“Oh. So, listen to this,” I said, as I tore off a piece of crust. I like to eat that part first.
“What?” asked Thalia.
It was Saturday night and she and Sean were over for one of our catch-ups. Usually I will (attempt to) cook on these nights but since I was still reeling from the previous week’s breakdown, we decided to just order in pizza.
“I was right.”
“Right about what?” asked Sean. He wasn’t looking at me and was engrossed in rolling his pizza slice into a manageable proportion.
“Right about Jonathan. He didn’t get back together with his ex-girlfriend after all.”
Sean froze and looked across the table at me. “Wow.”
“How do you know?” Thalia asked as she took a sip of water.
“I asked him. After I posted ‘Hurricane Crazy’, I just had to know the truth. So I texted him that night.”
“And what did he say?” Sean said.
“That he thought it was the easiest way to shut it down and also to make himself take the blame.” I looked down at my plate. “I mean, I kind of knew, but I thought it was so crazy to think that, that he would lie about something like that – I thought I must be wrong. So I figured it had to be be true. That he’d gotten back together with his ex and had been lying to me the whole time.” I bit my lip. “I think it was a pretty shitty thing to do actually. It made me question everything.”
“Yeah,” said Thalia. “That is pretty shitty.”
I put my pizza to the side and looked at them. “I mean, I don’t understand why he didn’t just tell me the truth. If he’d said, ‘Look, I’m just not into this anymore’ or ‘You are a crazy drunk bitch and I can’t take it anymore,’ I totally could have understood that. But this…this I don’t get.”
“Some people have a hard time saying things like that, Tracey,” counseled Thalia.
“Yeah,” I said, my voice rising to a whine. “But why didn’t he just stick to the story then? By eventually telling me the truth, he made me feel even worse about myself. Just as I expected, he really was just saying it to get away from me.”
“I’m sorry, Tracey,” said Sean.
I sighed and picked up my plate. “Oh, it’s okay. None of this matters now anyway. And I still got a lot out of the experience.”
“Especially the motorcycle ride. Don’t forget about that,” said Thalia, pointing her glass at me.
“Yes,” I laughed. “That’s true. I’ll always have that.”
When I originally started working on this post, I was going to have it end something like: “When I first met Jonathan someone said, ‘Well, if nothing else, he sounds like a great guy who maybe you can be friends with,’ and then I was going to write: “Yeah, we could have been friends. We could have. Except that I’m not friends with liars.”
I thought that would be a real zinger of a send off.
But then I realized I didn’t want to do that. I promised myself when I started this blog that I would never use it as a forum to trash someone. Even when I was writing the Wordsmith Series, I tried to be very mindful to focus less on his actions (which are, of course, only from my perception) and more on my reactions to the situation. The reason for this is, I don’t want the people in my life to feel they have to monitor their actions for fear of public retaliation. That is no way to conduct a relationship.
I don’t want to write out of spite.
But of course, if you betray me, you are going down in a written Hellfire of searing soot and flames. You won’t even be able to catch your breath.
J/K 🙂
I will only use my Blogpowers for good.
Despite how it all ended, I’m still really glad I met Jonathan. I learned not to be so judgmental, learned that there are some serious patterns in my life I have to fix and I’ve come up with a plan to fix them, learned that support can come from the most unexpected of places. And I’m glad I learned these things now, with him, as opposed to someone who was here locally and a true contender.
So yeah, he lied. So what. I forgive him, as I hope he forgives me for all my parts in this. He probably felt he had no other choice. It’s actually pretty incredible. I mean, can you imagine? You’re so desperate to get away from someone, you make up a lie that not only makes you look like an asshole but you know then will be written about publicly? My god. How desperate do you have to be?
It’s almost funny if you think about it.
I’m sure someday I’ll think it’s funny.
Yeah.
Probably.
And now we move on.
Not Quite A Cougar 
Yeah Tracey! We learn something from each experience. Go you!
Thank you Erin! We really do!
I am amazed at the similar experiences we seem to have. Thank you for voicing what i could only put in my journal. A definite learning for me. Thank you for sharing your story.
Thank you so much Alison. It really helps me as well to write about it.
I love this post. It is by far one of my favorites.
I connect with it because of the Trainer. I love him. He is bad for me, but I choose to love him and I continue to because of what loving him has taught me.
Why do we have to “move on” always??? I don’t want to move on because I’d forget what I’ve learned. What we have learned – lessons that
should be carried with us from one relationship to the next. You’ll grow from this. I will grow from reading the blog 😘 and therefore others will too.
Somewhere imbedded in his behavior, the lying knowing it’s implications, is a lesson and a message. We, as women and not just you as the person involved, need to head it so that the next man can reap the benefits.
All of these men, the loves lost, the assholes, the cowards… They’re perfecting us for Him. The more practice we have with these assholes, the better off we will be when the right guy comes along. You’ve got this T. I have every confidence.
Thank you so much Kait. This is a great note and so true. When I look back at the progression of guys over the past few years: The Wordsmith to The Pilot to My Ex to The Texan, I see that each person gets one step closer to the kind of person I am a good match for. And the relationship gets one step closer to what I want. It’s really interesting. Thank you for the thoughtful comment.
As Spock would say, “fascinating.” In more cynical moments, my theory is that people are dishonest in this way less out of a desire to protect the other person than to preserve their own self-image—as in, if someone were to just come out and say (cliché alert) “Yeah, I’m just not that into you,” they somehow might feel worse about themselves because they know the other person will be more deeply wounded, and they don’t want to pay the freight for that. But like I say, that’s a very ungenerous belief, so I try to keep those thoughts to a minimum.
I have something vaguely similar to this going on right now—a situation where it seems to me someone I would like to be closer to might be behaving in an evasive or (at times) dishonest way because maybe hey, they’re just not that into me—and this isn’t even as “serious” a situation as yours, so you’d think this sort of game-playing would be completely unnecessary.
I was very, very briefly on the cusp of being on the “Jonathan” side of this issue also a little while ago, when it was obvious someone was pretty “into” me and it also got very clear to me that, for reasons both superficial and substantial, I couldn’t return the interest. But that person bolted from my orbit before I had to make that choice – maybe somehow I sent out the signal without really knowing it.
But oh, sweet Christmas, when you’re on the receiving end of this, how it does hurt hurt hurt. And the kicker with this stuff sometimes is that the lonelier one feels, the worse behavior from others one is often prepared to indulge simply because you think this is all you’re gonna get, or deserve, ever again. As you say though, turning it around to decide that what you’re really in control of is how you choose to react to everything is the real key.
Thank you Nick. These are great thoughts. I definitely think that when you get through situations like this that all you really can do is just try to learn from it so you’ll be better prepared for the next time around.
And now you use this experience and apply it to the next. That’s how it works :). Don’t change too much though. The right one will love your quirkiness. Xoxox
That’s the plan!! Thank you Jenn 🙂
Ditto what Jennifer said. 😀