Last Friday I mailed an interesting combination of things. I mailed a box of Dan's stuff that I found when I was unpacking (somehow it got packed in with some of my stuff when we moved out of our apartment, and remained unpacked through our time in the house and my time in my apartment.) With it, I mailed a copy of "Mars and Venus on a Date" to my mom. I don't know what's weirder - that I had a copy of it in the first place or that I was mailing it unsolicited to my mom.
Before I mailed it, I flipped through to make sure there wasn't anything incriminating tucked in there. The only thing I found was a bookmark from the store where I bought it in St. Louis. I remember buying it on my first adventure outside of my apartment. It must have been my second day there, a Sunday, because I also remember coming home and sitting amongst boxes, reading the first sixty or so pages when I should have been unpacking because I was starting work the next day. I am not sure what inspried me to buy such a book. I mean, I moved to St. Louis partly as a response to being all but dumped by a guy who I am (and was) nearly certain is gay anyway. Man, was he hot.
So, I remember reading Mars and Venus on a Date, and thinking that the advice to commit to recognizing love in my life when it comes along was good advice. Many of the nights I was in St. Louis I would lay awake, pitching that idea out to the universe, that I was ready to recognize love when it came my way. Lo and behold, in my last few days there, surrounded again by boxes while I waited (endlessly) for a moving truck to show up, my mom called and told me that Dan had called the house and she gave him my number, or she got his number to give to me, or something. I think she told me that he was moving to California. So, I called him (or he called me) we talked, we decided to get together when I got back to Philly, and now, four years later, he never went to California and here I am divorced, recoupled, and living in the Midwest. Again.
I didn't look closely at the stuff in the box that I mailed to Dan. It seemed like an invasion. I looked around enough to be sure that it was all his stuff. There was a mini tape recorder, which I rewound for a few seconds, and listened for just long enough to hear his voice and confirm that it wasn't mine. (Where is my tape recorder anyway? The only thing I ever recorded on it were ntoes from fundraisers in St. Louis, and then a lot of me talking on the drive back to Philly.) There was some other junk in there that I recognized from his desk in our apartment, and an envelope from Zales. It was one of those things that, just when I think I am at my healthiest emotionally, makes my heart deflate. The little sound effects guy in my head picked up his trumpet and let fly a descending "Wah Wah Wah WAAAAAH." It was another month or two before I got around to getting the box of stuff to the UPS store, and something about mailing it --and the book to my mom-- left a shadow on me for a couple of days. I'm not sure why.
Dan, from what I can gather, is much better off, so it's not guilt anymore. That last post about not having angry breakups made me cringe after a day or two because it seemed sort of masturbatory, but maybe there was something to it. It's amazing how I can go a nice long time without thinking too much about being divorced, and then, whammo, a trip to the UPS store has me all freaked out for three days.
Of course, counseling my mom through her jdate posting for the past week didn't help matters. Last night she asked me if she could send the names of the guys who responded so I could look up their profiles and tell her what to do. I asked her if I had a choice. She said yes. So I said no, that's why she has Carole and Rhoda. Four years now my parents have been separated, but not divorced. That's nuts. In the time they have been separated, I moved in with someone, got engaged, married, divorced, met some one new, moved to Minneapolis with him, bought a house in Illinois and moved again, AND had time to get to the UPS store.
