I'm very slow at times. Often I will realise, hours later, the mood of a situation I was previously in, or the real reason for a person's actions or words. And of course I only realise when it is
too late to say or do anything.
On Sunday night I stormed outta S's place at midnight, yet again, after she'd crept off to the spare room. The usual argument. She said she was having trouble sleeping in that bed, but I'd noticed her sighing in exasperation everytime I fell asleep. When I fall asleep I am told my breathing changes, from normally loud to chainsaw idling.
One of those frustrating things that you cannot measure yourself short of leaving a video camera with sound recording as you fall asleep. Actually that's a good plan.
My snoring gets so bad at times with S that I am so on edge I am literally trying not to fall asleep in my usual way, an impossible task as sleep is perhaps the most basic of human tasks, hardwired from birth.
I can understand that snoring is the kind of thing a person could put up with in the first few years of a relationship but then find it annoys them so much they just cannot stand another breath of a partner they once thought they loved.
I've a friend that says that if you don't reproduce with a partner in the first three years of interaction, then we are wired to abandon the partner and move on to another potential partner.
Perhaps my snoring is just biology's excuse, just the reason it uses to abandon me for the next potential breeder...
So on Sunday night, I was wincing every few minutes as I crept into slumber. Eventually S got up, had a fag out the front and never came back. Alone, in the dark, (to use a cliche), I stewed and stewed. Just so angry. I had come over to her place to spend a night with her. I wasn't going to stay a night in an unfamiliar bed all alone just to wake earlier than usual and leave earlier than usual, to drive S to work.
So S confronted me as I left, told me it wasn't my breathing, it was just "that bed". I said "I came here to sleep with you, and you don't want to do that so I'm going". All sad and repetitive. I was told that I was being very rude, then S turned and walked back to her bed.
A day went by, neither contacted the other. I ate dinner alone, slept alone. Tuesday afternoon S rang me at work, all jolly, no recriminations. We ate dinner, and she left fairly early.
The next day, today, was her birthday. I bought the usual payday gabo, picked up takeaway dinner from the local Italian. The gear was strong but strange. It put up a wall between us, as gear does at times. We laughed together at a Hamish and Andys' Christmas Special. At one stage she asked "What's in your purple bag?"
I told her there was a book, I had brought a book. Why could I not mention there were a pair of work pants, and socks and underpants? Why did I just say a book? Why after over ten years on and off together can neither of us say basic things like "I want to stay here tonight"? I know I avoid such statements because I expect her to not have the same feelings. A woman who hasn't wanted me physically for seven years is hardly likely to say something along the lines of needing me.
I think we've both hurt each other so much we're both too afraid to reveal personal desires to each other anymore. .
But then what is the point of a relationship if you cannot do that?
So I said I just had a book. Not long after she said I should take the extra cream home. Her way of saying I was to go home. Later on she said "You would make me happy if you went home."
At the time, hurtful statements on a birthday. That's all I heard.
But in context, we were still really only a few emotional minutes after I left in the middle of Sunday night. She was still hurting from that I guess, and did not feel any obligation to be sympathetic to me, or show me kindness.
I know that gear prevents emotional growth, but in a relationship it also acts as a false skin, piling on over the wounds, never fixing, just hiding, allowing you to scratch an otherwise tender spot again and again, whereas without gear, the pain of scratching a wound would stop you the instant you brushed it.
Clumsy analogies, childish pop-psychological interpretations. What else do I have? Just a strong desire to wean off gear. And maybe putting these words down electronically has helped me realise I should apologise for leaving Sunday night. Not sure if it's the right thing for me to do but it's feels like a nice thing to do?
Yes, I'll send an SMS to her now...
Watching the 1981 Day of the Triffids BBC mini-series. Very 28 days later with all its abandoned London and post-apocalypse recovery. The original and the best. I watched it as a ten year old, I was a big fan of Wyndham's back then.
Happy birthday S.