I don’t seem to be good at maintaining intense long-term relationships. But I do have relationships.

Yesterday we had lunch with two lovely ladies from our community. They are both grandmothers who do not have local grand babies and they have a lot of love and energy to spare. I feel grateful to know them. I have known one for about six years now and the other is newer to our lives.

Yesterday my friend came to dinner. He is a good friend. He is a complicated friend. I’ve known him for thirteen years. We have been lovers and play partners. I have hurt him and he has hurt me. We have been vulnerable together. We have created magick together. Now we have an entirely vanilla platonic relationship and he is great with my kids.

Pam is having anxiety and I stepped in it so she is avoiding me along with the paper she doesn’t want to write. I hope she comes back. I think she will. She has been my good friend for fourteen? fifteen? something like that years. She knows my gentle pokes about finishing this stage are only about love. Her culture uses a lot more pressure than I do. I’m pretty sure this one isn’t on the final knell.

But every time there is a lapse or a pause or anything I have to be prepared. I have to harden my heart every time. Because I don’t know when will be the last time I speak to her again. If I allow myself to worry too much about her loving me then I will cease to function. Our relationship is too distant and occasional. I cannot need her. If I have need for her it will go unmet and I will just have to suck it the fuck up.

I am allowed to feel attached to people who are in a space with me and behaving in a positive manner towards me. If someone is not with me then I need to make the assumption that (s)he will behave in the manner that is suitable to them and there may be little overlap with what would be positive for me. That has to just be ok. I am not in every space. Every space does not have to conform to me.

I can’t feel like I need to have influence over things I am not a part of. It has to be none of my business. But that way madness lies. I am deeply concerned about people and things around me.

Shanna has been asking me “how do you know if a question is rude?” Ha. You don’t know until you have stepped in it. Life sucks that way. Some people will try and tell you that there are hard and fast rules but they are wrong. There are *no* hard and fast rules for what is polite or not.

People can ask me “rude” questions that I don’t find rude at all. I would rather be asked the questions that bother other people than the questions that make other people feel comfortable.

People differ.

I can’t be all bad. For all my existential angst I am having a bloody hard time carving out alone time because people want to see me. (I’m not complaining. I have to say no to some invitations and that’s something I have to learn. Please keep inviting me to things. It is good.)

I don’t know how to have boundaries around my energy very well. Sometimes going out is a massive drain of energy. Sometimes it is a source of energy. I also have “Don’t fail in public” energy reserves I keep around. I’m very worried about saving face. Because I know that fucking up in public is dangerous.

That tendency scares the shit out of me. I don’t like secrets. I don’t like feeling like I am skulking off to do terrible things out of the sight of other people.

That’s why I pretty much instantly confess my sins to you, oh internet. I’m not alone. I have terabytes of company.

I have two kids who want me to pull them out of the sticker puddle. Gotta go.