box and tossing him to the curb certainly tidied things up a bit. But as my co-worker, Dan, said, It's a boring woman who keeps an immaculate house. And my house, of late, has been gleaming. Spotless. Immaculate.

J re-emerged, dusted himself off and presented himself again as a friend. And, well, I took him back in. It's been uneventful and completely un-noteworthy-- except for the few friends who have sought to offer their warnings. I don't take those well. Never been open to criticism, or even advice. Comes with being extremely independent. You have to be to pick up and move across the country without a job or a single acquaintance on the other end. Come to think of it, I picked up and moved to Spain once, too. Why did I do that? The same reason I spent my rent money to fly to Aruba one winter : I can be awfully impetuous.

But re-connecting with J was not about being impetuous. At the time, it was about being whole. I'd missed him. He's foolish, and real and critical, and hilarious, and an irresponsible, rock-star-wanna-be and I had missed him. I don't wait with bated breath for his emails anymore and when he says he'll call, I don't care when he doesn't. Because once I got him back in my life, I realized I don't need him. It was nice to have him around, but I don't need him to be whole, or happy or alive. Took me some time to realize that. And I was careless with a lot of boys along the way. To Peace-Corps and Bald Boy and the Biochemist and the Writer: I should have called. And to He-who-shall-go-unnamed: You had me running scared.

Miniature love affairs with window washers and even fleeting, though possibly genuine attachments to those like Indie Rock Boy are sufficiently entertaining and a much better alternative than the real thing. Because, I've discovered, I'm just no good at the love thing.

Or pool. I really suck at pool.