It's Complicated

MY EX/BOYFRIEND recently moved to New York City, and, as I mentioned a couple of posts earlier, I live in Washington, DC. When he left, after much hemming and hawing, we decided to leave things on a “when we’re together, we’re together, when we’re not, we’re not” basis. It’s a situation where the rules are fairly clear but the emotions are anything but.

Our relationship is teetering on that borderline between uncertain and all fucked up, but we’re continuing along as if nothing has changed, which only makes things more bizarro. We talk every day about the nothing that only people in a relationship can talk about, and yet are apparently allowed to sleep with other people. I’ve seen him four of the past six weekends, and will see him for three of the next three, and yet we are allowed at some mysterious point on these weekends to go on dates with other people. I convince myself that he’s dead in a gutter when I haven’t heard from him and send him panicked text messages (“How’s yr day? I’m good. R U ALIVE?”), and yet we are supposed to be okay with not saying goodnight every night.

We haven’t broached the subject of what is going on, in large part because (A) he lives his life in a state of “what, me worry?” and (B) because I’m from Connecticut, where no topic is too large to swallow with a nice glass of whatever you have handy. I’m mulling our situation over at all times without raising the issue or drawing any sort of meaningful conclusion and he is, to put it plainly, not.

But that’s one of my favorite things about him. His tendency to over-think almost nothing is a good balance for my tendency to over-think, say, what to eat the night before my GMAT (salmon) or how many different cheeses I can keep in my fridge to maximize variety while minimizing spoiling (five, if you don’t count shredded or sliced cheese and you don’t get anything fancy that goes downhill fast).

I suppose the situation, as half-baked and unsatisfying as it may feel, is working. I have a lot of “hamster on a wheel” thinking to do, and I’m sure he’s just glad I’m not weirding the fuck out.

Or at least, no more so than usual.