You know, here's the fucking problem with love- you can't control it. You can't control what you want, or who you want.
Oh sure, you can pretend you do. You can pretend that everything you desire in a partner is your own goddamn idea, and how smart you are, pretty girl, for figuring out what you want and going after it, and fuck everyone else who thinks its a bad idea, because this is what you want, right? That's the independent woman spirit, right?
Fuck that charade, it's all an illusion, this notion that we have power over our own desires, and ultimately, over our own fate. We don't control shit. And in that way, we're no better off than the girls in the old world who still have their marriages arranged for them. At least there's some transparency in that scenario, since both parties are equally powerless. And honestly, what's more powerful, parental authority or emotions? Answer: Parents kill their kids for insolence a lot less often than people become overwhelmed and kill themselves. The arranged marriage folks get off fucking light here; congratulations to you.
I've read here and elsewhere how biology dictates who we're attracted to. I guess all that shit is true, I don't know. I think I just accept it as truth because it mostly works out. The girls want the big, fit guys, the guys want the girls with the curves. Strong babies won't die, curvy bitches won't miscarry. Makes sense, right?
Well, fuck you, biology. Because reproduction doesn't have shit to do with actually coexisting with somebody. Let's even assume that biology dictates who we'll get the most out sex with. That still leaves, what, 99.5% of the rest of life with that person? Unless of course you don't live together, or especially if they're just a fuckbuddy. No wonder I have so much casual sex. I get all the benefits of a man with none of the pitfalls- at least that's how it seems when I'm in the middle of getting the benefits. But I know that's me just bullshitting myself. I'm pretty fucking good at that. Been doing it my whole life. What starts as a survival mechanism has evolved into a monster that outsmarts me. I get it right between the crosshairs and before I can pull the trigger to take him down, he's gone, and a moment later he's tapping me on the shoulder, just to taunt me.
I know better. I know I don't just want guys for a fuck. That's why I'm so fucking miserable. If all I wanted was sex, then I should be high on life, whistling showtunes and shit (assuming I knew any).
Okay, so what is it that I do want?
Hold on to your hats folks, because here's where you learn just how fucked up crazy I am: I want movie/tv characters.
I didn't realize that's what I wanted until just now. But hear me out here, this is how I got there:
What I do now is what I've done my whole life. I watch movies, tv, and sometimes read books, and that's my way out. I can go to that place, through the wormhole, and the real me is in suspended animation while I'm in that other pretend place. Problem is, when I exit that place, I bring parts of it with me. I want those things for myself. I want one dimensional non-complex displays of brawn, warmth, and calm. I want Vin Diesel. I want Channing Tatum from The Vow: strong but kind, funny, artistic but no less manly, fights for what he wants (especially since in that movie, what he wants is a woman. also, that movie fits because she suffers amnesia, and oh how jealous I am of her sometimes. Do you realize just how much of my own life I'd rather fucking forget about? Her predicament has merit, if you ask me). Don't get me wrong, the movie's not that good, but images stick with me.
And it doesn't stop with men. I want the same for myself. I want to be the sexy, mysterious character that always keeps her cool, except for the few times that she rages, when she's completely justified and wreaks unholy havoc in almost poetically efficient ways.
But I'm not that way, and neither is the man that I love, who I have no choice but to love.
I lose my fucking cool all the time. I scream, I rage, I throw things, I hit. I'm a fucking basket case, a lot. And he- the guy- he's not Channing Tatum. He's not artistic, or even that conventionally handsome. He's got scars, inside and out. He doesn't always keep his cool, either. For a fighter, he chooses not to fight more than I'd prefer, and the less happy we both are, the less funny he is, of course. But I do see flashes. There are moments where we're happy together, where we laugh, where all is well, and all feels 'right'. These are my movie moments. Where he becomes that character I want him to be, and I become his.
Okay, that's me bullshitting. I don't think he wants a character. He's thankfully not fucked up in the same way. He just wants a non-crazy version of me. Good luck with that, buddy.
I know love exists, because I'm stuck with it. And it's the most intense feeling of overwhelming care and total loss of control. I don't know why I love him, really- and that's not the knock on him that it sounds like, it's just that biology aside (big, fit guys 'do it' for me), I don't know how we got here.
I didn't love him when he knocked me up. That wasn't supposed to happen. But he cared about me, and set about to take care of me to the best of his ability, and at a certain point, I realize that I really do love him. Scars, flaws, shortcomings and all- I love the motherfucker. And since that day, through the birth of our son, through our marriage ceremony, through our separation, all the way up to the present time, with me living in a strange neighborhood with barely a physical vestige of him anywhere in this too-big-for-my-stuff shell of a home, i've never stopped loving him.
I just wish it was easier.
(by the way, if you're wishing this was 'ragier' right now, then fuck you. I've got rage to spare, and am a burning cauldron of it as we speak. Just because I don't throw a bunch of caps and exclamation points in, doesn't mean I'm not expressing rage amongst other emotions. Goddammit.)
I'm so fucking angry that I am who I am sometimes; that I can't control anything around me. That I want the things I want. Sometimes I think I want too much in every facet of my life. I don't just want some money, I want more! I don't just want occasional sex, I want it all the time! I don't just want to be happy and harmonious occasionally, I want a lifetime of it.
That last one's the dead giveaway- that I want characters for partners, movie relationships for love, with a distinct happy, then conflict, then resolution into the happiest goddamn contentment you can possibly imagine, all fit neatly into a little drawer. Reality is too much. That's why I'm on Paxil. That's why I rage like a fucking child. That's why I'm always unhappy. Because apparently the struggles of a real relationship, the one I still sort-of have, are too much for my corrupted brain. I don't want a real relationship, I want a fake one apparently, and of course, I can never have what I want because of it.
I'm always going to be fucked up. He's never going to be anything different from what he is. Maybe this is why I sometimes like depressing movies, because it balances shit out for me. It helps me to find normalcy and ways that aren't fake and super-ideal. Maybe I can aspire to be like flawed characters, to want to be with flawed characters.
I remember when life for me was sort of like a movie. We laughed, and cuddled, and swooned over our newborn. We had good friends, and appeared to want for nothing. Sexy girl, ripped daddy, happy little couple.
I just realized, I'm in the part of the movie where everything has fallen to pieces.
See? I'm still doing it.
Surprise! I'm in therapy!