don draper

so yeah, i'm late to the mad men party. sue me; i was in law school and not watching television. but i've picked up the show, as the man loves it. it's vaguely fascinating, though far from my favorite show ever. but the one thing i've picked up from the show, besides SERIOUS clothing lust (oh, for the time when big-busted, curvy women ruled fashion - i had to be born into the skinny-jeans era), is that we seem to be living in the era of the double life.

i saw the ex this weekend. we had a mutual obligation at a social event that required us to play pretend like nothing was nothing. of course it did. he, quite frankly, sucks at this. and let me tell you, there is nothing harder to handle than watching your heartbroken ex watching people get married. tears and tragedy. so cocktail hour came around, and i found myself in the awkward position of being elegantly dressed and standing before a crying man.

so what did i do? i put on the ice-queen front. i modeled perfect behavior for how non-emotionally-wrecked people behave in public. and as we walked back to the party to face our friends (for the last time, in my case), i turned to him and said loudly, "hey, thanks for helping me look for that." yeah, that's right. a cover story. just like on the show, when the woman goes into the man's office (they all do it, so pick your favorite couple), shuts the door, has this deep, meaningful moment, then opens the door and says something like, "i'll get right on that. thank you for your attention."

the good news is that i don't have to do this very much longer. the strain is starting to show. it's hard to be natural in the old mask when the new life is so comfortable, so nice, so... me. don draper chafes in his identity because the lie is so large. i chafe in my old identity because the chains are so heavy. the time is so close, however, to when i can cast the old ways aside and be who i have always been meant to be. i can't wait.

false dichotomy

i'm home, in bed, showered and ready to get some rest after a long and protracted weekend. and what a weekend it was, too. so many events, so many ups and downs. i thought i was done being two-faced; i had one more shot at the double life, though, and boy, was it one for the ages.

don't mistake me; it's trying as anything to put that old, tired costume on one last time. it was a long and arduous weekend, filled to the brim with emotional land mines. my heart was scarred, my perceptions were changed. the wounds i sustained hurt so deeply that they took my breath away. but the business of friday and saturday made it, strangely, easier to hide the cuts and bruises on my heart and soul. i was able to float through the role, following the playbook when no one else did (damn it, i said trips gun RIGHT; you're all going LEFT). i drank my wine and let the stress float to the back of my mind. i said my goodbyes, gathered my things and got in the cab.

as i slammed the door behind me and we sped back to the suburbs, i flipped the switch, threw off the mask, and stepped into the warm embrace of the life i choose, the life i love. and just like that, it was all made okay again. i took off the costume and became myself again. as saturday became sunday, the man took over, soothing me, loving me, making me remember why i've done what i've done.

with his arms around me, feeling the stillness of his breath against my neck as he slept, i finally succumbed to the pain of the weekend. the cuts bled, the bruises throbbed, and the tears flowed. i may seem made of stone, but even stone can break. sunday dawned cold and gray, the perfect mirror of my mood. i had to do a little more acting, but for once, i couldn't draw my audience into the illusion. he brought me to his room sunday night, looked me in the eye, and demanded my honesty. he got it, too. and again, he delivered nothing more than absolutely the proper reaction. he stilled the swirling confusion and hurt, replacing it with measured sanity and calm affirmation.

i no longer lead a double life. the break isn't clean; far from it. but the stark, unrelenting split of circumstance in this weekend proved what a false dichotomy my supposedly bisected life was, even in the days before i pulled the trigger. sure, there were two sets of events. but what i've seen in the last 96 hours is that the choice was never really a choice. there was only one path. and from this day forward, i will only have to walk that road.

it feels inviting. i can't wait to see where it goes.

barely breathing

[soundtrack. sorry for the stupid commercial.]

"i know what you're doing; i see it all too clear..."
yeah, i'm writing you another letter tonight, my dear. you just don't know when to let it go, do you? i spend forty-eight hours just shaking with anger at you, and at me for the way i let you infiltrate every cell in my body. just rage, nothing but rage, and all-consuming rage at that. it was so all-consuming that i even managed not to feel somehow blessed by your very acknowledgement of my status update. (yeah, because we're thirty, or pushing thirty, going on fifteen, apparently.) that was good. but what do you do today? you manage to wield your particular brand of half-concerned, half-pedantic wisdom at me, and damn it all, i bite. you knew i would, too. i can't put you down like that.

"everyone keeps asking, what's it all about? it used to be so certain, but i can't figure out..."
i think it was the insanity of the weekend, the loose lips that goddamn near sank this ship twice in one night. (you should really find a way to shut him up, by the way. he's gonna cause you some trouble someday, whether about me or about something else.) it really did start me thinking. what the hell are we doing? moreover, what are YOU doing? what have you been doing all along? i mean, you've told me a lot. but really, i don't know what to think about your motivations. you're either the most obvious person i've ever met or the best con artist in the history of time. i'm not sure which it is anymore. but i sure as hell make it easy for you. i always do. i always have. but after all that, i'm really not sure i want to do this. it hurts. it's hard. it's getting risky. and i always end up feeling like i've given a lot more than i got.

"what is this attraction? i only feel the pain, with nothing left to reason, and only you to blame..."
to stop spewing bile for a minute and be fair about things, it's not like i think you're lying to me. it's not an issue of dishonesty, or feeling swindled, that con artist line notwithstanding. i'm starting to feel like i've been sleeping with dexter morgan: someone who's so incapable of human closeness that the closest he'll ever get to love is, well, a charade. that's the devil's bargain he's struck. preserving the interior darkness, the solitude, at the expense of everything real around him, becoming nothing more than a full-time master of disguise. hmm. sound familiar? i mean, i pour my goddamn heart out to you every time. i've come so close to professing love for you so many times... but i hold back. i hold back for two reasons. one, it's not possible right now. there are complications. but two, i know you can't deal with that. the one time you thought i did that, well, i've never heard you so scared. it's almost like (gasp!) you would've had to feel something risky, something that you couldn't manage or control. so what are we? what is this? what am i?

"and i could stand here waiting, a fool for another day; i don't suppose it's worth the price, you're worth the price, the price that i am paying, but i'm thinking it over anyway..."
i know what i am. loyal. loyal to a fault. loyal to the biggest fault you could imagine. i can be so fucking savage when i want to be, slicing people and things out of my life without a single hesitation. i did it to you once, too. and it was hard. and it hurt. it hurt more than this does, if that's even imaginable. so i've made my own devil's bargain here. i take all of this. i take the darkness, the distance, the limits you place on your affections. i take it because i'm a fool for you. i always will be, apparently, because even as thoroughly enraged as i am, i still won't cut you off. i keep you in my heart. i hold back how i feel. i maintain my own charade, knowing that it's the closest we'll ever get. i won't let it go. you win again. you always do. you get everything you want. meanwhile, here i sit, tied in knots. again. always. you have some kind of charm, you know, and it's something you don't even understand. good thing you don't; i couldn't imagine you in full command of this. you'd be dangerous. i mean, more dangerous than you are right now, that is.

so good night, my dear. sleep the sleep of the just, as you always do. just maybe, if you think about it, consider what this is. think about me, sitting here tonight, tearing myself to shreds over you. ask yourself if the wall you've built around you keeps you as warm as my body does. you need to decide: is the image worth it? or is there something in you that will let you open the door to me? you've got your options. make your choice. because i see you better than you think i do. i know your mind, your heart, a little more than you'd like me to. and my dear, you are so much more than your charade. we are so much more than your charade. think about that the next time you wake up alone.

"i know what you're doing. i see it all too clear."

conundrum

oh, freaking hell. and just like that, life gets complicated as anything again. basically, it breaks down like this. i have two scenarios from which to choose, both of which have good and bad points. the choice i make - and it must be made as soon as possible - will have serious repercussions on my future. not excessively self-reflective, i-think-they're-serious-but-they're-really-not repercussions, but the real deal. i literally have no idea what to do.

scenario #1
pros: i get to go home. i go back to my hometown, to an amazing grad program in my favorite place on earth. i get incredible, prestigious professional training.
cons: i have to move there as a married woman, putting a serious delay in my plans to be free.

scenario #2
pros: i get to be free. i get to live in a new city. i get pretty good professional training at a pretty well-respected grad program. i also get to do this without any restrictions on my personal life.
cons: i'd have to turn down the best program i got into to do this.

ugh. rational self-interest is my new watchword; i try to do the best possible thing for myself at all times these days. but there's a big problem here. what's best for me professionally and what's best for me personally are not the same here. i'd have to seriously undercut myself professionally to do the best thing personally. conversely, i'd have to seriously undercut myself personally to do the best thing professionally. this is the hardest choice i've ever had to make, and i have a matter of days to make it.

i know i said before that i was going to start relying on myself more often. but this one's too big for me. i'm opening the floor for advice. what would you do? no promises that i'll actually do what the consensus suggests, but i definitely need some input here. i've never been this lost in my life. help!

posters

i bought myself some nice posters when my student loans came through this semester. y'know, grown-up art-type posters, the kind that have to be framed. i picked them up from the framer today, and they are lovely. (seriously, you should check this guy out.) but as i looked at them, i realized that for as mysterious and circumspect as i think i am, i am about as opaque as glass.

the pictures i chose all have themes. "teach me something." "how long can we do this?" and the most transparent of all: "she loves him more than anybody. i don't think he cares." could the connections to the other boy be more obvious? it's a good thing for me that the ball and chain has no sense of how deep my disaffection runs. (he would also never dream that i could ever be as evil as i actually am in the parameters of our relationship, so that helps.)

i try so hard to be discreet. i try to be aloof. hell, there's a reason why everyone's identities are so couched around here. but at the end of the day, i am who i am, and i'm a woman who wears her heart on her sleeve. it's funny; part of my affinity with the other boy is my admiration for the way he handles his emotional life. he is always in control, always on top of things. he handles his business, one foot in front of the other, no matter what's going on inside. he doesn't feel the need to talk about it. ever. (in fact, he will actively avoid these conversations - it's only our long history, and my persistence, that has led to the maybe ten times he's shared deep emotional stuff with me.) i wish i could be even a tiny bit like that. but my emotions spill over the sides and splash everywhere. i am an open book, right down to the posters on my wall.

makes living a double life a dangerous proposition indeed...

in the life

when you're carrying on two relationships at the same time, there's a lot you have to keep inside. really, it's a lot like what i imagine being involved in organized crime is like, except there's no community to fall back on. even mafiosos have friends "in the life" to talk to when things get weird or stressful. here, not so much. you're pretty much on your own. the only person i can talk to about the other boy (at least in his role as the other boy) is, well, the other boy.

or so i thought. turns out that i'm not the only one with this little wrinkle in her life. i have a friend who also has another boy. and my god in heaven, there's NOTHING better than being able to talk this out with someone who doesn't have a vested interest in the outcome. when i have weird feelings, or things get too intense, i can go to her and talk it out. thank. god. it's saved my sanity a couple of times since all this started.

just goes to show you that there's really no such thing as an easy way out. there's always a wrinkle you never saw coming. thankfully, i have a friend in the life to keep me in check. makes the whole double life thing just a tad bit easier...

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.