(Cole):

     So I’ve decided to make some healthy changes in my life.  Just because I turned thirty over a month ago doesn’t mean that ship has sailed.  Better late than never, right?  I still haven’t quit smoking, but I’m going to, and hey, at least I’m thinking about it!

     I wake up every morning and drink three or four glasses of water before I leave for work, and I make sure I drink plenty throughout the remainder of the day.  I’m making a conscious effort to go to the market more frequently and only buy a few fresh, organic (when I can find it) ingredients to last me only a day or two, like I used to do when I was living in Europe.  A few fresh, choice ingredients, eating plenty of fruits and veggies, with a knife and a fork, a nice glass of red wine, a good book in hand.  That was the way I used to eat, before my life fell apart, in a way…

     I’ve also started brushing up on my Spanish, because it is seriously lacking, in comparison to my French, and if I want to start learning Italian in the near future, my Spanish needs some serious improvement.  So when I come home from work, before I go to bed, I do my best to study a verb tense that I should be more familiar with, and to learn five new vocabulary words. That, and I listen to Rosetta Stone for Spanish (Spain Spanish, apposed to Mexican Spanish.  There is a differnce!) at work for an hour, when I’m alone.  The CD I have is the one I got before I left to live in Barcelona for six months, so it’s a little simple, but repetition is key, and there is nothing wrong with brushing up on the basics.  Which reminds me…  My ex-lover from Spain has contacted me a few times, since my birthday (we have always stayed in touch, since I left Spain, December of 2011), just to say “hola”, catch up, etc.  I should write him back.  He doesn’t speak English, and nothing assists with brushing up on one’s language skills like communicating with a native speaker, right??? 

     Oh the tangled webs we weave.  Where is my head this week?  Well, fortunately it was in the ceiling of a kitchen and a bathroom, busy installing insulation in preparation for drywall installation, otherwise, I might be too busy stressing/obsessing over personal problems to function as a sane, rational human being. 

     Where do I begin?  Well, there is the text I received from the Giant, whom I hadn’t heard from for almost two weeks:

“God dammit MO!!!  I tried and tried to forget you!!  But alas… I could not!  I miss you and that sweet li’l wicked smile!  I am sorry for being a jerk… I was just being greedy and wanting more time with you! Forgive me?”

     My first instinct, fucked up, rude, and sarcastic as I may be, was to write back “Hey, so glad to hear you’re alive and well.  I haven’t checked the obits in a while…”

     Instead, I responded with silence, until the following morning.  I didn’t want to say anything at all, and in fact I wanted to ignore him altogether, but you see, I really do have a heart, and so the following day, around noon, I responded with this, and it’s sooooooo “accommodating” to his precarious emotional state that it even makes me ill, but at least it was nice, and hopefully made him feel nice too:

“Nothing to forgive.  We’re just in very different places in our lives right now.  At this moment in time, work consumes me.  My future is still uncertain, which is frightening yet exhilarating at the same time.  I need to be in a more stable, giving, and selfless place before I start dating seriously.  You helped me to understand that, and for that I thank you...”

     Not only was it cloyingly sweet, it was true as well.  I’m too busy to give any unencumbered bit of my free time to someone who does not only not stir my loins, but does not tickle my funny bone either.  What can I say?  He just isn’t funny, never made me laugh, and laughter is very important to me.  I refuse to date someone who doesn’t either make me laugh or make me horny, and to not do both is a definite no no.  After all, I’m not my ex-husband.  I’m not going to settle for someone just because they are there.  I have standards, for fuck sake! 

     And speaking of my ex, Martychist, Rapist told me just the other day that he is re-married (marriage number three, mind you) and has a newborn daughter.  Keep in mind this is the same man who not nine months ago had a meltdown at work and made a scene, throwing a little temper tantrum and yelling at my bosses about me.  Nine months ago…

So, we have been divorced a little over a year (the actual, official date is August 31’s, my birthday.  Double whammy happy birthday points for me, and not one but two reasons to celebrate!), and he is already re-married and has a kid.  That means when he had his little melt down at work he was most likely already engaged, and possibly knew that his now wife was knocked up.  I am happy for the man that he now has a family, something he always wanted with me and something I was unwilling to create with him, but it doesn’t sound to me, or to anyone else I’ve spoken to about the situation, that he is or was emotionally ready for this gigantic leap.  In a way, I feel sorry for him.  I wish him the best, I really do, and I am glad he found someone who wanted to have a family with him.  If he is truly happy, then I am happy for him, and I hope that he didn’t rush too quickly into something that he wasn’t mentally ready for or capable of handling.  Who knows?  Maybe the third time really is charm!

     I didn’t really care enough to ask whether or not Martychist was remarried when I first heard the rumors, but Marge said to ask Rapist so we could start taking bets to see how quickly he would get divorced for the third time.  When Rapist spilled the beans about the child, I laughed and said ‘well the kid sealed the deal.  They’re basically trapped now!’  We got a good laugh out of that, and then he told me that Martychist got fat and looks like shit.  Not necessarily things I take pleasure in hearing, but they don’t make me feel bad either!  Hell, if he’s happy, that’s all that matters. 

     So let’s see…  What’s new with me?  Nothing.  Nothing at all.  I’m still playing the same pingpong game inside my head.  Happy with Rapist.  Not happy with Rapist.  Fine with how things are.  Not fine with how things are.  But one thing remains the same.  The sex is always epic, passionate, hot, sweaty, numerous positions, violent kissing, groping, moaning, grunting and, for me at least, multiple orgasms… 

So how do you say ‘no’ to the person standing right in front of you when that person knows every single button to press to give you pleasure, and when to push it, and with how much force, and for how long?  Marge says the only way I am going to get what I want from him is to stop putting out, and in addition to that, straight up stop talking to him for thirty days.  She says that then, and only then, after he goes thirty excruciating days of realizing just how much he misses having me in his life, will he finally submit to my very reasonable terms.  I understand that she is probably right, but to me it seems like using sex as a weapon, and I HATE when women do that! 

Take out the trash or I won’t have sex with you.  Take me out to dinner for Valentine’s day or I won’t have sex with you.  Fuck, you know the routine.  And the thing is, I know that what Marge is suggesting is a different thing, I just don’t like the thought of it… 

First off, if I stop having sex with him, I won’t be getting laid either, and that would be a HUGE problem for me.  Let’s not forget that the only reason the Rapist and I started fucking in the first place was because I was recently separated from Martychist, had moved out of our house and into another town, was in the middle of an outage working 72 hours a week, and I just wanted to get fucked.  Shit, if I had had the time and energy, I would never have propositioned someone working at the power plant!  How does that saying go again?  You don’t play with your meat where you make you make your dough? 

But… I was lazy, tired, and horny.  Do I really need better reasons? 

Second, I would really, really miss him.  And third, I don’t want to have to manipulate the guy to get him to “submit” to my terms.  I just want him to want to.  And it isn’t that he doesn’t want to be with me.  I know he does.  I can see it in his eyes, hear it in his voice, and feel it in his touch.  I know by the way he picks up the latest beer or scotch I have been drinking so he can try it, and, as he says, “feel like he’s bonding with me”, even when I’m not around.  I know he wants it by the way he’ll check out a book from the library that he knows I love, or sample a dish he’s never tried before because he knows I like it. 

Martychist was like that too, but the difference is this:  Martychist blindly loved and agreed with everything I loved.  My favorite author was suddenly the “best novelist we had in our personal library” and everything I said was basically as good as the word of God.  With Rapist, if he isn’t thrilled with a book, or prefers one of his favorite beers to one of mine, he has no problem telling me.  That, and I would be willing to bet money that if Rapist ever tried to read the newspaper over my shoulder I would only have to send him one brief, satanic, murderous glance and he would never attempt to do it again, unless it was a joke to provoke me, as a from of foreplay.  And, I’m sure he is not so needy and wimpy as Martychist that he would have to follow me around like a puppy dog in the morning, when all I want to do is drink my coffee, check my email, read the news, and take a shit before being expected to behave in any sort of civilized manner with another member of the human species.  My one hour to myself in the morning is sacred, and probably not something I will ever be able to do without.  It’s like Martychist always told me, I was born old.  So, maybe I was.  All the more reason to leave me the fuck alone in the morning, because some of us geezers can be quite vicious!

     So there’s all those reasons, and then, how do I begin to just stop talking to someone who makes my palms sweat, my heart beat, and my clit throb?  I obviously can’t explain it to him, or he would think I was just being a manipulative bitch playing a stupid game.  Do I just straight up stop talking to him, no explanation, nothing?  I don’t want him to think I’ve found someone else.  I don’t want anyone else.  All I really want to do is prove a point, and thus far, words have been an inadequate form of negotiation. 

Who knows?  Maybe words won’t get through to him.  Maybe he needs something more convincing, more forceful, than a sentence that I can spew with such conviction over the phone, yet when he is there right in front of me, touching me, kissing me, stroking my hair, kissing my forehead, looking into my eyes…

You get the point.  The thing is, that in depriving him, I am also depriving myself, and let’s not forget that more often than not, I behave and think more like a guy than a chick, and even Rapist has discovered this to be true.  That’s probably why he knows that sex is my weakness, my Kryptonite.  Hell, if sex wasn’t so important to me, I might very well still be married to Martychist and I would never be in this situation in the first place! (Not really.  Ick!)

     So, in a way, Marge is right.  I should either “accept things as they are, or play hardball, in order to provoke the changes I desire.”  In her experienced opinion, the only way to get what I want is to make him suffer, for lack of a better word.  But is that “fair”?  Is that true sportsmanship, or is it akin to planting an apple tree in your backyard to coerce the deer over before you shoot it in-between the eyes?  I would never kick someone while they were down, or sucker punch them, so is it too much to expect that I can win this fight in a proper manner, or must I resort to manipulation tactics, the definitive and fatal thing that ultimately drove me away from the Giant?  If I’m going to fight at all, shouldn’t I fight fair, even if my sane and rational tactics have thus far gained me little ground, if any? Is it all really fair in love and war or are some “hits” below the proverbial belt?  Can I use every weapon in my arsenal, even if some are illegal in the state of California, or do we lay our weapons down and fight this one out with our bare fists?  Should I slap him in the face and challenge him to a duel (that certainly sounds like a whole lot of fun!), or study my “enemies’ lines” and creep in while he’s sleeping so he never even saw me coming?  It’s funny.  As women, Disney conditions us to believe we are princesses awaiting rescue, and no matter how long we may sleep, a prince will come and rescue me.  Well you know what?  I have slept twelve hours a day, when my schedule permitted it, and the only thing that woke me up was a full bladder and an aching back.  Disney never prepared me for this type of situation.  Thanks a lot, Disney, and by the way, FUCK YOU!

     The thing is, fairytales and happy endings do not exist (except in Asian foot massage establishments).  They are the lies we are told as children to give us hope, because without hope, if we knew the way things would really turn out, we wouldn’t have the courage to go on living…