Happy Solstice, as so many of you are ahead of us in time zones. Father’s Day. Juneteenth. Much to mark and celebrate.
You are all astute people, and I am sure you could have seen this coming a mile away, but Mr. B. totally spaced my birthday. He ended up going to a play that a number of his friends from prison were putting on, a fun gay/trans version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
I woke up yesterday morning on my birthday with intestinal cramping that I managed enough to get through class and out to breakfast with Mrs. Sherlock but was wondering how the heck I was going to manage this digestive discomfort in an intimate setting later, so in a strange way it was a relief that he forgot.
Hello, aging body. Good to know you. I am feeling somewhat better this morning. I don’t know if it is a bug, or something I ate but, ugh.
The good news is that I did no League stuff yesterday at all. Nada. None. And I took all my seedlings, there were about 10 of them, down to the garden and spent a bunch of time putting them in and puttering. It is so rare that I get to spend an open-ended amount of time down there. It was a warm clear day and by the time I arrived it was in the partial shade.
On Thursday, the reason I couldn’t help with the League contract stuff was that I had a commitment to go to the Dialogue Group and a Board Meeting after to talk about some slight revisions to our mission statement. This meant I was going to see Walt for the first time in 3 weeks. Mr. B. was working and not available so that simplified things.
I met the Korean painter at the bus stop, and we rode out together and had a pleasant chat. She is blissfully unaware of the underlying dynamics here. She asked about that young man, she couldn’t remember his name, the one that recently got out of prison and was seeing his sons for the first time in years.
Walt’s partner showed up a few minutes after we started the group. She rarely comes. She was quite friendly afterwards as we were putting the chairs away and the room back together. I admit I was curt with her. And Walt assured me that the board meeting would be short, and he would give me a ride home.
I am like, ugh, again, dreading the prospect. In the end as the board meeting was wrapping up, I looked at him and said, I am going to take the bus home. And I did. A bus with a toddler screaming at the very top of his substantial lungs. Wow.
So yesterday, midday after I get home from my birthday breakfast/brunch I get a text from Walt. “Can we meet (at a local café to me) today or sometime this weekend?” Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.
And then when I am at the garden, a text, it was a beautiful decorated one from his partner wishing me a happy birthday. The Painter was in my morning class and must have mentioned it was my birthday. They are in daily contact. This is all getting a crazy incestuous feeling to me.
Later when Mr. B. tells me he is going to a play instead of coming over to hang with me I asked him if the play was Walt’s idea. He got mad at me and said, no I just got off work and haven’t talked to Walt in days…
(It is funny because some of the people in this version of the play were in the production in prison that Walt directed and the movie {film} was made about, so Walt was in fact behind all this… as is William Shakespeare.)
Anyway, I wasn’t angry because Mr. B. chose the play over hanging with me, I didn’t feel good, I was angry because he got mad at me for jumping to what appeared to be an obvious conclusion.
I am not making excuses for him. It sucked. And it hurt. Big Time. But I knew this thing was fleeting and he has so much going on, there is no room in there for me right now. It was fun! We had fun.
And I learned so much about myself, and where I am presently, and what is important to me and what I need.
And knowing that going forward, finding a way to get those needs met is going to be a challenge I may not be fully, (how do younger people say it?) resourced for this.
And now I have a date to meet Walt today at the café at 2 PM.
This reminds me a lot of all the drama that occurred when I first me Mr. Finch and his group of poets and we started our companionship, and our relationship with Open Diary. So much drama! But I was a lot younger then.
What the heck did I expect hanging around with a group of actors, painters, musicians, writers, photographers and craftspeople?
The amazing Miss E. sent birthday greetings from Dublin and also Mr. P.O.A. my heartbreaker love from San Francisco, who is 82 now, also remembered my birthday. I was quite touched by that.
A perk of getting older, (if one is in a reflective mood) is perspective. I have had, and am having, a wild, sweet and rich life.
And it ain’t over yet.
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