Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Away From The Tepee.

Tonight Brett and I sat across from each other at my favorite burger joint (read: any burger joint,) and ended up on the topic of my blog. After we had discussed the general quality of meat in Berkeley, the homeless epidemic, what charities we would donate to the upcoming year, and my fear of balding...it only seemed natural to end up on my blog and what to do with it going forward. I told him that it had been harder to write recently. We have been going through a really, really rough time and trying to put a positive spin on it was proving to be daunting. And, sometimes, you can't take a piece of crap and paint it pink and throw glitter on it...and not have people see that it is still a piece of crap.

Not saying our union is a piece of crap. But the situation sometimes is.

I feel like when I committed to this experiment, I really wanted to be authentic the whole way through. I wanted to document the lows: (me living on my couch in the dark covered in cheese dust the whole first month,) and the highs: (making friends, changing light bulbs without injury, learning to take showers without planning escape routes in case of burglary.) I did it for a while...and then things got real. And hard. And sharp and unnatural and scary. And I chose not to share all of that with the world and my 17 readers mainly made up of Brett's family. So, I blogged about my Mom and my problem with public urination.

Which was totally helpful.

Brett agreed tonight that it wasn't exactly wise to air our dirty laundry out on the Internet, but he encouraged my authenticity. "Sometimes...this is really hard." He told me. "But you owe it to yourself to put that out there. Someone always has it harder than you...and people need to know that it is ok...it is ok to go through a rough time...and not always know the answer. We don't always know what we're doing. And that is ok."

So we talked about the rough stuff. And then we went to the bar next door and ordered 4 different scotches and tried to sound fancy as we broke them down. ("This one is especially oaky...and burn-y. Like, my lungs are on fire. Ok, and now my stomach. Oh...yum?") And we listened to a jazz band and came home and had an intimate moment. And the intimate moment went like this:

Me: "OH MY GOD. FINALLY. I WAS ABOUT TO KILL MYSELF."
Brett: " You got your period? Good. Because it has been really fun living with you."
Me: (probably a little sarcastic.) "You're a stud. I love you."
Brett: "Do you know in ancient Native American tradition..."
Me: "Brett."
Brett: "They thought periods meant the women were possessed with evil spirits...?"
Me: "Brett."
Brett: "And they would banish the women...?"
Me: Brett.
Brett: "And make them sit in a hole for a week or something...?"
Me: "Brett."
Brett: "....."
(whispered a moment later to himself:)
Brett: "I just really feel like they were on to something."

Perhaps they were. But since Berkeley is running shockingly low on period ditches, I will have to remain here...with him...for the time being. But I dug my ditch away from our tribe in a different way. I let him fall asleep in the tiny twin bed first, so I can crawl in later and not disturb him so he has the best possible head start on sleep. And I offered to take the couch shift at 1 am when we become tired of pushing one another on the floor in a sleepy battle for space.

Maybe we have some adjustments to make during this new phase of life, and maybe we don't always have the answers or know exactly how to proceed. Maybe it is easier to drink scotch and listen to jazz and tell stories from our dating days. Maybe...in a way...it is digging a ditch away from the tepee...but it works for us right now and it makes us feel secure and safe and it helps us remember who we are.

And maybe who we want to be.

Which for me, right now, is not an ovulating woman.


No comments:

Post a Comment