The Inauguration

I was out with my good friend Josh, my favourite ex-work comrade, yesterday inaugurating the first patio day of 2005. Granted we had to sit under a heat lamp, but it was nice to share pints in the open air again. Ah, the little things. During the 4 1/2 hours we spent together, sitting on ice blocks once known as our asses, his phone must have rung 25 times. Josh=50% Mr. Popularity 50% Mr. Congeniality.

Something that happens to many people I know, both boys and girls, is for some reason there are name patterns that occur in dating scenarios. For me, there have been 3 significant Seans in my life. For Joshie there have been 6 Claires. Sitting on the elevated patio in the Beaches area Joshie had spotted Claire version 1.0 and 3.0.

Joshie's dating a lot these days. His last Claire, version 6.0 had done a horrible disservice of having an affair behind Joshie's back. 6.0 has fully realised, much too late, what she had in Josh. Her phone invitations to dinner sometime have gone unreturned. The last person I heard Josh was dating was a very lovely redheaded actress.

The Comrade: And are you still seeing her?
Josh: Yeah, I'm seeing her on Saturday.
The Comrade: Is this an exclusive thing?
Josh: Hell no. She's only in town for the next month or so. Both of us know this is just for that time.
The Comrade: Is there ever an exclusivity clause even when no one says anything? Do you have to say it, or is it a given?
Josh: Well, yeah, if you have history, then it's a given.

I had a friend
Who turned into a great friend,
Who turned into my lover,
And now it's changed.

I suppose it had to. Next level stuff. I'm reminded of first person shooter games, an old addiction, where I would take my assassin armed with optimum health points, fully armoured, caches of ammunition and über powerful weapons onto the next level. There was a sense of duty, of accomplishment, of righteousness. I don't feel that now. I feel scared and vulnerable and extremely fragile.

Things I really never noticed about Fatty was his ability to deflect things by using humour, adding a couple of bars of humming, spontaneous laughter for no apparent reason and mumbling his words. Actually I have noticed these things before, but there is an entirely different context now. These are ways for him to pull away when my scruntising gaze becomes too intense for the lad. Too exposing. When a man pulls away from me I've learned to cut the cord, hurling back whence I came. I don't want to, but it's my self-protective nature to need to.

If I give all the love I have, it will be squashed.
Like a girlfly on a mirror in a pink tutu.

It reminds me too much of my past marriage. It reminds me too much of last August with the Boy with Kaleidescope Eyes. With them I gave freely. Naturally. Honestly. And got burned. I can't afford that anymore. We cats with 9 lives have died several times already and can't afford haphazard slaughters. Each death has promoted a rebirth, true, but not always have I come out better. Wiser, yes, but not necessarily better.

The better would be to still have all the trust and wonder in someone new. The better would be to forget the hurt that ever happened. The better would be to take things one day at a time, something I have great difficulty doing.

It is still so new.
Wash, rinse, repeat.
It is still so new.

He had to remind me this this morning.
It's just the beginning.

I told him what I was scared of.
And as I told him it was the first time he'd seen me cry.
I told him I'd try not to hold back as much.
He told me he'd do the same.