Please bear with me, while the Idiot is changing

I know, I keep saying "it won't happen again", and yet I pass judgement on you and what you do, I give my unsolicited opinion, and I repeatedly hear but do not listen without judging.

I am trying. Really. The break that you imposed had caused me to think and reflect on myself, and I have been trying.

All the work in the past two weeks has been cancelled out in one fell swoop by my idiocy last night. That won't happen again.

I know these mental habits of mine are my bad habits, my weaknesses, and they are the very things that cause me to say the wrong things at the wrong time to you, causing you distress. It also applies to when I speak with other people.

But it is going to take some time, and won't be an overnight change. I am sorry for the inconvenience, and ask for your patience that I am not Mr. Perfect but am Mr. Aspiring to Be Perfect.

So please be patient while I continue striving to be better. And as a friend, please let me know (as you always have) whenever I am not listening to you, and I am being a total prick.

Misunderstood

You asked, are you really a bad person?

No. You're not a bitch either, if that is what you're thinking.

You are, though, one of the most misunderstood people I know. You are one of the sweetest people I know, willing to do a lot for friends as I have seen you do before at IUB and here. At the same time, you have this hard exterior which makes you as approachable as the Great Firewall Of China, to those who do not know you well. In other words, you are very much like creme brulee: hard outside and soft inside. That is a description which people who do know you somewhat, from back in Germany (our host mothers), would probably agree.

I know, it sounds like flattery. But flattery implies trying to flatter in order to gain something in return: I'm not expecting to gain anything at all.

I'm sorry I told you all the things I told you tonight. As you said, you were already feeling down and out. For me to say all those things just added to your misery, and made you clam up. It was cruel of me. It was petty. It was also completely wrong.
I said all those unspeakable things, for which you probably will not give me a second-chance to remedy and to make up.

I blame myself, my idiocy, the moment of madness that made me say those things because it seemed like the right thing to do at that time.

I blame myself for passing judgement on you, and thus spoiling an evening which I had originally intended as an evening for you to enjoy yourself, to relax, to forget.

When you finally read this, I don't know if you will ever forgive me, or if you are now too scarred. If, like last week, you decide not to communicate with me, I understand.

I can only hope that you will forgive me some day, and allow me to make up for it somehow. And also that you can forgive my friends, who, in all likelihood, told me those things they said in order to help me let go of you last week. Friends say things to friends which are meant to console, which means there is always a particular slant and bias. In all likelihood, they probably didn't say those things or mean it in that way; it was probably the same meanspirited mind of mine at that time that interpreted it that way.

I am sorry, and seek your forgiveness.

Missing a dog

I know this sounds weird, but I have been missing the dog outside your house for the past week.

He's such a nice dog, and I love just petting him on the head and talking with him.

Pensive apologies

I have been thinking about my past actions.

And I realize, a lot of times, I was not listening to you. I heard,but did not listen.
Or I gave too much "advice" or my own opinion, instead of listening to you. It's something I will change, not for you, but as part of my personal programme.

And I still haven't thanked you for your candour, for your bluntness when you told me your decision.

Time

Maybe the same waves of time that have now rented us apart
and swept you away
might someday bring you back
as a different person
as a different soul
to a different me
in a different reality.

Who knows?

Mornings

I miss you most in the mornings. Nowadays, I wake up alone in my own bed, looking outside of the window at the reddish blue sky.

Somedays when I do not turn on the air conditioning, I wake up with the same humid air on my skin, and the feeling of unbearable warmth as my stale sweat sticks to my back.

I think of the mornings when we woke up side by side, on that mattress of yours in your rented room.

I miss your warmth. I miss your laugh. I miss your big smile and your twinkling eyes as you laughed at me. I miss laughing together with you, at something, at nothing, at each other, at myself.

I miss you pointing at your own tummy and complaining that you are fat. Right before we parted, I had said your tummy looked bigger than normal. Maybe it was inflated in my eyes by our impending parting of ways; in reality it was probably not too different from normal.

I still think you are very beautiful, and I am still very much in love with you, but differently. Now, I'm in love with you but willing to let you go, to let you do what you have and want to, and for me to move on with my own life.

I hope you are happy, and I sincerely wish for you to be happy, to be free from anger, fear, the feelings of insecurity.

And when your feelings of annoyance subside, drop me a line. Hopefully we can be friends again.

Being single for a while

I can't bear to be with anyone else right now.

Right now, I'm feeling depressed about our relationship not working out.

I try to distract myself with work, which is picking up; and I know that you don't really care, because you have succeeded in not caring about how I feel about the matter, and because you have succeeded in overcoming your feelings for me as well as your guilt.

Yet sometimes, I wish I could just talk to you. To hear you talk about your day. To talk with you about my day, and how shitty things go or how well work is.

Sometimes I feel so alone, and a lot of times you are the person who understood me best, even while I was surrounded by friends.

I miss you. And I can't be with anyone else for a while. You've set the standards so high...

Something random

You remember the lady who we met at the university fair, who came with her two sons and kept talking on behalf of them?

Yeah, she turns out to be a very high-level person within my umbrella organization. It was so bizarre meeting her today.

It's getting trying

After these few days of not getting any response from you in reply to my email, it is a little hard to take sometimes.

There are so many things that i want to tell you, but which you no longer want to hear.

I don't blame you. Afterall, you have already made a decision, and you are sticking to it as you invariably do: I could see it in your eyes when you bravely told me the decision to be single, that it was set. That it was permanent.

Right then, I had reacted badly. Instead of taking things like a man, instead of appreciating your candour and your forthrightness, I had blurted things which I now regret intensely. I clung on tighter, which repulsed you even more. I clung on so tightly that like a full grown man holding tightly to a slightly-built woman, I hurt you.

And I became even more selfish. In a way, I became a monster.

Now your hurt is over, and things have changed. Or have they? I cannot help wondering half the time, is there no sentiment left, on your part, or has time and work already succeeded in obliterating all your emotions that you used to have for me?

That night when you said to me things while you were intoxicated, on the phone, which the very next day you denied saying any of that, I can't help wondering if it is true that "in vino veritas", and maybe you were telling me some truths? Or perhaps it was true right then, and no longer true now.

I, for one, am keeping to my word. I will no longer do what I did in the past, i.e. to break my word to you. Now that you have made it clear that you consider me to be a pest and an annoyance interfering with your work, I won't disturb you anymore.

And even though now we are on the same island, in the same time zone, I will try and consider of you as being non-existent, even though, seriously, I miss having you around me, just as a buddy.

I love you. Not as any category, as in any relationship or anything, but I just want you to be happy, with or without me.

Hello

I hope things are going well for you.

Non-communication time

Hey,

So I've decided that I want to communicate with you later, and to not communicate with you for a while. In the meantime, though, I'm going to use this blog to write down what I want to say to you; and really, whether you read it or not in the future, it doesn't really matter.

I want to give you some time now with your life, with settling into your new job et al, and to not interfere. The last thing I want to do is to be the Ex-Boyfriend hankering after you, harassing you in the way that I was harassed, interfering with your life and trying to wiggle into your life when you want to live a life on your own and not be under my shadow, so to speak.

I'm really glad for you that your life is turning out to be good now, with your new confirmed job, and all this work which is occupying your time! It's good, no? And it seems to be a potentially good launching pad for you.

Hey, by the way, I wanted to tell you that I really like you music mix which you had made on my computer. I had it on my iPod, and it's a really good and smooth mix of music: you have a real ear for DJ-ing, and you really should consider doing it.

It's hard letting go, and sometimes I feel down and depressed, like I did two days ago. It helps to meditate, which I've been doing a lot of. Maybe it wouldn't take so long for me to get out of samsara ("Next Station ... Nibbana") afterall...

That said, I really want to continue being your friend. So maybe in order to do that, I should just give you some time alone, I think. As I said before, I need the time alone as well, to be by myself, to relax, to be happy.

And I am happy being single, right now. I attended this vipassana meditation session last night, and it helped tremendously in calming my mind down. Especially after the night before, when I was so full of angst and tension that I was unable to sleep at all, last night was a huge relief to be sitting in a giant meditation hall, with my mind calmed down and feeling a lot better about things than previously. The metta bhavana was especially helpful in sorting out the knots within me, and I can't help but think that maybe, that might be helpful for you too.

On to personal matters, I told my parents that I was going to help JM. My mother advised me to tell my father that I was doing this to help JM, and thankfully, I listened to her: it worked like a dream. He didn't scream or shout or react angrily the way he does when he feels sad; rather, he just asked a few questions and then left it at that. Later on he told my mother that "yeah, it is a good idea for him to do it for a year or so, let him see how things are living by himself..."

:D

I'm so excited about living by myself now, you've no idea....
:D :D :D

Gloomy day

Jeez, the weather today is awful. Overcast and gloomy.

Usually I love this weather, but not today, not when I'm feeling gloomy myself.

And not when I've been without much sleep since last night. I've slept maybe 3 hrs the whole time?

I'm beginning to dread work; in general I'm feeling very ambivalent about it. It's a nice work environment, very slow-paced and very nice and calm. The people here are very nice and friendly as well.

But except for one boss, I really don't click with any of them. It's a constant effort trying to talk with them, and it gets very tiring after a while. There's very little joie de vivre in this place.

Feeling very down and dead

I wasn't able to sleep for the whole of last night.

The moment I hit the sack, the minute my head crashed into the pillow, I tensed up as thought flowed through my head like a neverending stream.

I don't blame her for her decision. Afterall, I had made a similar decision about my previous relationship, right before I got together with her, and she had helped me smoothen the turmoil.

It's just this feeling of deja vu, going back to where I never wanted to go back again.

Maybe it is because this is happening right at the exact same bedroom as all my previous breakups. The same bed, the same bathroom, the same freaking flat.

The same voidness beneath, the same empty feeling, the same gastric troubles are popping up again. I feel nauseous, yet hungry.

I need to vent to someone who can listen, to someone who can help me ease the trouble, but I know deep down inside that nobody can. I know that the only person who can solve this is myself, and I need to solve it myself. Nobody else can tackle my pain except myself, in much the same way that nobody can pee for me except on my own.

I have this constant urge to look for signs, be they signs from her, or signs from horoscopes or what have you. Normally I don't pay heed to those bullshit stuff. In fact, I despised that habit of an ex girlfriend. And yet, what do I make of this breakup-out-of-the-blue, when I had read it in her horoscope and though, "bah, bunch of bullshit", and it turns out to be true?

Of course it is probably just a one-off, and the rest of the thing is just bullshit.

It hurts that she is so unequivocal and certain about "we are not in a relationship" now, and that she loves me now as an ex-bf. A part of me wants to use this time to improve myself, and to win her back by being strong, and being able to take this alone-time and be constructive.

Another part of me just wants to give up everything, let this pass, and just move on. Yet another part wants to scream out to the world, to vent it all out and to cry, ridiculously.

I think there's no reason why I shouldn't use the time now to improve myself, and be constructive. Whether she decides to return to me or not, I'll at least feel better about myself instead of feeling all sorry about myself, as I do right now.

Note about Content

Now, she's not a dumb girl, so I'm not going to post every single thing I've written on the public blog: some things which are too emotional are just going to stay private as drafts. I'm not going to change this, so if some entries seem a bit incoherent, this is the reason, and please bear with me for a bit.

First Post - Beginning of Purgatory

Until purgatory ends, I'll be posting here online, separate from my other blogs.

Hopefully 'she' will not notice that there has been an additional blog in my profile. But then, she usually doesn't notice such things, I think.

So, Purgatory has started for me, since we're in the stage of the relationship now where she officially gets a 'break' to think whether she really wants to be with me or not.

In the meantime, I can either break down completely and die, or be positive about it and take a different approach.

This blog will be a registry of my daily ups and downs as I live in Relationship Purgatory.

Why would I want to do this note-taking, so to speak?
Because it helps, as it's probably my only sure way of venting.
Because it helps me make sense of the irrational and the seemingly nonsensical.
Because deep inside, I think I'm pretty scarred.
And because the web accords an anonymity that nobody from work, play, school, community centres etc. will recognize this as coming from a guy living in Purgatory. Why? Because I need to maintain this melodramatic lie of normalcy, maybe because this will help me get over this crazy period of my life.

Undoubtedly I will probably live until I'm 40+, and maybe laugh when I encounter this blog again. Or maybe not.