I have to make it clear up front that NOBODY reading this has contributed to this rant. I promise, the people who inspired this have no idea my blog exists. Just so you know. OK now read it.
Kirsten: Hello. What a charming tie.
Person: Thank you. I'm very rad. Who is your boyfriend?
K: His name is Reboyfriend, most specifically on my blog, which is the only thing that matters because everyone who reads it is magic and I treasure them. I still get butterflies when I see pictures of Rbf.
P: Where is he?
K: He lives in heaven.
P: I'm sorry to hear of your loss.
K: Thanks. Me too. We just got headstones. So pretty. Want to see?
P: No. I want to circumvent social norms to ask if you've started to date again.
K: I'd rather talk about going to India.
P: But I'm really preoccupied with your single status. It's an odd number, and that makes my married, middle-aged ass SUPER uncomfortable. I want your status to be different.
K: Me too.
P: I'm going to say things about you getting married someday so that I can sleep better tonight.
K: I can see that. And I'm saying really polite things to dismiss this issue and reroute the conversation.
P: Yeah, I'm missing all of those cues.
K: I can see that also.
P: Sooo. Have you started dating yet?
K: No.
P: But you're too cute. You can't be alone forever.
K: I can't? I am pretty sure it's allowed. So, technically I can.
P: No you can't. Being single is like being an armless legless torso person, who has to find a way to get all their food from the dumpster behind Jimmy John's.
K: I do very well alone.
P: No you don't. Being alone is the worst thing that can ever happen to anyone ever. Nobody has ever survived it.
K: I'm OK.
P: Nope.
K: ..............
P: Did I mention you're too cute to be alone? I'm cloaking this in compliments so it goes down easier and then you can't easily paint me as a complete tool. You're pretty, you don't deserve to be alone.
K: Thanks. Well, I'm working on destroying my complexion and waistline so that I look more like people who DO deserve to be lonely and miserable.
P: Oh ruk ruk ruk!!! (That's how a complete tool's laughter is spelled)
K: I'm really just doing my own thing these days, haven't really thought about that.
P: Yeah it's really soon after the accident I guess...
K: Yeah! You said something right! I think we might have diverted the conversation before you hurried to throw in "But you'll find someone."
P: ...But you'll find someone.
K: OK. Well I don't know if I need to "find" someone since I'm not looking right now. But I'm staying busy, trying to heal, and trying to have fun. I have really great friends and my family is incredible.
P: {lunging at me} But you WILL get married.
K: Behh Ok. Sure, maybe.
P: NOT MAYBE.
K: Mumble fidget clear throat hate awful bad evil this is such a fail, my cuticles could not be more fascinating. Is that some sort of silver Ford Taurus? Those are interesting too. I need to stare off that way.
P: NOT MAYBE. Why are you ruining this for me? I wanted to sound sage, and all-knowing. I also can't handle your reality. It scares me. YOU HAVE TO AGREE WITH ME.
K: So when you buried your partner, your lover, your other half, your best friend, your everything...how long did it take you to replace them?
P: Who knows. I've never buried a partner or a lover or my other half or my best friend or my everything. All those people are alive and thriving! OH and I forgot to throw in the disclaimer that I certainly don't mean to imply that Rbf is REPLACEABLE even though that's pretty much what I'm implying.
K: Oh. So after God appeared to you to tell you about my future, did He command that you shove it down my throat like this?
P: I'm really tempted to not correct you, because I like the sound that one part, about God appearing to me with imperatives regarding your fate.
You know what I wish I could say?
Besides STFU?
That I know something they don't - and I'm not referring to my awareness of boundaries and general manners. I mean I know something about them that they don't know. Some people have a very strong compulsion to tell me this about my life and future, that I'm bound to live it in _____ fashion. It's a common reaction of people confronted with my situation. It makes them uncomfortable. Most of them don't know that the reason they fixate on convincing me of their idea of my life, is that it makes them feel better. Not me. They don't know that, but I do.
They have no idea that it is still painful to me to have it pointed out. And most don't recognize my resistance, and therefore force the topic - insisting with absolutes like "can't" and certainties like "you will."
My objection is not faux-modesty. I'm not holding out to solicit assurance. Know what it is? The sad truth that I really just want to pretend, for a little longer, that he's just around the corner. This force-feed is like telling me that he's not. And it's like losing him all over again. I wish people could understand this. I know it's sad, that it's naive, and that it's going to hurt when it wears off. But I wish people would just play along. Not because it's true, but because it's the polite thing to do.
The only thing people need to be concerned about his this: Every single second of my whole future was deleted, and I'm still just trying to grasp that. The only thing I ask is that I have a little more time with just question marks there where my future used to be. I wish people would please stop rewriting it for me. I'm not ready to have it retold by someone else, someone who knows nothing about what this feels like - by someone whose future is still theirs to call "tomorrow." It may sound like a happy ending to them, but it feels like a kick in the face to me.
When my life is eventually rewritten, it will be solely authored by me. And told by me. I will not hear it from someone else. There is nobody who knows my experience except for me. I want to be the person who announces it if I've moved on, if I've let him go. And most importantly, I want it to be OK with others if I never do. I want people to be comforted by my peaceful decision to live an authentic life, whether or not someone's by my side. My biggest fear is not dying unmarried; it's dying unaccomplished. When people speculate on the likelihood that I'll backfill his role in my universe, it's not a comfort. It's scribbling all over the blank slate I paid everything for. And it hurts. And this is the most sense I've been able to make of that anger. And I'm so glad I have a place to yell about it.
This little exchange of cluelessness happens to me probably about once a week. When I mentioned that I wasn't really thinking about "that" right now, that Rbf isn't someone you move on from in just one year, a man recently responded "Aw, OK now, that's a real nice sentiment, but you are too young to be by yourself forever." He was so condescending and tactless it was breathtaking. After he walked off, I turned around and pouted into the shoulder of my bestie Jason. He knew it was coming and just said "Kir, he's an ass." I asked him why it's always old, married people who do this? It's highly possible that the offender heard me say this, peppered with my signature f-bombs. I'm weirdly content with that being true. Could it be that the big fat lesson he thought he was being bestowed upon me was actually his to learn? Who knows. But the point isn't whether or not it's true. The point is whether or not it's nice to say to someone. Do I come up and tell a 50 year old man that he's about 40 pounds overweight? That his house is totally upside down in value? That his sweet teenage daughter is SOOOO not a virgin? Do I throw it in his face, even when it becomes clear to me that he does not feel like believing that right now? I wish some people weren't so damn stupid.
I still wonder if I'm in a weird dream that I'll wake up from any day, and roll over and tell Rbf all about. A year is a long time to feel that way. Sigh.
That was an epic vent-out, if there was one. Thanks for listening. Love to you.
/Fin/
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