The Slick Adventures of Downtown Girl

Breaking All The Ground

Monday, March 26, 2007 | posted by Kate | permalink | |

"Love is the answer,
At least for most of the questions in my heart
Like why are we here? And where do we go?
And how come it's so hard?
It's not always easy and
Sometimes life can be deceiving
I'll tell you one thing, it's always better when we're together..."
-Jack Johnson, 'Better Together'

So I have decided to revise my Monday post because what I wrote early was terribly boring, and I've got much more interesting things on my mind lately.

Like how I am trying to be a responsible person and get to bed at a regular time since alarms go off before 7 am (Yeeeeech!)

Like how tonight I could tell that R was all wound up getting his house cleaned and his laundry done and all of his studying set. The man's got a lot going on but he did make me dinner.

And me? In rare form, while he made us dinner, I laid on his couch. Heh. After I had dinner with him (he made a great pasta and a spinach salad!) I let him know I was going to get going (despite my pink overnight bag in his entryway). Real sweet, I threw my arms around his shoulders and smiled at him.

Me: "I'd like to stay and hang out, but know you probably won't do the same things you would if I wasn't here."
Him: "I'd like you to stay, too, (sigh) but I know you're right. And I pretty much only have tonight to get this stuff done for Wednesday."

Because I am ACTUALLY comfortable being at my place, (in my jammies, in my bed), I can say things like that and leave gracefully. No simmering or feeling resentful or disappointed. Because I know, even better, understand now, that there's always tomorrow, this weekend, next week. If I don't sleep in his arms tonight, it will be sometime soon. It doesn't kill him (or me) to miss the other one, to be left wanting to see the other, to wish that we could spend more time day by day.

A younger version of me would have stayed and then not understood why she didn't have his attention, why he became cross and tired. She would have made it about her when it really had nothing to do with her. This older version of me is somewhere closer to: "I deserve your full attention, and you deserve to get the things done that you need to do. When you're available to give me your full attention, let me know."

Besides, I knew I would feel awkward sitting on his couch or pretending to do other things while he was cleaning or studying or doing God-knows-what. Worse, if I was watching TV or something like that, he probably wouldn't want to get his stuff done, and he is clearly unsettled about the fact that his projects are not completed. And I know what that feels like. Finding balance in life for work, love, live, relaxation and everything else is something that no one else can show us.

I know he's got me as a priority, because he clearly dropped everything to make me dinner tonight. He was grateful that I recognized he needed the time tonight ('cause the month is ending soon and his deadlines loom) but was still disappointed that I had to go. He clearly would rather hang out and play. And this is what I want to see; that I'm important to him, that in his perfect world, we'd spend all kinds of time together no matter what day of the week it is.

And, he responded perfectly to the situation, making sure that we have plans for another weeknight this week; playfully reminding me to "pack a bag." Him making sure he was going to see me another night (and incidentally, the NEXT possible night he's available!) just cemented in my head that we can be on the same page throughout a busy week, that we can be flexible but still loving, that I can be important but not always need to be first. He walked me out into the warm night, my bag slung over his strong shoulders. (I feel happy that I have someone I pack overnight bags to go and see, and that my guy doesn't seem to mind what it looks like when he carries my incredibly feminine bags.)

You know what, R? I think I'm REALLY starting to get the hang of this whole relationship thing. Somehow, with you, I'm unselfish without keeping score, giving without giving too much, thoughtful without conceding what I really want. I am really excited about who I am when I'm with you, because it's still me. I am capable of loving you, without losing me. Even if in three weeks, three years, thirty years, we're not together, and our love only lives in my memory, I will know that you were the first man I was able to love without rearranging myself to do so. I don't think you realize how much I have grown in the past year, in the past six months, in the past six weeks. I met and had the good fortune to fall in love with you at an incredibly interesting point in my life.

On this warm spring night here in downtown, all I can think is: Look at us, baby. Look at us. Look at me, in love with you, breaking all the ground.

"She's breaking all the ground,
breaking all the ground,
breaking all the ground out from underneath
she keeps breaking all the ground
breaking all the ground
breaking all the ground out from underneath..."
Joe Firstman, 'Breaking All The Ground'