Tuesday

Dana has agreed to help my dad finish the house so I can get out of town faster, which is just superhuman of her, and one of the reasons I love her so much. Even though we’re divorced, she’s still nice to me. Not many people get that kind of friendship after a divorce, and I am so happy to say that I did. As we said to each other yesterday, we may not ever be a couple again, but there will always be an us. Dana has also said that she hasn’t been as eager to get back together as I have, but that some of the messages that we have something worth working on have stuck in the back of her brain. I told her that was enough for me. We both need time to explore the planet on our own, but just the fact that I am not leaving her with a basket of regrets and she does remember good things lets me rest. It wasn’t all bad.

I got a little tipsy celebrating with Dana and told her sister that I loved her. I do not remember doing this, and because it was a memory Dana had and not me, I crouched on the floor and just cried. Mostly because I have been tripping over my own feet emotionally for a long time, and I was terrified that I’d sad something horrible. I didn’t. I also handed the phone back before I heard her say “I love you, too.” But Dana told me she said it. I asked her to tell Steffi for me that it was one of the most healing moments I’ve had in months. And, of course, when Dana said that I talked to her sister and told her I loved her, she waited until the very very last moment to say Stephanie said she loved me, too. So, I’m like hunched over in “no, God…. please…. no…..” mode when Dana reassures me that all is well and I said, “you might want to have led with that.”

Still looking for a place in DC because the other two were gone by the time I was ready to plunk down money. Craig’s List makes it so easy to search for shared housing, though, so new places are imminent. I love how you can just go to the web site and type in the neighborhood I want. I don’t want to be further out than Alexandria, because I don’t want to drive anywhere. I have found several places in SW Waterfront and Dupont I want to look at, because I won’t have to buy gas. I’m also looking at Anacostia/Bolling AFB area because A) It’s cheaper 2) That is the neighborhood where I really want to live. The idea for St. James was conceived by thinking how a church design would lead down into the river for those that wanted to be baptized that way. In order to get to know the neighborhood well enough to start a church, it might behoove me to live there. Plus, I don’t want to be too far from Dupont, because that’s where my favorite restaurants are, especially the ones where a woman might be likely to come up to me and say she saw me reading a book.

God, I am so adorable when I’m reading. It’s only when I start talking that there’s a problem. 🙂

Everything is coming together like a puzzle. The corners are done as I reach toward the middle. Dana is already coming to town in June, so we will not be apart for very long before we get to see each other again and check in. I want to show her “my DC,” and I will take her for every spare moment she’s got between her family and friends that already live there. If they’re available, I would like her to meet Ruth & Brian, because I think she would like them and it’s a not so subtle hint to try and get her roped in up here………….. #prayingonthespaces

I know you’ll read this eventually, honey……. I have the best of intentions. Somehow I don’t think trying to get you to move closer to your parents and me is that much of a bad plan. 🙂 Even though I might have a new girlfriend/wife by the time you move, that doesn’t mean that I won’t explain to her that I left half my brain in Houston and she needs to love you for all that you are, too. I never want you to go away. It’s in the standard best friend contract, which we signed almost 12 years ago. That’s Addendum A, in case you’re wondering.

Back to you, Bob. Let’s go to the phones.

I would be lying my ass off if I didn’t say I hoped Argo would finally come around, but to say that she’s the reason I’m moving is a superhuman, Elastigirl stretch. I lived perfectly happily in DC without her for almost two years, and that hasn’t changed. I have told her that the world will explode with our agreement and nothing less. I have to thank her for giving me my space. That I’ve been able to process an enormous amount of shit so that I could move on by going back and reading what I’ve thought over the years. I told Dana today that I couldn’t in good conscience reach out to her, because I’d already irritated the hell out of her long enough. It is not worth my time to invest in a relationship that was so amazing in the beginning and devolved so that instead of being a loving friendship, it was gutter-sniping all around. Two first children with the quirks to match. However, I think that would go away if we could actually have a conversation. Or, it might not. Ultimately, that is her call. I imagine a great scene of bumping into each other accidentally and not quite recognizing where we know that face from, but it sort of looks fam……… OH MY GOD.

Because I like this girl, it will be on the one day I run out to the grocery store in my pajamas and bedhead. Because of course it will be. Either that, or she’ll walk up to me in a restaurant and my face will be so full of food I can’t talk, because that’s always attractive. It’s not Argo’s siren that calls to me, it’s the life I led while I was there. I felt more like myself walking around alone in DC than I ever had before.

I also realized another reason why I cannot stay here, and it has bothered me since I was 15. Because there was no clear message on Diane’s part that we were never going to be together until AFTER she’d already let me read her journal, I have these sentimental feelings about Houston that have become very creepy over time and they scare the hell out of me. Like, I almost didn’t go to my first therapy appointment when I got here because her office was six blocks from Diane’s old house.

Argo has changed my perspective on Diane, because listening to me gave her a chance to help heal me after a long and arduous (argoous?) emotional journey. She’s one of the people that rushed in when I was so sick two years ago, because I was just starting to vomit up emotions I hadn’t felt in eons.

But because my memories of Diane here are no longer happy for me, they torture me in a way that I just don’t want anymore.

I took a break from writing this and found a place in Silver Spring, all bills paid for $795. I’m flying out on Tuesday, I believe, because my roommate said that was better for her. However, if it’s cheaper to fly on Mondays, just come on.

The line that got her was “I’m thinking of starting a homeless ministry in Anacostia.” The line that got me was “we have a huge screen porch where you can do your writing.”