Protected: Mr. Sinatra
25 December 2006
Filed under Uncategorized
Tags: dating, hook-ups, romance, unattainable
It’s Hard
23 December 2006 
As much as I admire Carrie Bradshaw (sex and the city), there is one thing she does that I like to think I would never imitate: she goes back to Big.
Going back to an ex when you know it’s over, no matter which side of the breakup you’re on, rehashing all that pain that you’re finally able to numb to, is something that I like to think I am above doing. But sometimes, it’s hard to keep the thought from slipping through my thought censor unnoticed.
It’s hard because I remember the way his eyes get that half-moon shape when he’s pretending to be mad at me but isn’t. Because every once and awhile, I’ll see someone do that silly little pivot dance that he would do all the time even though he wasn’t much of a dancer. Because I read a book and find a line I know he would appreciate, but I can’t tell him.
But these things remain only thoughts and memories. Because it’s too hard for him to talk to me, or even see me. And when I do see him, I still see that dashing smile only in my memory, because he won’t look at me. Even if he did, he wouldn’t be smiling.
It’s hard because it’s Christmas. Because last year I made Christmas cookies (a big accomplishment for me) and walked through the snow to bring them to his family. Because I want to send him a Christmas card or give him a call, just to say hello, to see if he ever goes to Starbucks since I got him hooked (against all of his non-coffee-drinking intentions).
But I can’t, and won’t, do any of that. Because as hard as it is for me to keep him out of my life, it would be harder for him to try to be a part of it as a just a friend.
Because I don’t want either of us to make Carrie Bradshaw’s mistake.
Complexity in music and lurking anxiety
23 December 2006 
Among all of the simple scales and flirty eighth notes, there’s always some intense anxiety lurking in the background. As if Bach couldn’t quite decipher what was wrong (or didn’t feel like revealing that something was wrong) so he went for a superficial pleasantry and left deciphering his underlying distress up to the listeners.
Something is nagging there. Something is not right. (Miss Clavel turned on the light and said “something is not right.” sorry, I couldn’t resist the Madeline reference.) But she wasn’t sure what it was. Bach wasn’t sure. I’m not sure. Only that the nagging is worse than any other. It’s worse than my mother (and that says a lot if you know my mom).
I feel like I should be fixing something, but I don’t know what to fix. I’d like to discuss it with someone, but I don’t really know the subject of conversation. All I know is that nagging voice is there coming somewhere from my stomach rather than my head.
As I can’t do anything about it until I know what it is, I ignore it and play my own simple scales and flirt with lighthearted eighth notes. And then it builds up, crescendos if you will, and I’m stuck in that tremolo, not knowing when it will end, but not being able to do anything else until the bridge kicks in, inevitably in a minor key that reveals the source of the nag, and it is all the more beautiful because of that.
So, between Bach and writing this note, I still haven’t reached the bridge yet. But I do feel like I’ve pinpointed what I’m feeling, which, I suppose, is better than nothing. So cheers to that and my nerdy metaphor between baroque music and my inability to figure out what’s bothering me. 
The Unattainable
So there are those people, those who are unattainable, at least to a certain degree. You can be friends with them, sometimes even get lucky, but actually be admitted into their realm? Forget about it. Especially if they know that (gasp!) you like them.
What is it about this whole fear of liking someone or being liked? And why must people be so unattainable? I’m not saying I’m not guilty of it myself, but why can’t we open up enough to other people to admit that, hey, we can carry on a good conversation, we have similar interests, similar friends, we like each other.
However, most of my experience with admitting to liking someone has either led to trouble or embarrassment. As a result, we all wander around like characters in a Jane Austen novel, not willing to admit that we actually like the person we like and convinced that whoever we like absolutely hates us or is in love with someone else. We just wait around, wasting our time on people we don’t care about, on the off-chance that someone will slip something and, low and behold, we discover that other person (the one we had written off but we still think about constantly) likes us and we like them.
Unfortunately, that off chance is much more likely in one of Austen’s novels than in reality. Most of us are either too weak to handle the truth or too weak to handle commitment. Either way, we’re weak, and it’s pathetic.
So the next time someone has the guts to admit to liking you, respect them for their honesty and their courage at a time when everyone wants to jump on the single train. As for commitment, well I don’t really want it myself right now, but are a few dinner dates going to hurt anyone?
