Volatile Cola: Where to Pour it?

I feel so confused. Frustrated. Aggravated. Helpless. It's the weirdess most uncomfortable feeling. I don't like it. I just came from the festival few days ago. This sucks. This attachment love crap. Whatever it is. Anyway I met up with J in the city. I wasn't sure what I was going to feel when I saw him. I hadn't seen him in about a year. Would he look the same? I look different than what I did a year ago. He told me he hadn't seen anyone from back home in a while so he didn't know how he was going to feel either. Ashley and I met him at the bus station. He looked the same. Still attractive. He cut all of his hair off. I didn't have a huge rush of romantic emotions. I felt comfort. Relaxed. Like returning to a place you once knew. You have familiarity because you've been there before. You remember being there years ago but it also feels new because it's been so long since you've been there. I was happy to see him.

As the weekend progressed I realized a bunch of other feelings happened. Showed up unexpectedly. Not only did I have the same "storybook" ideas of us rekindling a relationship but also all of the negative feelings I felt when we were together. It was my protective shield coming back. Me subconsciously finding any little things that might remind me of all the characteristics I felt he had and the ones I placed on him erroneously. I feel like I am way too vulnerable with him. I don't like it. Because I don't think or I don't know if he will or can handle me with care. Beyond my (slightly) tough exterior is a lot of mush. You have to handle mush carefully. I feel like I trusted him with my internal being before and he trampled all over it. Not purposefully. It just felt that way. It's hard to explain. With his family, money issues, school, and working third shift he had a lot going on with little time for me. He said he didn't really know then, how to include me properly, nor did he feel like he had the time or energy to nurture our relationship. But interestingly, now that I understand why he did such things (unknowingly) it doesn't make the negative way I felt go away. It still hurts. I still feel I need to protect myself. I feel like I have to put on an extra tough emotional shield because the ways I felt that he hurt me was unintentional. It like who knows what he is going to do or say thinking its to make the situation better and it results in me feeling worse. But this "unintentionalness" makes me want to stop saying "he hurt me". Because I could apply that phrase to Langston's father. He outright made conscious efforts to be absolutely horrible to me. I don't feel J has done that. I don't feel like he has ever done that. I felt hurt in our relationship but it is hard to place the entire blame on him. Many of the things going on in his life at the time was out of his control and I also feel like he hasn't learned how to express his feelings…his emotions, which allowed him to distance himself from me.

Ok, so now I don't feel so much like the victim. A casualty from a not so great situation from the past but not a victim. I stated in a previous post that I think I was more attached to J than loved him. This is where stuff starts getting confusing, weird, frustrating. First I must say, I believe that every time we are intimate or more so have sex with someone we deposit a piece of ourselves in the other person and that other person deposits a piece of their spirit in us. The more we are intimate with them, the more of them we have in us. That's why when we see an old flame there is something in us that moves. Tingles. Reacts. Butterflies. They are in there. In you. Because J is the person I have been the most intimate with and allowed myself to be the most vulnerable with I feel like he is taking up a whole lot of spiritual space in me. This creates the attachment. But I don't know that if the strong feelings I have are because of the deposits or I really love him or both. Do they work in tandem? You can have one without the other but I don't know how each feels separately (being attached or being in love). I can't say I have cared for any other man the way I have for J. I have cared for other men. Clarence would be the second strongest. I really cared (and still care) about Clarence. But the way I care about him now has changed. It's not in the romantic way that it was before. I think what helped was that I really realized how a relationship between he and I wouldn't work while recognizing that he is still and will always be a great guy. Kevin would be third. I feel like that was puppy love and more of a lust thing than anything else. I definitely saw how he and I could never be. But with J…I could see myself with J. What I did after we broke up was convince myself that he never really cared about me even when I had plenty of times that I could recall that spoke to how much he did care for me. But I wanted to believe that he wasn't good for me so that I could forget about him. Maybe I convinced myself too well. Up until now. Now I want to love him. But more so I want him to love me back. I don't like this feeling. I feel like closure is dependent on him. A part of me wants to tell him that I loved him then and still love him now and I want us to start over and be together. But I won't. Not blatantly. Why? Because I feel like I have exposed too much of myself, too much of my feelings thus far. But I still want him to know, although I feel like he already does. We had a talk while in the city. I feel like I have always been the one to be emotional and say how I'm feeling. He will say how he feels if I ask but he doesn't offer his feeling. Only time I remember him offerings his feelings was when he said he want us to be friends. But because he doesn't seem to express his feelings the same way I do it's hard to decipher if its strong, true, genuine. There are two problems with what I just said: First, why does everyone have to express their feelings the say I do? I have always said that I need to see my future husband cry at least once before we get married. Why? Because I need to know that he can and is willing to display a wide range of emotions. But after some more thought, I feel like its more about me not wanting to feel like the only vulnerable person in the relationship. How do I deal with someone who expresses themselves differently…a way I'm not used to? I feel like it has more to do with me not trusting J. Well, the feelings of me deeming J untrustworthy when I really wanted him to be the bad guy. I convinced myself that he was probably messing with somebody or many somebodies other than me when we were in a relationship. And decided that is why he was distancing himself from me. I couldn't think of any other reason at the time. I knew about what was going on in his life but I didn't think that was the reason. I feel like I was very selfish then. Or maybe more so scared and uncertain about a man I felt like a fell for too quickly. Although, all of those made-up characteristics I placed on him should be gone, they are still lingering in the background. The feelings are still hanging around.

The second is what makes me think that will be able to tell the authenticity of someone's feelings? I feel like I can feel other people's feelings. I can sense where someone is coming from. Which is why I could not completely convince myself that J was a bad guy because I did feel more great feelings than not so great ones. Then what am I expecting from him? To act like me? I don't want that. I'm looking for him to do something and I don't know what that is supposed to be. I just don't want to feel open and exposed anymore. I want to feel like he was/is just as emotionally invested as I was/am. He says cared for me then and does now but I don't know what is preventing me from completely embracing that. I think if I start really truly believing that J cared for me all this time and still does, then I will be opening myself up to a world of hurt. It like, I want the top popped on my shaken soda bottle of emotions but I don't want it to be initiated by him if he isn't interested embracing me fully. If the top is going to be popped and I know J isn't there to partake in all my feelings for him then I want to be the person who lets all of the shaken soda out and I direct the liquid down the sink, rinse out the empty bottle and prepare it for whatever, whomever, God wants to feel it with next. If I accept that J did and does care for me, then I feel like I will go back to feeling vulnerable and alone like I did once before. I would need him to put himself out there first. Tell me what he wants. Tell me how he feels. His vulnerability would make for a safe environment for me to openly and completely express my strong feelings for him. Or if he tells me he is not interested in forming a relationship that would be my signal to release the feelings I have. But because he hasn't done either of those things, I feel like all of these feelings I have for him are all bottled up inside and is causing frustration, anger, pain. My emotions feel volatile. Like I'm going to explode. It like a glass bottle of soda that has been shaken up. Open the lid with caution. Not that you will get hurt, but be ready. There is a lot of love and hurt in there. I just want the feelings (soda) to go away or be put to use. They need to be poured down the drain or J needs to start drinking. But is he thirsty…

So what am I supposed to do? How do I fix this? First I feel like I have given him too much power. This is crazy! He has the ability to affect my feelings and emotions and I don't like that. I feel like so much rests on whether or not HE decides to express is love for me ( I should say care because he never said love) or care for me, BUT even when he has demonstrated his affection it didn't suffice. It wasn't enough, I didn't understand it, or it wasn't in the form that I wanted. But that is ridiculous. Well it sounds ridiculous. Or maybe not so much. I feel like all of this is insecurity. Not insecurity about myself but insecurity in our interactions. I want to love him. Damn. But I'm scared that I going to end up feelings like once did. But why am I scared when he hasn't even mentioned him even thinking about getting in a relationship with me. Why should I care! This goes back to power thing. This doesn't feel good. So he can do one of three things: Tell me he wants to start a new relationship, blow me off, or says he wants to create a plutonic friendship. The second one feels like it would hurt, but one of two things would happen: I would back to thinking "see, I knew he really didn't care for me anyway" or I would take it in stride, the attachment would dwindle and it would be relatively easy to no longer deal with J anymore. The last option is a tough one. Especially given the bottled-up volatile emotional feelings I have for him. The whole time being his friend, I would be thinking of how I want to express my feelings towards him but couldn't because we were simply "friends". As for the first, in my head I would want the first.

I thought that if we were to decided to go back to a relationship and he treated me the way I need to be treated and I supported him the way he needs me to, then I would be able to actually feel that he cares for me and I would finally get the security I had been looking for in our relationship from before. It feels like I need him to prove to me that he cares for me. Is all of this about "fixing" the past, starting a new future or both? I'm at a standstill. I don't know how I am going to move forward with him. I feel I've been trying to convince myself of how I SHOULD feel and how I SHOULD handle J and I's situation but each attempt over the years has been unsuccessful. I feel like if he were to call me right now I wouldn't know what to say. I would still feel bottled up. I would be choosing my words carefully. Choosing my thoughts carefully, trying not to daydream about how I think we could be. This feels so stupid. Pointless is a better term. But not at the same time. Maybe because I feel like I should be able control this. I am told that God is not a God of confusion. What does that say about this situation? I feel like I either don't want him to ever call me again or call and profess his love for me (very storybook… I know). I don't think I can really deal with anything else. It's too difficult. Either option will allow me to have the space/opportunity/ability/support to do something with the carbonation in my cola bottle.