And I certainly hate waiting

There really seems to be no substitute for time. I keep making out with my exes, who are my real friends now. It’s lovely. 

I really thought I could talk to a more recent ex. But every pleasant interaction, even just over the internet, just waters a weed that needs to die. 

I know this because I’ve killed this kind of weed before. I loved a man who didn’t love me back. I wanted so badly for him to see me. I could not imagine not wanting that. But I kept hurting myself on him and so I walked away for a while. In the months we didn’t talk we both changed. And now I have exactly the relationship I want with him. We’re friends. 

This newer ex, I still want. I know we’re not right for each other. I know I was in love, again, with who I wanted him to be. I thought he wanted to be that too. But either way, he’s not it and he’s not interested in trying anymore. I know that in my head. But my heart still longs for something that will never happen. Every time we speak he either pisses me off or feeds my hope for something romantic to blossom between us again. 

So I told him that our conversations are not allowing me to heal. 

And what I meant by that was they’re feeding my desire for and hope in something that’s not happening. I want him so badly and that want only gets worse the more we talk. It reminds me of what I loved about him. It makes me want to ignore what makes us not work. It makes me want to show him affection he’s not capable of reciprocating, and break my heart a little more every time. And it makes me feel pathetic and ashamed for feeling these things… especially knowing what I know.

I think, based on previous experience, that it’s going to take some time for my heart to catch up with my head. It’s going to be a while before I don’t desperately, deeply want things he cannot give me. I hate it. I hate being weak and needy and sad and vulnerable. I hate sobbing over someone who is not at all right for me. Someone who never saw me and likely never will. I was utterly wasted on him. I know that. But I can’t stop hoping he’ll finally wake up. 

And I certainly hate waiting. 

I was thinking about what someone new might say to turn me on. The only thing I could think of was so unspeakably sad. I’d want them to tell me I’m beautiful, and for me to believe that they believe it. I miss is the beginning of our relationship, when I believed him when he told me he thought I was beautiful. Toward the end, I kept asking him to say it more often. What I was really asking him to do was convince me he meant it. But can anyone find a perpetually insecure, disappointed face beautiful forever? 

In the months I didn’t talk to the first man what changed in me was that I became able to see him with clearer eyes. Less tainted by love and lust I can see the reasons I fell in love with him and stayed with him. And I can see the reasons we are not right for each other. I’m finally at peace with however he might feel about me. Not that rejection doesn’t hurt. But that I don’t have any hope of having what I used to want with him. I love him. I always will. I’m attracted to him. But what I want most of all is to be his friend. And I am. And I’m happy with that. This is how I’ve come to be secure with him again. Weird how much easier it is to be close to someone you don’t desperately need to be pretty majorly different than they currently are. 

So that’s what I want with this one. I wish I could fast-forward to it, but I don’t believe I can.