Lots to blog about.
First, the pre-law/pre-med trip on Feb. 24-25.
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Instead of renting a bus or something, the group decided to go in a few cars. Somehow I ended up in a car with these two really hot straight guys. Who for some reason seemed to like me. One of them has been in the pre-law group since last year, Jason. He’s a year or two younger than me. Dresses well. Dark brown hair. Tall-ish. I could see him being rich some day. Seems to know how to have fun with the boys watching the football game, but at the same time can give a great impression in the classroom. And he’s friendly. I think he’s in arts, but he looks like a business person. Actually, I remember now, he’s in poli-sci. Shannon knows him. Calls him her hot friend lol. The other guy is a bit shorter than Jason, same age. Slightly more adorable and less intimidating than Jason. Darker hair, darker eyes, tends not to smile as much, but when he does it’s really cute. Name’s Luke. Gives off an impression he’s more macho than he is. He’s in bio, like me, but he’s in the pre-med group, not the pre-law. And he’s in the military, or the militia, or something. We were in programming together last semester, and he totally saved me in the lab. He could actually program, whereas I’m not that great. He was an awesome help. Anyway, so I end up in the same car as them. Thought it would be pretty fun. They’re both pretty nice guys, it seems. Then this other guy got shoved into the car, too; Ray. He seemed quiet. He wasn’t attractive, and he ended up being a douche, which only added to his unattractiveness.
So off we go. The car ride was about 4.5h long. The guys spent most of the time quoting from comedy routines and Family Guy and South Park and SNL and lots of other things I never watch. I totally could not participate in these convos, but I did laugh sometimes. We ended up listening to this random song about a zombie talking to his friend in a mall… actually a good tune, became like the theme song of the trip. Ray was kind of homophobic, in a weird way. Like, at one point he’d be saying how outrageous it was that the Westboro Church people (you know, they protest at everything, super anti-gay) were protesting outside Heath Ledger’s funeral, and then later on he’d make these awful gay jokes, and he always used “gay” derogatorily. Almost like at heart he might not be homophobic, but that most of the time it didn’t matter because he gave off a homophobic vibe because of the casual things he’d say. Luke, on the other hand, was very vocally pro-gay rights, surprisingly, and made a point of saying how it didn’t matter to him if someone was gay, and how he thought discrimination based on sexual orientation was stupid, etc. Like, even just if something he was saying could potentially be interpreted, indirectly, as being homophobic, he’d make a point of saying that that’s not what he meant. I REALLY appreciated this. Made me like him even more. Jason wasn’t homophobic, aside from occasionally calling something gay, like, the rain or something (at which point Luke would be like, “I didn’t know rain had a sexual orientation.” lol), though he wasn’t as vocally pro-gay as Luke. It’s funny how often topics about gay people or sexual orientation or whatever come up in a group of straight guys.
After stopping at a restaurant and a liquor store on the way up, we arrived at the hotel, and lounged around for a while. We drank a bit, went out to eat with the whole group (20-ish), came back, kept drinking, went to a bar, back to the room, and to bed by 3-something. A very fun night. But we, everyone (well, almost everyone), stayed up far too late really. The organizer of the whole trip, E, had scheduled a tour of a courthouse for 8:30am the next morning, which most of us, including myself, thought was optional. A few people ended up going, but most of us decided to sleep through it and go on the law-school tour at 10am. Apparently E was pretty upset about it. We seriously thought she’d said it was optional, but anyway, nothing we could do about it but feel bad, and apologize (which I did when we got back, via email). Anyway, the law-school tour was awesome. Two students and an associate dean talked to us for a while, and then the two students led us through the whole law building. It would be pretty nice to go there (it’s my third choice school, the one I’ve already “accepted” to), but I still think my second choice is preferable.
After that we all met up at Pizza Hut (took forever to find, and it was super windy and rainy) where we all decided to buy E a big gift ( ...not from Pizza Hut tho lol) and get her a thank you card. I’m the money collector, and I’m still trying to track one last person down now, and it’s 3 weeks later. Drive home was fine, a girl came with us, I talked to her for most of the trip back. It was nice to have someone who could carry on an actual conversation and not just endlessly quote from comedy sketches or whatever.
About three days after we got back I worked up the nerve to msg Luke and tell him how much I appreciated how open-minded and non-prejudicial he was of gay people. Naturally this meant I came out to him, too. He wrote back this awesome reply, was glad I told him, and agreed that Ray was an ass lol. I would NEVER have done this, say, last year at this point. Being out is so wonderful. But seriously, I think it's important that straight people who bother standing up for gay people get positive feedback about it. Like, I really liked that he said the things he said, and the only way he's going to know how awesome that is is if someone tells him. And I love it that I'm ok enough with myself, and open enough about my sexuality, to be able to give him that feeback.
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After the trip was through, break was great (see last entry), but my thesis was beginning to catch up with me. The big biology conference was coming up (March 7-9) and it was Feb 22 and I hadn’t even finished all my data input. P, my supervisor, had gone abroad for the break, and so wasn’t around to make me feel like I had to rush. Or be productive at all. So I spent that weekend at the lab, and after contending with a midterm and other business, finished it all by Tues. Another midterm on Wed and then I had a meeting with P on Thursday. I was SUPER stressed that day- I thought that P would be terribly disappointed and possibly angry that I hadn’t gotten as much accomplished as she’d wanted (I’d told her I was almost through with the data input before she went away). But she was so positive! She can intimidate me a lot, but I really do love her. So we made a plan for all that I had to do between that day, Feb 28, and March 4th or 5th. I was putting all my project onto a poster, which is one of the ways scientists convey their findings to their peers at conferences (either posters or oral presentations). P had wanted me to do an oral at first, but the two other students presenting at the conference from our school had also wanted to do an oral, so we drew from a hat, and they won (which I’m now very happy about). Anyway, so the poster had to be given to the printer’s at least 24h before I could pick it up. I was leaving at 4am on Friday, so I had to pick up the poster by Thursday, which meant I had to have it done by Wednesday. And when we were having this conversation it was Thursday. I basically had to do all of my data analysis, write a conclusion, revise my intro, objectives, and materials and methods, and then design and put together the poster in 6 days. Plus contend with two more midterms.
Those six days were the busiest, most intense, and most productive of my entire life. I spent almost every free hour at the lab, usually staying till 1am or so. I skipped every class except labs and midterms. P stayed with me for quite a few hours for a number of the days I was there, she was a HUGE help with the stats. My stats background is pretty weak – for some reason our school doesn’t offer an upper level biology stats course. First year stats is almost useless, and plus I forget most of it. And anymore stats than first year’s isn’t mandatory, so I took other things. Anyway, I was really overtired through that period, and I didn’t end up finishing the poster till about 6pm on Wednesday, after the printer’s had closed. I had been talking to the printer guy the week before, however, and he’d said that really, while they recommend 24h before-hand, or even 48h to avoid technical difficulties, it was possibly for him to do it in one 8h shift. So early the next morning I brought in the file, and we set about trying to get it to print. The printer guy is maybe a few years older than me, like, 25 or 26, really nice, so it was a pretty good morning, even though it took over 3h to just get the file to transfer correctly to the right format. We were dealing with both PC and Mac formats for things, and just moving the file around seemed to mess it up. Anyway, the laminator guy was sick, so I couldn’t get it laminated, but P had said it wasn’t necessary if I couldn’t get it done. Beth agreed to pick it up because I had lab that afternoon. She was so good to me that week, even sat around at school waiting for me that Wed. when classes got cancelled but P and I stayed in the lab to keep working. Anyway, the poster looked fantastic, I was so happy.
I still wasn’t happy with my grasp of the stats however, so I took a bunch of books and papers with me to read before I had to present. 5 of us were going on the trip, all bio students naturally; myself, Shawn (super smart, super nice, cute, popular, all around wonderful person, thin, dark hair), Dana (enthusiastic, nice, she loves me, recent convert from psych, I work with her at school, curly brown hair, not overweight, but a few extra pounds), Taylor (reminds me of a petite version of Angelina Jolie, smart, hilarious, stylish, straight brown hair), and Nicole (gorgeous, blond, smart, stylish, got to know her last year in fish class). I’ve known all except Nicole since high school, Dana since elementary school. Nicole and Taylor are already really good friends. I know them, but I’m closer to Shawn and Dana. We left at 4:30am to drive to the nearest big airport. Dana drove. We could’ve taken a flight from the local one, but it was way cheaper to drive for almost 4h to catch our 11am flight to the conference city. The drive there was pretty fun. Dana got to know Taylor and Nicole and bit. The flight was fun, too. I sat by Nicole and Taylor. And I got the window seat.
Friday afternoon was good, too. Hotel was fine, me and Shawn in one room, the girls in another on another floor. I spent most of the afternoon with Dana and Shawn buying sticky things at Staples to put up my poster, and trying to figure out bus routes, finding food, and walking back to the hotel on my own, where I fell asleep for an hour. Woke up and reviewed stats for a while, then went to the university to register at the conference. Wandered around the campus with Taylor and Nicole (the other two were visiting friends). It was fun just exploring. Anyway, I stayed up till 2am –ish reviewing stats.
Conference really began the next morning. The building we were in was super modern, lots of glass and steal and tile, I loved it. I presented my poster at lunch time. I thought it went well, though the judges had way more questions/criticisms of my experimental design than they had about my statistical analyses. But whatever, I was just glad to have it over with. SUCH a relief. All of that work, all of that time, finally I had presented. Really, the effort was more for P than for the conference, and while presenting for the judges had been stressful, the deadline of the conference for the poster’s completion was more stressful, and the stress I felt for the judges is more representative of the stress I still am feeling for my thesis defence in April. Anyway, at that point I could then enjoy the conference and not have to worry about remembering what the parametric equivalent of a Wilcoxon Sign rank test was or whatever. The presentations were mostly interesting, although, as with past conferences, most of the molecular ones went over my head. Taylor and Nicole both presented around 3pm. Both of theirs went well. Shawn probably understood and retained more than any of us. Dana, while not understanding as much, was definitely enthusiastic and into it all – I was impressed. Last year she wasn’t much of a student. This year, however, she switched her major to bio, and she’s studying way more, and getting better grades. I’m impressed. The third and last presentation session was the worst, just because we were all pretty tired, especially me, and the presentations weren’t as interesting. We were back at the hotel by 5-ish. I’d wanted to take a nap, but that never happened, and before I knew it, we’d started drinking.
I had three beer in the hotel room with Shawn and Dana. Then we all went to the banquet at the university. And who ended up sitting next to me but the chair of the biology dept! (from my university) I was like, this is going to be a disaster – but it was actually really fun! It’s nice to interact with professors in a non-classroom, non-hierarchical environment. He was super pumped I got into law school. He and one other prof sat with us, B. They were cool. And drinking a bit, though not as much as we were. It was Nicole’s birthday, too, so we all sang to her lol. Big 22 lol. I was on my 4th through 6th drinks at the banquet, and I never thought I’d interact with faculty while that intoxicated. But it went well. Immediately after the banquet was, for some reason, a lecture. Another academic lecture. About half the people skipped it to go downtown, but we decided to take it in. And it was absolutely hilarious. Everyone was loaded. And the prof giving the talk totally knew it and totally made the whole thing really funny. I really enjoyed it. Then that other prof who came to the conference, B, he’s great, drove us downtown in his rental!
Anyway, the rest of the night consisted of many bars (maybe 5) and the walking outside required to get from bar to bar, which was in itself pretty fun, lots more drinking, a hilarious girl from Alex’s school, dancing, a rapping Englishman, a karaoke bar (I didn’t sing, but Nicole did), pizza, and finally back to the hotel where I barfed and then went to bed, where Dana and Shawn leapt on me when they got back about 2h later (I was in a surprisingly good mood and just laughed).
The next day was a slow recovery. We missed the whole morning session of the conference and made it to the lunch banquet. B let us hang out in his hotel room all afternoon (Me, Nicole, and Taylor all slept in his bed) while Dana and Shawn went on a drive with him to see things in the area (it was freezing raining and cold and I was hung over so I opted not to go). Anyway, we ate a nice supper when my appetite came back, and then got on our flight at 8pm. Dana had slept from when she, Shawn and B had gotten back to when we left for the flight, so she was ok to drive home when we landed. B was staying an extra day. I left one of my bags in his room but he brought it back on Tues. Everyone stayed awake for the drive home, it was hilarious. I was in bed by 4am. And up for class the next day! Having skipped so many the previous week I was intent on making it – and I did.
So then there was this week. Pretty low key, communications assignments/tests/speeches dominated. Easy stuff. I’m feeling scared again for my thesis, but today I basically just slept and lounged around. Nice to do nothing, but I’m totally on borrowed time.
Mom and Dad are still in Florida. They call now and then, still always laughing and happy. I’m glad they’re having a good time. Snow is still on the ground here, but it’s getting milder.
When I read this in the distant future, I’m going to wonder what was going on in the world. The US presidential election is in the news a lot, or at least, in a lot of the news I read. Hillary and Obama are still battling for the Democratic nomination, while McCain’s got the Republican nomination wrapped up. The Conservatives under Harper just passed a motion in Parliament extending the Afghanistan mission to 2011 at least. The space shuttle’s just brought the Japanese built module up to the ISS. The governor of NY, Eliot Spitzer, just resigned over a prostitution scandal, making way for the first black, and first blind man to become governor of NY, David Patterson. I think today’s the anniversary of the Iraq war. The Latimer guy from out west who killed his disabled daughter a few years back just got parole. The Russian election was a few days ago; Putin’s successor was “voted” in, of course. Pakistan had their election, too, in the wake of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination. …I think that’s an adequate snapshot of what’s going on in the world at the moment.
Rachel’s brother. I haven’t really blogged about him ever. I’ve known him almost as long as I’ve known Rachel, since, like, grade 7, but he was always an extra person, you know, younger sibling of a friend. Anyway, his girlfriend is very sketchy. It’s led to numerous iffy situations for Rachel’s family so far, and now, quite suddenly although Shannon predicted this would happen, his girlfriend is pregnant. I thought that this wouldn’t happen because it’s so easily preventable… but I guess I was wrong. I thought he was smarter than this! He’s only, like, 19 I think. Anyway, apparently she’s going to get an abortion. But she’s very mentally unstable, and if she thinks that he’s going to leave her if she gets the abortion, then she might end up keeping the baby. Which, of course, Rachel’s family is completely against. Rachel’s brother’s always kind of been the golden child, destined for great things and all that. And he is smart, if a bit full of himself, though he’s gotten better over the years and I do like him. I hope things work out for him now.
Just over at my grandparent’s place. They have me $1000! To go toward law school. I’m still in shock over it. SO nice of them. I love them so much… and really, they never give huge gifts like this. Well, I shouldn’t say never, but usually they give random gifts, like, knick-knacks that they’ve picked up in Maine at these super cheap stores or something. Hilarious, random things. I love listening to my grandfather’s stories. While he can go on for quite a while, they’re always interesting. And my grandmother’ll chime in, and they’ll bicker, and it’s always funny. They’ve done so many things in their lives, and now they’re super old and they’ve still got each other. I think it’d be nice to end up like that.
Okay, enough blogging for one night. Today was a completely wasted day. Up super late chatting to Chris last night, mostly about sex, till 3:30am, slept till noon-ish, then did nothing today except cook, and read (l’Actualité), and nap, and blog, and visit my grandparents, and now I just drove Beth to a friend’s place. No productivity at all. Oh well, guess I haven’t had a nothing day in a while. But I bumped into P at the grocery store yesterday and said I’d be in to the lab on the weekend! I’m getting up early and going tomorrow. I have to lol.
Night!
Showing posts with label grandparents. Show all posts
Showing posts with label grandparents. Show all posts
Saturday, March 15, 2008
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Autoanalysis
I think I’ve developed an unhealthy obsession with Vince and Six’s relationship. Well, maybe it’s not an obsession, but it’s a …preoccupation, there’s the word. Maybe it’s how I channel my suppressed jealousy. I’m attracted to both of them, physically. And mentally a little bit, too. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be as attracted to Vince if I was around him all the time… but the only reason I say that is because I’m not around him at all, and haven’t really spent any extended amount of time with him. And I automatically assume I wouldn’t like him as much if I was around him all the time. Reasonable..? So I suppose I might actually like him more in that situation, but who knows. Six I already know how I feel about him. We’ve been friends for years, since 2004. I’m attracted to him physically, and he to me apparently, but he’s got issues that prevent me from liking him as any more than a friend. He’s still got issues about being gay (… don’t we all, but still, his are larger), he’s a bit too negative and cynical, as much as that can be funny sometimes, he’s a drop-out who continues to not go back to school, he smokes, AND he’s paranoid. Now, these only matter in judging him as a potential boyfriend. In terms of being a friend, the only thing I can fault him with is that he’s not the absolute best to go to for comfort, and he’s paranoid. Both of which are get-around-able. Vince I’ve yet to really get to know, aside from our online chats, and that one weekend. But still, they both have occupied far too many of my thoughts lately. Now, I don’t want you to get the wrong impression – I don’t think I’ve ever thought of them at school, which takes up a lot of my time. Ok that’s a lie, but not very often anyway. But still. I can’t go online without thinking about them. Just, either one or the other, or both, or spending time with both of them again. Alex would have to be around, too, but he’s not part of my preoccupation. And you know, it’s totally idealizing them, and their relationship, and building it up into this wonderful, perfect thing of which I’m envious and for which I’m happy.
I did this exact thing with Thomas and Rebecca, two friends who’ve since moved away. They were much more ideal in reality than Vince and Six, at least in my eyes. Both of them were geniuses, first of all. Awards and scholarships galore, and they won even more upon acceptance to their grad schools. They’re also both extremely friendly, community minded, politically aware intellectuals, but at the same time they’re approachable and funny and weird. In my eyes they're nearly flawless. I loved them then and I still do now. I totally idealized their relationship, and I suppose them as individuals to a certain extent. I wanted to be around them, I enjoyed them, and I just knew they’d be together forever. Of course, this was doomed, and they broke up shortly after leaving for different grad schools. To me, once I heard, it was as if the world had gone mad. I was totally unprepared for the break-up (not as much as Thomas, apparently, but whatever). This event definitely contributed to the somewhat fatalistic attitude that I now hold towards relationships. But this attitude is still buried beneath a romantic, sentimental, sappy layer within me that I think has led to this current thing for Vince and Six. It seems I can’t help but let this happen.
I must admit that I think part of the thing I’ve got for them is due to the absence of gay friends in my day-to-day life. I SO enjoyed having that when I went and hung out with them and Alex that weekend. So, this is a temporary feeling. All I have to do is find some new gay friends lol.
Six and Vince had their first big argument last Sunday, a week ago. I was at work when it happened, but Six had msged me on facebook as soon as the whole thing got going. Which says something about how upset he was, because Six NEVER msgs me. On msn or facebook or just email, or anything. I always have to start the convo. He’ll keep it going, even invite me places and stuff. But he never starts it. It’s odd. And on occasion supremely annoying. Anyway. Apparently, Vince had been drinking in someone else’s dorm room, at some party or something. It took place in Vince’s res. Anyway, Vince’s friend G was in attendance, too. One of Vince’s few gay friends, and also one of the few people he’s out to. So they all got drunk, and then the party ended in the night sometime, at which point Vince learned that G had no way of getting back to his apartment aside from walking. It was an approx. 20min walk. On a windy, frigid winter night. So Vince, the nice guy that he is, said to G that he could just stay in his room for the night, and walk home in the morning. Thought nothing of it. They stayed up for a while talking and YouTubing or whatever, talking a lot about their respective boyfriends apparently, and then went to sleep. Both slept in the same bed, though not under the same covers, or something. PS this is all Vince’s version of events, although I do believe it. Six was aware that G was there, because he chatted to Vince after Vince had gotten back to his room with G after the party, and they’d used a webcam. Six was a kind of upset that the whole G staying over thing was taking place.
Next day, sometime around lunch time, Vince clicked on Six, tried to make some small talk, but Six was upset about the night before, so he wasn’t being very conversational. One word answers and such. Eventually Vince, gently, was like, is something wrong? And then, are you upset about last night? And after a bit of Six being like, I don’t want to argue on msn, and then, I don’t want to argue when we’re far apart, he eventually just let it out, how upset he was about the night before. Anyway, I won’t go into the gory details, even though Six told me absolutely everything. Just sent me the msg history. It was, frankly, depressing to read. I felt a little bit like I was intruding, even just reading the thing, and also pretty upset just because they both got so upset. Like, tears upset. Six was totally the angry one, and Vince was totally the apologetic one… ughh it makes me sad to just think about the whole thing. Anyway, I quickly encouraged a phone call- I would NEVER want a fight of any emotional import to take place over msn. Ever. It’s nice as a casual chatting medium, or information exchange, or something through which you can chat to people you’ve found online. But not for anything too serious. I mean, I’ve done it, argue, talk about big important things, but it’s not my first choice. Alex and I were chatting as I crisis-controlled Six. He’d been doing the same thing for an hour. Apparently Six had also turned to a few other people for advice, some of whom were not the most wholesome, and just reflected Six’s confusion/distress back to him, amplifying it. Both Alex and I tried to calm things down and encourage phone calls. Eventually this happened, and they made up, and all was well. I briefly chatted to Vince a few days later, and tried to be supportive to him, too, just so he would know I was still behind this relationship.
I’m very wary of trying to be a support for both of them, however. I tried to do this with a past relationship of Six’s, with S. I’d started chatting with S summer before last. Six met S that Christmas, and they started dating before December was through. It was Six’s first serious relationship where he really fell for the guy. It was also S’s first serious relationship. Six was 20. S was… 18 I think. I thought that S was a nice person. They appeared to be happy, and in love, and I was happy for them. I never actually met S. (My relationship with Six is weird, it’s only started to become a bit normal this year. But anyway, that’s for another entry). So my judgments of S were based only on online chats. But still. He was young, but he seemed nice. At least fairly mature. Anyway, as you might’ve guessed, this relationship came to a rather untimely end. A very awkward, messy, untimely end. I forget when exactly. The whole thing only lasted for a few months, although in my mind it takes up a larger portion of time because of how strongly they felt for each other, and because of the lasting impact it’s left on Six. I mentioned that I’d started chatting with S that summer. Well, we continued chatting all throughout that fall, and through the winter, during the whole relationship with Six. At first, this was awesome. I felt like I was the confidant of both of them, and I could calm things down between then if there was a fight, I could open communication channels if they were blocked, and I could also be in the know about everything that was going on with them. I liked both of them and they both seemed to appreciate having me to talk to. Now around the mid-way point of the relationship, I started to realized that I was starting to play for both sides, so to speak. Sympathizing with both of them, often in a way that I wouldn’t really want the other guy to know about. Sort of like a… “I’m really on your side” kind of thing, to each of them. I don’t think I realized what a bad situation I was creating for myself. But still, they both seemed to appreciate me, a lot, so I kept doing it. As things started to get weird between them, the whole thing began started to get somewhat stressful for me. I had to really start, not lying, but really crafting how I interacted with both of them so as to keep the appearance that I was just as close with each of them as I’d always been, even though at that point it would have been impossible because they were really not getting along. I was lying to one or the other, but I could never really tell which. Truthfully, if I had to choose who I was being more truthful towards, it would’ve been S, unfortunately, because I often find Six too emotionally unstable, a bit too reactive, a bit too.. paranoid, I’ve mentioned that lol. Not that S wasn’t being unreasonable sometimes, too. But anyway. Six started asking me what S was saying about him. S started asking the same thing. I’d always been open about the fact that I chatted to both of them a lot. This is where everything really got out of control. Unfortunately, even though I hadn’t been completely truthful with either of them about how I felt about what was going on with their relationship, and how I judged the decisions they were making in terms of what they were saying to each other, and how they were treating each other, I’d still developed a sense of loyalty to each of them. As in, I would never really sell one out to the other. If one of them told me something in confidence, I would never share it with the other. I’d only really lie about what I was feeling about things, so as to appear more in line with what either S, or Six, was venting about, depending on which one I was chatting with. This sounds like I’m a terrible person, and maybe I was, but I’ve certainly learned my lesson. Anyway, so they started asking more directly about what the other one was saying about them. And of course, I couldn’t really reveal anything explicit, I’d just try to give vague positive impressions of things. Six especially wanted more information, and when I refused on the grounds that S was my friend too – yikes. He felt so betrayed. He said some pretty hurtful things to me. Fortunately, I’d been in arguments with him before, and I knew he had a tendency towards the melodramatic, if perhaps unintentionally. So I didn’t get very hurt by anything he said, but it certainly put a strain on our relationship. S never really got too upset, he seemed to understand a bit more what my predicament was. Eventually Six and I got past the whole him feeling betrayed by me – he had a lot more anger and sense of betrayal toward S than he ever had toward me. But it continued to come up now and then over the following months. That’s one thing about Six, he doesn’t let things go. He’ll bring it up, use it as a jab, but then quickly say “anyway” or “but whatever” and interject some new topic. I hate this. Either address the issue, and resolve it, or bury it and don’t bring it up ever again. Unfortunately I could never really get angry at him when he’d bring it up because I felt guilty over the whole thing. During the break-up, Six had used the argument that he and I were better friends than S and I, and so I should spill S’s secrets to Six out of loyalty to Six. This of course discounted any loyalty I felt towards S, which I couldn’t do. Even though, and I agreed with Six on this one, I had never met S in real life, and I really did have far less of a friendship with S than with Six. But I still couldn’t bring myself to betray S like that. As much as Six felt betrayed by me withholding information from him, I never saw that as real betrayal. Telling Six everything, however, would have been.
So we eventually moved past it. The larger issue for Six, of course, was the break-up itself, and the betrayal he felt at S. I think he still finds it very difficult to really fully trust a boyfriend again. I’m sure this affects how he behaves in his current relationship. The larger issue for me was that I could never again put myself in a situation like that, where I was on both sides of a relationship. So really, when I’d blocked Vince before he and Six started dating, after they started dating I was glad that I wouldn’t have the opportunity of getting to know Vince, because then I’d never be the middle person again. But then Six asked me to give him another chance, and then I went up to see Vince and Alex with Six. And I really liked Vince! So now my goal is to somehow be friendly with Vince, but remain definitely on Six’s side. Hopefully the situation won’t have to be framed in terms of “sides,” I’d rather just be an observer. But seeing as I am Six’s friend, and we’ve been friends for years, and we share stuff with each other, I will not put myself in a position where I feel loyalty to a guy who is causing him so much pain.
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In other news, my grandmother is completely losing her mind. It’s pretty sad if you think about it too hard, but she is happy, she lives at home with her husband, my grandfather. They have the best of care (hired). Lots of creature comforts. And really, she can be quite funny, if you indulge the repetitive questions and comments, which of course we all do. We went to their place for supper tonight, brought all the food with us. Beth, my sister, and I always really enjoy our grandparents, they always make us laugh hysterically. They’re in their late 80’s now. Hopefully they’ll stick around for a while longer. I think when they go it’ll be the first time death really touches close to me. I’ve lost a gazillion older relatives over the years, been to more wakes and funerals than I can remember, but I was never terribly close to any of them. Sure it was sad, and I may have shed a tear or two here and there, but no one really close to me has ever died. This is definitely a temporary state of affairs.
---
I’m going to accept my first, and so far only, offer from a law school this week. Put down my non-refundable deposit. The deadline is the end of the month, and I’ve yet to hear from any of the other schools I’ve applied to. I’ll be more than happy attending this school… but it’s not my first choice. It’s my third. Though first, second and third are all rather close in terms of how glad I’d be to attend there. There’s also a fourth choice, which I already don’t really care about anymore because my third accepted me. My first choice is somewhat more competitive, so I’m trying to be defensively pessimistic about my chance of being accepted. But I can’t help but hope. If I do get accepted there, or my second choice, then I’ll just let my third choice keep my non-refundable, and I’ll accept to the first or second. I might not hear for months, unfortunately.
---
I have a crush. I think. My last real crush moved away summer before last. I’d hardly had any time to even learn if he was gay. We’re facebook friends though, so I keep tabs on him lol. Still inconclusive. Anyway, this new guy, Liam, he’s in a class with me. A comm class. I noticed him in the first class, thought he was cute, in a dorky kind of way. He’s kinda short, longish hair, though not really long, not like, shoulder long, just got a lot of it. He had glasses that first day, though he hasn’t since. He’s a first-year. He gave a speech the other day that was really touching. I made an excuse to talk to the prof so I could learn his name. Since then I’ve been trying to find a way to catch up with him in the hall sometime to tell him I liked his speech. Seemed like the best way to start a convo. Unfortunately, there’s this girl he’s always with. Lisa. I’m hoping she’s just a friend and not a girlfriend. Another first year. She also gave a good speech, technically better than Liam’s. Though not as touching. Maybe because Lisa’s was more polished, while Liam’s was more… earnest and unpolished. I like her contributions to class discussions; they’re intelligent, and articulate, in a soft-spoken kind of way. So she does present somewhat of a challenge to talking to him, but I think I could reasonably talk to both of them at once. Anyway, I couldn’t find an opening this week. But then, today, coming home from work at the library, I passed him in the parking lot! I work at the university, and he lives in res. He was just walking by with a guy friend. I looked up, realized it was him, smiled, just as he seemed to do the same thing, I said hi, quietly (I’m generally dissatisfied with my casual hi’s, I don’t think they have enough umph to them, but whatever), and he said hi back! In that shy little way he has. This made me really happy lol. I’d never interacted with him before, so, I’m hoping this is a nice first step. It’ll make it easier to start that initial convo.
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I could probably keep going, but this is a bit of a mammoth entry lol. I’m half watching Twisted with Dad on Bravo… it’s pretty dark. A movie, for those who’ve never heard of it.
ciao
I did this exact thing with Thomas and Rebecca, two friends who’ve since moved away. They were much more ideal in reality than Vince and Six, at least in my eyes. Both of them were geniuses, first of all. Awards and scholarships galore, and they won even more upon acceptance to their grad schools. They’re also both extremely friendly, community minded, politically aware intellectuals, but at the same time they’re approachable and funny and weird. In my eyes they're nearly flawless. I loved them then and I still do now. I totally idealized their relationship, and I suppose them as individuals to a certain extent. I wanted to be around them, I enjoyed them, and I just knew they’d be together forever. Of course, this was doomed, and they broke up shortly after leaving for different grad schools. To me, once I heard, it was as if the world had gone mad. I was totally unprepared for the break-up (not as much as Thomas, apparently, but whatever). This event definitely contributed to the somewhat fatalistic attitude that I now hold towards relationships. But this attitude is still buried beneath a romantic, sentimental, sappy layer within me that I think has led to this current thing for Vince and Six. It seems I can’t help but let this happen.
I must admit that I think part of the thing I’ve got for them is due to the absence of gay friends in my day-to-day life. I SO enjoyed having that when I went and hung out with them and Alex that weekend. So, this is a temporary feeling. All I have to do is find some new gay friends lol.
Six and Vince had their first big argument last Sunday, a week ago. I was at work when it happened, but Six had msged me on facebook as soon as the whole thing got going. Which says something about how upset he was, because Six NEVER msgs me. On msn or facebook or just email, or anything. I always have to start the convo. He’ll keep it going, even invite me places and stuff. But he never starts it. It’s odd. And on occasion supremely annoying. Anyway. Apparently, Vince had been drinking in someone else’s dorm room, at some party or something. It took place in Vince’s res. Anyway, Vince’s friend G was in attendance, too. One of Vince’s few gay friends, and also one of the few people he’s out to. So they all got drunk, and then the party ended in the night sometime, at which point Vince learned that G had no way of getting back to his apartment aside from walking. It was an approx. 20min walk. On a windy, frigid winter night. So Vince, the nice guy that he is, said to G that he could just stay in his room for the night, and walk home in the morning. Thought nothing of it. They stayed up for a while talking and YouTubing or whatever, talking a lot about their respective boyfriends apparently, and then went to sleep. Both slept in the same bed, though not under the same covers, or something. PS this is all Vince’s version of events, although I do believe it. Six was aware that G was there, because he chatted to Vince after Vince had gotten back to his room with G after the party, and they’d used a webcam. Six was a kind of upset that the whole G staying over thing was taking place.
Next day, sometime around lunch time, Vince clicked on Six, tried to make some small talk, but Six was upset about the night before, so he wasn’t being very conversational. One word answers and such. Eventually Vince, gently, was like, is something wrong? And then, are you upset about last night? And after a bit of Six being like, I don’t want to argue on msn, and then, I don’t want to argue when we’re far apart, he eventually just let it out, how upset he was about the night before. Anyway, I won’t go into the gory details, even though Six told me absolutely everything. Just sent me the msg history. It was, frankly, depressing to read. I felt a little bit like I was intruding, even just reading the thing, and also pretty upset just because they both got so upset. Like, tears upset. Six was totally the angry one, and Vince was totally the apologetic one… ughh it makes me sad to just think about the whole thing. Anyway, I quickly encouraged a phone call- I would NEVER want a fight of any emotional import to take place over msn. Ever. It’s nice as a casual chatting medium, or information exchange, or something through which you can chat to people you’ve found online. But not for anything too serious. I mean, I’ve done it, argue, talk about big important things, but it’s not my first choice. Alex and I were chatting as I crisis-controlled Six. He’d been doing the same thing for an hour. Apparently Six had also turned to a few other people for advice, some of whom were not the most wholesome, and just reflected Six’s confusion/distress back to him, amplifying it. Both Alex and I tried to calm things down and encourage phone calls. Eventually this happened, and they made up, and all was well. I briefly chatted to Vince a few days later, and tried to be supportive to him, too, just so he would know I was still behind this relationship.
I’m very wary of trying to be a support for both of them, however. I tried to do this with a past relationship of Six’s, with S. I’d started chatting with S summer before last. Six met S that Christmas, and they started dating before December was through. It was Six’s first serious relationship where he really fell for the guy. It was also S’s first serious relationship. Six was 20. S was… 18 I think. I thought that S was a nice person. They appeared to be happy, and in love, and I was happy for them. I never actually met S. (My relationship with Six is weird, it’s only started to become a bit normal this year. But anyway, that’s for another entry). So my judgments of S were based only on online chats. But still. He was young, but he seemed nice. At least fairly mature. Anyway, as you might’ve guessed, this relationship came to a rather untimely end. A very awkward, messy, untimely end. I forget when exactly. The whole thing only lasted for a few months, although in my mind it takes up a larger portion of time because of how strongly they felt for each other, and because of the lasting impact it’s left on Six. I mentioned that I’d started chatting with S that summer. Well, we continued chatting all throughout that fall, and through the winter, during the whole relationship with Six. At first, this was awesome. I felt like I was the confidant of both of them, and I could calm things down between then if there was a fight, I could open communication channels if they were blocked, and I could also be in the know about everything that was going on with them. I liked both of them and they both seemed to appreciate having me to talk to. Now around the mid-way point of the relationship, I started to realized that I was starting to play for both sides, so to speak. Sympathizing with both of them, often in a way that I wouldn’t really want the other guy to know about. Sort of like a… “I’m really on your side” kind of thing, to each of them. I don’t think I realized what a bad situation I was creating for myself. But still, they both seemed to appreciate me, a lot, so I kept doing it. As things started to get weird between them, the whole thing began started to get somewhat stressful for me. I had to really start, not lying, but really crafting how I interacted with both of them so as to keep the appearance that I was just as close with each of them as I’d always been, even though at that point it would have been impossible because they were really not getting along. I was lying to one or the other, but I could never really tell which. Truthfully, if I had to choose who I was being more truthful towards, it would’ve been S, unfortunately, because I often find Six too emotionally unstable, a bit too reactive, a bit too.. paranoid, I’ve mentioned that lol. Not that S wasn’t being unreasonable sometimes, too. But anyway. Six started asking me what S was saying about him. S started asking the same thing. I’d always been open about the fact that I chatted to both of them a lot. This is where everything really got out of control. Unfortunately, even though I hadn’t been completely truthful with either of them about how I felt about what was going on with their relationship, and how I judged the decisions they were making in terms of what they were saying to each other, and how they were treating each other, I’d still developed a sense of loyalty to each of them. As in, I would never really sell one out to the other. If one of them told me something in confidence, I would never share it with the other. I’d only really lie about what I was feeling about things, so as to appear more in line with what either S, or Six, was venting about, depending on which one I was chatting with. This sounds like I’m a terrible person, and maybe I was, but I’ve certainly learned my lesson. Anyway, so they started asking more directly about what the other one was saying about them. And of course, I couldn’t really reveal anything explicit, I’d just try to give vague positive impressions of things. Six especially wanted more information, and when I refused on the grounds that S was my friend too – yikes. He felt so betrayed. He said some pretty hurtful things to me. Fortunately, I’d been in arguments with him before, and I knew he had a tendency towards the melodramatic, if perhaps unintentionally. So I didn’t get very hurt by anything he said, but it certainly put a strain on our relationship. S never really got too upset, he seemed to understand a bit more what my predicament was. Eventually Six and I got past the whole him feeling betrayed by me – he had a lot more anger and sense of betrayal toward S than he ever had toward me. But it continued to come up now and then over the following months. That’s one thing about Six, he doesn’t let things go. He’ll bring it up, use it as a jab, but then quickly say “anyway” or “but whatever” and interject some new topic. I hate this. Either address the issue, and resolve it, or bury it and don’t bring it up ever again. Unfortunately I could never really get angry at him when he’d bring it up because I felt guilty over the whole thing. During the break-up, Six had used the argument that he and I were better friends than S and I, and so I should spill S’s secrets to Six out of loyalty to Six. This of course discounted any loyalty I felt towards S, which I couldn’t do. Even though, and I agreed with Six on this one, I had never met S in real life, and I really did have far less of a friendship with S than with Six. But I still couldn’t bring myself to betray S like that. As much as Six felt betrayed by me withholding information from him, I never saw that as real betrayal. Telling Six everything, however, would have been.
So we eventually moved past it. The larger issue for Six, of course, was the break-up itself, and the betrayal he felt at S. I think he still finds it very difficult to really fully trust a boyfriend again. I’m sure this affects how he behaves in his current relationship. The larger issue for me was that I could never again put myself in a situation like that, where I was on both sides of a relationship. So really, when I’d blocked Vince before he and Six started dating, after they started dating I was glad that I wouldn’t have the opportunity of getting to know Vince, because then I’d never be the middle person again. But then Six asked me to give him another chance, and then I went up to see Vince and Alex with Six. And I really liked Vince! So now my goal is to somehow be friendly with Vince, but remain definitely on Six’s side. Hopefully the situation won’t have to be framed in terms of “sides,” I’d rather just be an observer. But seeing as I am Six’s friend, and we’ve been friends for years, and we share stuff with each other, I will not put myself in a position where I feel loyalty to a guy who is causing him so much pain.
---
In other news, my grandmother is completely losing her mind. It’s pretty sad if you think about it too hard, but she is happy, she lives at home with her husband, my grandfather. They have the best of care (hired). Lots of creature comforts. And really, she can be quite funny, if you indulge the repetitive questions and comments, which of course we all do. We went to their place for supper tonight, brought all the food with us. Beth, my sister, and I always really enjoy our grandparents, they always make us laugh hysterically. They’re in their late 80’s now. Hopefully they’ll stick around for a while longer. I think when they go it’ll be the first time death really touches close to me. I’ve lost a gazillion older relatives over the years, been to more wakes and funerals than I can remember, but I was never terribly close to any of them. Sure it was sad, and I may have shed a tear or two here and there, but no one really close to me has ever died. This is definitely a temporary state of affairs.
---
I’m going to accept my first, and so far only, offer from a law school this week. Put down my non-refundable deposit. The deadline is the end of the month, and I’ve yet to hear from any of the other schools I’ve applied to. I’ll be more than happy attending this school… but it’s not my first choice. It’s my third. Though first, second and third are all rather close in terms of how glad I’d be to attend there. There’s also a fourth choice, which I already don’t really care about anymore because my third accepted me. My first choice is somewhat more competitive, so I’m trying to be defensively pessimistic about my chance of being accepted. But I can’t help but hope. If I do get accepted there, or my second choice, then I’ll just let my third choice keep my non-refundable, and I’ll accept to the first or second. I might not hear for months, unfortunately.
---
I have a crush. I think. My last real crush moved away summer before last. I’d hardly had any time to even learn if he was gay. We’re facebook friends though, so I keep tabs on him lol. Still inconclusive. Anyway, this new guy, Liam, he’s in a class with me. A comm class. I noticed him in the first class, thought he was cute, in a dorky kind of way. He’s kinda short, longish hair, though not really long, not like, shoulder long, just got a lot of it. He had glasses that first day, though he hasn’t since. He’s a first-year. He gave a speech the other day that was really touching. I made an excuse to talk to the prof so I could learn his name. Since then I’ve been trying to find a way to catch up with him in the hall sometime to tell him I liked his speech. Seemed like the best way to start a convo. Unfortunately, there’s this girl he’s always with. Lisa. I’m hoping she’s just a friend and not a girlfriend. Another first year. She also gave a good speech, technically better than Liam’s. Though not as touching. Maybe because Lisa’s was more polished, while Liam’s was more… earnest and unpolished. I like her contributions to class discussions; they’re intelligent, and articulate, in a soft-spoken kind of way. So she does present somewhat of a challenge to talking to him, but I think I could reasonably talk to both of them at once. Anyway, I couldn’t find an opening this week. But then, today, coming home from work at the library, I passed him in the parking lot! I work at the university, and he lives in res. He was just walking by with a guy friend. I looked up, realized it was him, smiled, just as he seemed to do the same thing, I said hi, quietly (I’m generally dissatisfied with my casual hi’s, I don’t think they have enough umph to them, but whatever), and he said hi back! In that shy little way he has. This made me really happy lol. I’d never interacted with him before, so, I’m hoping this is a nice first step. It’ll make it easier to start that initial convo.
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I could probably keep going, but this is a bit of a mammoth entry lol. I’m half watching Twisted with Dad on Bravo… it’s pretty dark. A movie, for those who’ve never heard of it.
ciao
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
Joyeux Noël
Well, I successfully found gifts for that last person I had to buy for – my friend Rachel – and I was able to settle into Christmas Eve guilt-free. We had my grandparents over for supper, which is becoming a bit of a Christmas Eve tradition. They are absolutely hilarious, if unintentionally so. I’m so glad I like being around them. Both are in their 80’s, and my grandmother’s mind is kind of going, but they’re still a hoot.
Beth (my sister) and I ended up watching X-2 after everyone had gone to bed. Then I had some cereal, and read a bit, and now it’s time for last minute wrapping. I so leave things till the last minute.
Hope everyone has an awesome Christmas, whatever your religion :)
Beth (my sister) and I ended up watching X-2 after everyone had gone to bed. Then I had some cereal, and read a bit, and now it’s time for last minute wrapping. I so leave things till the last minute.
Hope everyone has an awesome Christmas, whatever your religion :)
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