the other boy

i began five days of blissful alone-ness today. the ball and chain is on a vacation far away, leaving me in the house with nothing to do but contemplate what my life would be like if this was my reality. it's not a perfect situation; i'm in charge of the dog he made us get when we came down here, and that dog's already eaten a tube of burt's bees lip balm and one (thankfully cheap) dress shoe. but even with that little wrinkle, this is a nice place to be.

even better, come friday, i get to go back to the place i call home. though i live in the southeast for school, home is the mid-atlantic, and i get to step into the other life i lead. by the time i get to the airport, for a little window of time, i get to forget the ball and chain and fall comfortably back into my old pattern with the other boy.

yeah, that's right: the other boy. a girl's gotta have some diversion in this life, and he's mine. how this happened is a long, drawn-out story, but for the last year-plus, i've been deep into some extracurricular activity with this guy. he's been a part of my life since we were teenagers. i was secretly in love with him for years, but it never came to pass. but through a long series of twists and turns, we ended up sharing a hotel room over a new year's weekend. a long talk alone in the dark, both of us vulnerable and lonely, and that, as they say, is that. i never had a chance. neither did he.

you'd think i'd feel guilty about this. nope. i feel ENTITLED to this. i sacrifice so much in my daily life to keep the ball and chain happy. the other boy is my reward for this. the other boy expects nothing from me except the occasional trip to the sack. he spends as much time with me as i request, gives me everything i want, and cares unconditionally. now, it's not like this relationship isn't riddled with complexity (at least from my perspective); it certainly is. but at its heart, this is so easy. it's so nice to spend time with a full-grown man.

i take my share of responsibility for the disintegration of my relationship with the ball and chain. i helped create the monster i'm stuck with now with the way i subsumed everything to him. but i will NOT live the puritan way of suffering through the mistakes i've made. i'm going to be proactive and do something about it. until i can get free, and there's still some time left on the calendar before the inevitable dissolution, i will not deprive myself of what i want. i'm just not that kind of girl.

the rest of the world can live by some antiquated standard of sacrifice. i choose to fulfill myself. after all, loyalty to self alone is the purest kind of loyalty. i will never let myself down again.