The Word

6 years. That's the last time I saw you pulling away in your car and I cried because I'd ended my first real relationship with my best friend, but it was better for me. I knew what you were and I knew what I was becoming.

I couldn't follow you down that path. I tried. It wasn't me. I couldn't be in an open relationship. I care too deeply, too much, too possessive, some might say. Is it wrong to expect your boyfriend to remain faithful? To only touch you, who had never denied him? Everything you asked, I did; so much more than I was willing to do. Unwillingly, I knew you.

Unwillingly, I left you. I had defined myself by what I meant to you, years of calling myself yours and identifying myself by the fingerprints you left on my skin, your breath in my hair, the blood on my neck. I kept myself alive for you. We shattered -no breaking- a powder keg, a grapeshot fired into tender flesh, bone confetti dusting the grass like snow, so over, there would never be a zombie of this relationship to shamble back.

You destroyed me, my better self, stole my soul and threaded it through your chest hair, close to the heart that never beat. You drove away to her. I cried and disposed of what I forgot to give you. I sent a letter, a cease and desist. We could never speak. I thought you honored that.

3 years. That's when you sent me a message that tore my heart out. You asked how I was, what was up. Had you changed? It didn't matter. You never apologized. We have nothing to say. We know each other, had wiped the slate clean, and there is nothing to say, no letters that fit together or words that make sentences. When you know everything, there is no mystery.

You asked if I meant the cease and desist. I did.

Today. You followed me. Stop. Why toy with me? What could we possibly say to each other that would mean anything? My body seized up, like a released spring, all tight metal still hot from kinetic energy. It is quick to remind me of past pain, like I'm allergic to you. I block, I remove all thought, all trace, of you. Because if I can't see you, you can't see me.

I write to erase the ache, to ease the stress I feel just thinking about you and what you did. I don't know what you've done with your life; I've carefully refrained from checking up on you, content in the idea that your happiness does not depend on me knowing about it and vice versa. I supposed you to be in a new life, one where I had never existed. I talked about you to new friends who never knew your name as if you were a caricature of a real person, a mosquito made human, a louse with a mouth. They laughed as I regaled your abuses in comedic fashion, "Isn't it hilarious how I paid him so he wouldn't feel bad after the break up? I know, he cheated on me with 6 other girls, I don't know how I stayed with him either." So funny, the pains of yesterday. How easily they come when there's no immediate threat. The delivery says everything about the story.

And you're in the past, the ghost of bad Mexican food resurfacing all these years later.

What would I say? Thank you for being a jerk, you made it easier to let go? I learned how to be independent by reminding myself that a relationship could go so incredibly wrong? I prevented interest because I couldn't fathom attraction to another male, let alone a functional one?

Once we considered binding ourselves in sickness and in health... I submit a simple reversal of the sentiments in that we repel each other in life, til Death do us meet.

Believe every word of this last sentence, for I mean it sincerely and in no other circumstance: I'll see you on the other side.

Midnight

I've been thinking a lot about motivations and decisions, mostly how they affect someone close to me. We've been friends for a few years and I've noticed he never makes a decision. Whether it's where to eat, who to date, or what to do while playing a video game, he will always do the opposite. This is completely unlike another friend where he does stupid things just for fun. This particular friend will do stupid things in video games just to see how it turns out, the kind of kid who turns the Bunsen burner on high in science to see if the glass will actually explode.

The guy I'm originally talking about will turn the burner on high just because he was told not to. There is a stupid-stubborn streak and I've tried puzzling out why he does those things and I think I'm onto something based on the people I've met who are similar... but I don't know.

His background is sad and private, but it follows the same characteristics as other men I know who act this way, meaning one of hi dddddddds parents was overbearing and a tyrant and the other was a doormat. 1 person in the household made all the decisions for everyone else and the other, who should have protected him, wouldn't even protect herself.

Science-wise, there are plenty of examples of males reaching adulthood who challenge their rules and role models, specifically their fathers. Male lions are kicked out of the pack, male orcas swim alone, male elephants form bachelor groups who are constantly on the prowl for loose (unattached to a harem governed by a more dominant male) females... males often get the rub when it comes to staying within community protection. Puberty is when everyone is discovering themselves and for most boys, this means figuring out where they stand. If they hate their parents, and most children of the aforementioned dynamic do, they try to choose the opposite of the dominant parent in an attempt at individuality. If the parent was religious, the child becomes atheist or anarchist. If the parent hated art, that child will pursue a career in it. The same thing can be seen in younger siblings to a lesser degree, but to a lesser extent as they are not distancing themselves from something/someone they despise, but trying to stand out of the crowd. They will be different enough to be noticeable in a bid for attention, not in a bid for completely cleansing themselves of what they view as an inferior upbringing.
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Examples? I dated a guy who had a domineering mother who bossed her boys around like they were in the military. Praise was rare, they were constantly flip-flopping on crazy diets so she could lose weight, and she controlled every aspect of their lives down to home-schooling them. His father was a porn addict who excused himself by saying his wife was never interested and it wasn't cheating if they never physically hooked up. He constantly undermined his wife, throwing parties when she wasn't around and giving the kids anything they wanted as long as she wasn't within earshot. Yes, they eventually divorced. With this background, my boyfriend was constantly conflicted at what he should do. Dad said stay home from church while mom said to go, mom said to eat your vegetables while dad said pizza with mushrooms was ok. He was an anarchist, believing in no government and that people should do whatever they want whenever they want. (For the record, he was a good guy that changed. It's possible. It happened. I was also a bad girlfriend. Many factors went into the break up, I am only examining how he was before everything fell apart.)

The indecisiveness in his upbringing forced him into a mental corner, where he could only choose to be wrong because that's the only thing that he COULD choose: anything else would be a point for either side and he didn't respect either one of his parents. He couldn't go to church because his mom would win, and he couldn't stay home because his dad would win, so he decided to go sometimes when he felt like it and not when he didn't want to. I would ask/tell him to do something that would benefit his life, such as wake up on time for class, and he would only do that if there was a reward involved. I was constantly pointing out the right thing to do, as were the people around him. It wasn't morally right, it was 'logic' right, as in there are concrete, solid, logical, scientific reasons to do these things, completely independent of a moral god or God. Regardless of the reasons, he chose the wrong thing just to prove he could.

You see this a lot in toddlers as they assert their independence, especially when you tell them not to do something and they do it anyway. Teenagers are the same way. As we transition into what we view as being more mature, we kick against our traditions and in some cases, this is a good thing. Slavery was bad and needed to end: sexual harassment had to stop; these are all traditions that humans fought against. Not taking your medicine simply because your doctor ordered you to is one of those things pushing humanity's IQ into the toilet.... case in point... anti-vaxxers. No amount of scientific evidence will convince them their BS-spouting, tree-hugging, mentally-inbred excuse for independent thought....

Ugh... bane of my existence, those people.

Anyway, my boyfriend came from a background that pushed him into bad decision after bad decision and rendered him woefully indecisive the rest of the time.He was pushed from one friend group to another, from one class to another, and eventually he was pushed into jail. His life spiraled out of control and he let it happen, even encouraged it, because it was different.

I'm worried about my friend. It's midnight, and I'm worried about the decisions he's making and not making. He says he likes this girl, then he turns around and says he doesn't know. He only loves women when they've left him completely, it's only when he doesn't have it that he realizes what he was missing out on. He refuses to connect with people and it's infuriating to watch him push everyone and everything away because he's trying to achieve some douche bag vision of himself. 'He's a heart breaker who loves all the ladies and they all love him, he's a successful businessman who has no time for romance, he's a writer who spends no time writing, a reader who chooses not to read' things like that. Complete lack of commitment.

And he's screwing up a relationship with a really good girl because he's too chicken to dump her face to face.

This is venting, and I don't care, it's frustrating not to talk to him about these things because I should let him live his own life and make his own mistakes. I would like to drum these things into his head until they're the only thoughts left, but I'm trying not to nag or interfere in his life. He's such a good friend who has never learned to commit to anyone, even his own dreams. He is