Tag: Friendships

The Postcard

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ 2 Comments

Twice now Zac has traveled and sent me postcards from wherever he is. I am pleased by this, because he often writes messages that I’m embarrassed the whole house can see, but it’s all in good fun. At this point, I think it’s more for shock value…. or he doesn’t know that he’s sending a postcard to six people.

However, it’s always touching that he remembers me when he travels. He asked me what I wanted, and I told him a football jersey or a scarf from wherever. It’s my standard answer, because even if I don’t wear all my scarves at one time, I hang them up as decoration. I also asked him to bring me a specific brand of candy that I had the last time I was in Paris, which is not where Zac was, but in Europe you can find them quite easily. They’re sour gummy Smurfs. My dad and I had a couple of hours to wait where we were just sitting in a French hotel lobby. There are gummy Smurfs on the table. By the end of the wait, there were gummy Smurfs on the table. Anywho, if Zac forgot, it’s no sweat off my nose. I can find nearly everything I want off Amazon, and with American prices, getting things imported is really not that much more expensive.

For instance, red bush or honey bush caffeine free tea is one of my favorites. Locally grown is about $9.00. Imported directly from South Africa? $11.00. Locally grown and sourced is great unless you are changing the fundamental nature of how something is supposed to taste. Red tea grown in American soil just doesn’t taste right.

It’s the same with licorice allsorts. I’ll eat any brand because it’s available, but Bassett’s is the gold standard and again, maybe a dollar more than Gustav’s. I also like British hard candy, because Americans don’t like currants as much as I do (delicious in pancakes, btw, and they’re on the raisin/Craisin/nuts/salad toppers aisle at the grocery store (in little Sunmaid boxes).

I’m not really in the mood for fall food right now, but I might experiment because fall pancakes are so delightful. I make mine with pumpkin spice or apple pie spice, cranberries, pumpkin seeds, and lots of salted butter. I don’t need syrup. I eat them as soon as they’re ready. I stand over the stove when I eat most of the time, because that’s how cooks do it. I don’t need to save up pancakes to serve to other people, so I just make a few and start cleaning up the kitchen. They don’t have to stay hot to be delicious with that much butter.

Last night, Joshua Weissman taught me how to make popcorn properly, and it’s not something I would have thought of. Fry your popcorn seeds in ghee, because the water in the butter will turn the popcorn soggy. You can make your own or buy it, but the outcome is the same.

When I’m not looking specifically for movie corn, I bring it down a notch. I put popcorn seeds in a paper bag and pop them in a microwave (you don’t need to buy the pre-made packets. Popcorn seeds and a kids’ lunch bag are sufficient). Then, I just spray Pam or butter-flavored Pam on it to get my spices to stick. So far, I like Old Bay and Tony Chachere’s best.

Slap Ya Mama is even better, but you have to be careful with it because heat builds, and if you don’t specifically make a choice to miss you lips, the pain of capsaicin on your face will remind you not to do it again.

Speaking of which, this is why when I’m making a very hot marininara, more of a Diablo sauce, I use penne. Less chance for the chili flake to drag on your lips, like with spaghetti.

You also have to be careful and wash the oil off your hands with Dawn before you go to the bathroom. At least one of Dana’s culinary school mates did it to himself.

The only time I like capsaicin on my skin is when my arthritis is acting up. It relieves the pain in my hands quite nicely.

Cooking is therapy, particularly marinades or dry rubs with lots of cayenne and no gloves. I would stick my hand into a vat of Carolina Reaper sauce if I could. It was the easiest and cheapest way to stay sane on the line, because your hands effectively “get high” and you can function again, because the pain and strain feels like it’s much further away.

It feels like the pain is floating on your skin, rather than of it.

My rheumatoid factor is normal, so I think I can blame the kitchen for this much pain. But it’s not narcotics bad. It’s Aleve bad. Nothing sharp, just persistent. I have found that I’d rather take ibuprofen because a fresh dose more often is a lot better than your pain medication running out and you’ve hit the limit.

Take the limit on Tylenol seriously. It would not be approved today due to liver function issues. So, I’m careful, but I’m always on something for pain.

My official diagnosis, and I’ll have to get a second opinion on this….. but I’m damned clever…. is that I’m 46 and YMMV (your mileage may vary for those who haven’t been on the net since ’99). In my very humble opinion, no more diagnosis is needed, because by this age, some things work. Some don’t. I have not broken down, I have merely failed to proceed.

And I just have to Rolls with it.

Ok, so speaking of Rolls Royce, the reason they’re so unreliable is that they were never meant to be driven the way Americans drive them. England is tiny. They don’t put clicks on their cars the way we put on miles. OF COURSE a car is going to last longer the fewer miles you put on it.

I feel like I have lived my life putting more clicks on me than I can handle at any one time, and I’m at a crossroads as to how to accomplish that. It was important to me to be a military dependent so that my family could travel together, not that a relationship is made valid by a stupid piece of paper I couldn’t have til 2001, and even that was only in Vermont.

Editor’s Note:

When Kathleen and I got married, we planned a whole trip around it. We went from DC to Woodstock to the first town over the Vermont border we could find. Why did we have to drive all the way from DC to Woodstock, you might ask? We had tickets for Rent on September 14th, 2001. By the time we left DC, there were no hotels for MILES AND MILES. We were driven by 9/11 to take the trip anyway, and just circumvent NYC because we needed our benefits so bad. We knew everything would be booked. We did not realize that Woodstock would be the first town we’d even find a room. It was 0400. People keep saying “never forget,” but living in Alexandria and hearing the plane hit the Pentagon, knowing that we had Broadway tickets in New York that would take years to redeem…. it was all too much, and yet, we kept going. It’s one of the true “nevertheless, she persisted” moments of my life.

To say that Kathleen and I didn’t want to marry each other and did, anyway is not accurate, I don’t think. I think September 11th scared us enough that we realized we couldn’t be without legal documentation now that it was available. We didn’t rush into it as much as 9/11 forced our hands. In that respect, neither of us did anything wrong. We were not fools rushing in (by and large). We were fucking terrified and we earned that right. We couldn’t even talk to our parents for three days, and when I asked my dad if he thought we’d be safer coming home, he said, “no. Stay where the fighter jets are. They could hit Houston next.” It doesn’t seem like a logical target until you start thinking about crippling the “all bidness.” If Pasadena and Deer Park were bombed, it would take years and years to recover.

It’s fun to shit on those areas because it’s full of rednecks that fit the white male Texas archetype to a T. Unless they’re being really offensive, I enjoy good ol’ boys because it is exactly like standing out by the fence with Hank Hill. I’m such a writer that it’s not about cars or construction or whatever traditionally male topic is being discussed. It’s learning about those things while watching how men interact. I can honestly say that the reason I am so proficient with Linux today is not because I enjoyed Linux. I mean, I did, but that was secondary to sitting and talking with Luke and Joe while they worked. Joe was the system administrator. Luke and I were the content creators.

That’s how this blog started, in a roundabout way. I learned about web design and blogging in those early days- “Clever Title Goes Here” premiered in 2001 or 2, now that I think of it.

When I thought of the reason I’d put my blog start in 2003, it’s because I blocked out 2001-2002. It’s not because Kathleen and I were a train wreck. It’s that I gave my coworkers my URL, and this one guy at XOM decided he was the authority on homosexuality because he goes to church and all that, and would be passive-aggressively irritating at work, then leave comments on my web site that I should have reported to HR, but what the fuck would they have done in that day and time?

It really fucked with my head, which is why I don’t talk about writing at work anymore unless I know the person really well. And even then, just the barest minimum to introduce my audience to them. For instance, I doubt that Jaz from Alert Logic cares that you know she called me “prehistoric,” and I said, “why do you think there are so many dinosaurs on my t-shirts?”

“T-Rex Hates Pull-Ups” is my favorite.

I also don’t think that my coworker Jesse told me I couldn’t have any more candy because “you haven’t blinked since you got here.”

I hope that Aaron and Michael realize what soft spots I have for them, how we’ll always be connected because of our time together. Interestingly enough, Michael was Navy cryptography, so apparently personal and professional intelligence is a recurring theme in my life. 😉

It’s good to have a constant that’s so interesting, because people that write really good spy fiction have often been spies themselves. It’s not just John le Carré. There are lots of spies who choose to make their livings as a writer after they get out. For instance, Jonna Mendez and Tracy Walder write non-fiction. Alma Katsu and Ian Fleming are the general go-to in popular fiction. le Carré is not for beginners.

Again, reading le Carré is about actively wanting to know a TOM CLANCY AMOUNT about intelligence. I’ve said that before, and it makes Tom Clancy fans laugh. They know he’s going to be accurate down to a right and left wing nut. He’s like the Tolkien of DoD, and I have found that applies to le Carré as well. However, to me that’s adrenaline. For some people, it’s tangents that stop the story from progressing.

I like it when authors I genuinely enjoy do things that make the page count longer. Doesn’t mean it’s on purpose, as if longer means better. I just mean that if I find a world I like, I tend to want to stay in it for a long time.

For instance, I really like this world we’ve got going on between us. It’s not just fun for me to write, it’s fun for me to read. I lose the sense that I’m me once time has passed. The more I start to see the person I was rather than the person I am, patterns emerge and I can see them more clearly. It’s what made me see that I was better off with raising friends to partners rather than spending all my time looking for that one perfect person who completes me. I honestly got tired of waiting, because every time I’ve tried to have that fairy tale with someone, it has been busted for one reason or another. Whether it was their fault or mine is irrelevant. I didn’t try to understand all this to place blame. I’ve changed over the last decade because I saw that the perfect dream was unattainable because of my neurodivergent mind, and “you’ve got to dance with them what brung you” (title of a Molly Ivins book).

I adjusted my life to fit me, rather than trying to fit into others’ expectations of me, because they were built on a lie. It is not a lie that I have been consciously telling to myself so much as the impression I give to others and gets reflected back to me. It’s that my disabilities are not real. I am perfectly able, physically, mentally, spiritually, ecumenically……… grammatically.

Editor’s Note:

I often think of this meme in my head…. “you’re a terrible writer.” “Ahhhh…. but you have heard of me.”

I think what I’ve learned through my relationship with Supergrover is twofold now. The first is that if you are moved by some entries and infuriated by others, I am doing my job correctly. I am recording real life as it is, not trying to curate anything so that we all look like people that should be admired.

I stab the knife into my own chest harder than anyone else’s, because I will tell you all day how flawed I am, how I’m subject to red mist rage, how that kind of meltdown leads me into burnout, etc. I am not putting myself over as a paragon of anything, and that’s one of the things I asked Bryn, FLAT OUT. “Am I painting other people more harshly than I paint myself?” I check with her on this a lot because I don’t want it to seem like I just “go after people.” She said, “no. If anything, I think you go overboard in telling everyone every way in which this could possibly be your fault.” I laughed, because it’s always funny when it’s true.

I will analyze a problem six ways from Sunday, trying to figure out what it is that drove both our motivations in an interaction, because when I am interested in someone, I am interested in not only their problems, but keeping our relationship healthy as well. So, I love those friends that come to me with their problems, but also acknowledge that they are capable of being a problem, because they’re not always convinced they’re right, and they know them. They’ve met.

And even if I don’t like the person that they’re talking about, I will give objective advice, because you know what divides a friendship? Telling someone they shouldn’t love someone else. For instance, if Dave is being a twat to Bryn, I wouldn’t tell her to leave him because that’s not my call…. if I did, she might get defensive and that would be counterproductive to my PowerPoint presentation on why she should break up with him.

I’m only using Bryn as an example. Replace Dave with Michael and it’s how I feel about Supergrover as well. It’s not my job to make their calls for them, just to support them in whatever they do. And in fact, in the 10 years that I’ve loved Supergrover, I’ve realized that the most devastating news I could hear is if Michael didn’t want to be married anymore. I think they’re rock solid, I’m just saying that even though I was sorry I couldn’t be her everything, that didn’t make me stop wanting her to find him.

That’s the thing you learn about polyamory that you don’t know until it happens to you. When your definition of love stretches to include red and yellow strings, all the jealousy stops and you begin to enjoy hearing your partner’s stories with their other partners. One of the things that I did with both Kathleen and Dana that stopped us from really growing as a couple is that I both lived and worked with them. I am not making a case for poly here. I am making the case that when we spent that much time together, we didn’t really have any differing experiences with which to converse. A lot of conversations were repetitive because so were our days.

There are ways to fix it if you’re mono, the repetitiveness, but I find that I’m happier when Zac says something like “let me tell you about this cool thing I did.” I want him to be happy in his other relationships, and to console him if they end. It’s the same with Bryn. They both have the capacity to be whomever they want to be, because I’m not going anywhere.

All I ask them to respect is that this is my slice of life, and they do- graciously I might add, because the three of us do manage it. They don’t have editorial control over anything, but I do discuss boundaries on what I can and can’t publish. My rule with every relationship is not to report hearsay. So, conversations between Zac and I are valid. Conversations between Zac and his partners are private, because I wasn’t there.

I only want to write about the ways in which our lives overlap, and hope that everyone knows that when a relationship is painful to me, I’ll say so. But I also won’t let that stand as we progress back together. I am not attacking anyone if you take everything as a tapestry, all the weaving of my own opinions as to how life is treating me….. and how I’m treating it. It’s how I make people come alive- I chart day to day and then everything looks different. My entries from five years ago are not the entries I write now. Not even close.

That’s because in real life, everyone contracts and expands depending on their self-esteem. Mixing your self-esteem and someone else’s opinion is a toxic mess. It deregulates your emotions to an enormous degree. I’ve made that mistake several times in my life, and I think that’s what’s different about me now. My self-esteem doesn’t go up and down every time someone talks to me. If someone doesn’t care what I think, I definitely don’t return the favor. But I’ll remember everything about the interactions between us that I both loved and hated.

That’s how you fall in love with a writer. They don’t remember dates, but they remember how the air smelled the first time they met you. How a picture struck them just right. How a smile becomes a lifetime. They can portray you as you; they can make you laugh, scream, and cry in a way that no other person can because they’re not just your lover or your friend, but your favorite book as well.

It is said that the two worst days in a person’s life are when someone starts writing about them…………. and the moment one realizes they’ve stopped. I know this is true because people will be angry as SHIT at me, and because they only want me to paint them as angels, swear they’ll never speak to me again. Then, a few years later, they’ll be mad that I used to write so beautifully about them, and why don’t I write about them anymore? This comes with absolutely no recognition of the fact that they emotionally destroyed me the last time I did, so why would I be eager to repeat the experience?

I wouldn’t be so connected with Supergrover if the relationship hadn’t been necessary to both our mental health. That there’s a reason I didn’t just block her and move on my merry way as if nothing had happened. But her refusal to talk about any of that is not my problem, because I’ve offered. That’s all I can do.

She doesn’t come off in my blog entries like a villain, or at least, I hope that’s not what you pick up. The truth is that people have problems, and I only own half. I am constantly trying to figure out how much I am responsible for a problem, not trying to cast blame on someone else. I am deciding what is mine and what is yours, and it comes across as judgmental because it is. First of all, I think like a judge. I am trying to balance everything, not trying to guilt people. I am trying to find out the facts to be able to make a decision, and yet it comes across as an attack even though I am extraordinarily precise with language.

My pet peeve is “you made me.” I have never made anyone do anything in the history of their lives. Therefore, I make a conscious effort to say “this is how your words made me feel,” because that is casting judgment on how they’re treating me in the moment, not who they are as a human being. Weighing facts, not people’s worth.

I’m a line cook. Therefore, lots of my friends have been mentally ill or substance addicted, and/or have been to jail. I’ve found more in common with them than I’ve ever had in common with someone who does everything right. A person’s value is not kept in holding them to the worst mistake they’ve ever made.

I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints. The sinners are much more fun.

Back to Normal

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

Last night I got to talk on the phone with Zac for the first time in what seems like eons, because we have a date coming up on the 10th to go and see Jason Moran at The Kennedy Center. I was teasing him and said, “do you even like jazz?” He, very, very diplomatically, I might add, said, “I like you enough to buy you tickets and go with you to a jazz concert.” I fell over with laughter, but then he said that he wanted to catch up in person, so we didn’t talk long. But it was very good to hear his voice and I am glad that I don’t have to wait much longer to see Oliver, who is a dog. I have always teased Zac about this, that Oliver and I are in a relationship and he can come, too. He jokes back that Oliver is arguably one of his best features.

I don’t know whether it will happen any time soon with my move and all, but I can’t wait to have more couch time with Zac just watching Slow Horses, because it really is fun hearing the real stories behind how they do things in tradecraft (it doesn’t matter whether we’re watching CIA or MI-6, they use nearly identical techniques). I had to wait while Zac is out of town because that’s the one “couple show” I promised him, although I have gone back and watched “The Pigeon Tunnel” several times to fall asleep.

The first couple of times I watched it because it was exciting, and now it’s John le Carré seemingly rocking me to sleep. Have you heard his voice? It’s distinctive and posh, which he explains is an affectation because he grew up a trained thief whose family was always broke; his father was often working for/running from the Russian mafia.

When David’s father (Cornwell- I use it with John le Carré interchangeably) realized how successful his books were, his dad started running a game on him. Threw a shit fit because David wouldn’t give him any money, and he never heard from him again. But David wasn’t hard-nosed. His father asked him for money to invest in some pipe dream of a farm, and David said that if he wanted to work a farm, he would buy it for him outright and give him an allowance to run it. David’s father running off into the night clearly meant that David’s money was going to be used for completely legit purposes.

So, exploring old le Carré adaptations has been my jam recently. I think “The Little Drummer Girl” is actually better than “Tinker Tailor,” but perhaps I’m biased because it felt as adrenaline-fueled as Alias and Homeland.

I also found a really old adaptation of the Bourne series that was on TV in the 80s or early 90s. It’s so great, although quite dated and no one will ever be Matt Damon…. or Julia Stiles, for that matter.

I also got to talk to Bryn a little bit and we’re getting excited. May first is not all that far away. It’s going to be hard to believe she’s real, but I hope we have a blast. And I’m up for as much sightseeing as they want to do, or sitting around and catching up. Perhaps it will be really nice weather and we can sit outside. I can’t wait to see how Colin reacts to Bryn and Jack’s (also a dog) “Conversations.” Since Bryn is a dog trainer, dogs don’t move unless she allows it, and all dogs naturally do it around her because she just exudes alpha. How can you not, after working with primates all those years? And in terms of “screaming alpha,” it doesn’t have to do with anything but soft, quiet strength.

Alpha males in the human population are picking up lessons from animals that they never meant to give. Alphas lead from the back, they take care of everyone else. They’re the ones you go to in a problem. They are not parading around telling people they’re they alpha because no one has to ask. It just shows.

I think we’re both getting used to each other’s strengths, and picking up where the other feels weak. I can’t divine things over text all the time, so I would say that I talk to Bryn on the phone and Video Messenger most frequently than I do anyone else. What I’ve discovered is that having female energy around me is enough- that if I don’t meet a life partner, I’m happy as I am. It’s fine for Zac to have other partners, because I set up our relationship that way. I knew he already had partners, and I was prepared to be fairly low on the totem pole because I didn’t want to be a partner in the capital p sense of the word. I’m too busy a writer…. just because I write in volume doesn’t mean I’m not saying anything of substance…..

All of the comments I’ve gotten in the last few years have proven to me that’s not true, so that’s not a dart that can hurt. My readers have been with me through everything, the good and the bad. They don’t act like the universe has punished me for a decision because it hasn’t. I go on to a new thing depending on the options in front of me, knowing that how it worked out is how it’s supposed to be. I said something yesterday that I didn’t clarify in the moment. I have before, but not just then. When I said that it wasn’t my destiny to belong to one person, but to many, I didn’t mean my partners. I meant all of you. That this is not a joke or a hobby, it’s been a portfolio I’ve built over 20 years.

Who has peer reviewed me?

  • Martina Navratilova
  • Margaret Cho
  • Wil Wheaton
  • Eden Kennedy
  • Ernie Hsuing
  • Anil Dash
  • Jonna Mendez
  • Mary Karr

Therefore, I don’t need external validation to know that I do help people more than me. I say things of substance all the time, and there is nothing on God’s green earth that will ever convince me otherwise. That’s because not only have I looked at my own writing and thought, “I like that line.” It was one Supergrover liked, too. There’s no more substance to my writing than that. I’ve already made it. I’m done. My career will never get any better, and I swear on a stack of Bibles.

That’s because I will never in my lifetime be seen the way I am right now, the way I have been for 10 years.

If SuperGrover saw Daniel’s “I will skewer you” letter, I bet you anything her reaction was “Fuuuuuuuuck. Let me get my purse. :::::sigh::::” Even if she never reads this entry, that image made me fall over with laughter, because it was like the beginning of “The Incredibles.” “Can’t you just stay clean for one minute?! I just cleaned up!” Like, the newsreel is playing in my head and I’m cackling. I need laughter right now, and it feels good.

You know, even when you’re no longer speaking, if you don’t dissolve a company, it still exists. Therefore, I choose to believe that Leslie Lanagan & Pet Monsters on a Fraying Leash™ is still intact. In fact, I have added new members. It’s just a longer flight for Bryn….. but that doesn’t mean she wouldn’t do it.

We’re big enough to face our feelings head on, and it’s so hard to fool a dog trainer that I stopped trying long ago because I figured out quickly I couldn’t keep up with her. Because of this, I have an innate interest in seeing her on the floor of Congress. 😉 She wouldn’t do it, I’d just like to see what happens when I just light the firecracker and she goes.

She also doesn’t care that my blog makes me sound like a dick.

I’m so blessed that I have friends who support me no matter what, no matter when. Even Supergrover. How do I know? She told me.

So, she may be far from my heart, but not from my soul. It’s only now that I realize because our communication was so poor, I was never receiving any of the messages she was trying to send and vice versa. I don’t know that we can ever be trusted to create new patterns again. But I know us. If we knew the other was in trouble, we’d have to sit on our hands to keep from moving and even that wouldn’t last long.

She gave me the confidence to believe that I am the one who knocks, and not in a scary way. It’s just an illustration that I am old enough to have boundaries and limits. I am old enough to decide what I want to invite in and keep out of my life. I don’t have to accept the status quo, as in trying to fit in where I wasn’t wanted. What I found was that Daniel loved the idea of being married, but didn’t seem to like me much. He only had two problems with me- everything I did and everything I said…. because it was always a blame game instead of working together.

I decided that it wasn’t going to get any worse because I wasn’t playing another game. He’s still playing games, but all of his e-mails are going to Spam, because I’m not interested in reopening the discussion or reengaging. He’s right- I can’t block him from my blog. But I can limit my exposure to him. I have to trust my instincts on this one, and my instincts say he’s not the right change for me now….. when people tell you who they are, believe them. I could forgive Daniel being totally avoidant last time around, because we were both under pressure. I did not see enough change in him to warrant continuing the relationship because I’d say things like “I want to work with you,” and I never got more than “I’m tired of being yelled at every day.” First of all, I never even turned on a caps key.

Second of all, I was talking about how we could integrate both Cora and Daniel into a house with me- there wasn’t anything about which to yell. I didn’t ask for heat, but I got a lot of it.

And it’s not about him. It’s about me not wanting to take a gamble that my next ten years are going to be exactly like my last. I’d like to make new mistakes now, because I have people in my life who allow me to do that, because they know they’ll always make new mistakes, too.

I know this is all over the place, but what’s different about that? I just wanted some room to stretch out, process the last week or so, and enjoy some time with solo packing and getting ready for my new house. I really am excited. It’s time for a change all around.

The funniest thing that’s happened is that there are two Colins in my phone. I was telling one that we should overhaul a few old iPods and see how much we can get for them- Bluetooth, USB-C, etc. Colin responded that he might have an old one I could play with, and I said, “oh, that wasn’t meant for you, but I love that you just responded like this was a perfectly normal thing to ask a housemate.” He laughed. I like that we’re doing all the good witty banter so that it’s not awkward when I get there.

David has already told me that he has a girlfriend, but I haven’t met her yet, and don’t know if/when I will. But it will be cool to know her and to have Colin meet Zac and Bryn. Bryn won’t be around all the time, but it’s good that they’ll know who each other are nonetheless.

It would also be perfect if Lindsay was here that week, but I’m not going to hope too high on that one. Lindsay is a mythical figure, both here and not here. I think she is secretly a mythical creature, and no one has ever bothered to prove me wrong. You wouldn’t either if you met her. She’s pretty invincible.

So, if Lindsay’s in town, now I have two fierce dragon women saying, “fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck……… let me get my purse.”

And now things are back to normal.

Resigning from the Game

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

I should have known that this is exactly how things were going to turn out with Daniel, but I felt like it was important to keep the promise to myself- to see whether rehab had indeed cleared his mind and whether we could make the plans we made fit a future now. I did not want to be the person that abandoned their partner while they were in the worst part of their lives. I couldn’t be that person to my partner, and I wasn’t. I can be proud of that.

But in retrospect, there was a red flag on day one that I couldn’t ignore, and I ran from it, because I knew that I had made a horrible, horrible mistake unless Daniel was telling the absolute truth, and there was no way of knowing whether he was telling the absolute truth from this many miles away. He said that he was still drinking, but it was night and day now. It’s not the thing you want to hear from someone that’s been to inpatient if you know even a couple of things about alcohol and the brain. It’s not that they’re not telling the truth. It’s “are you willing to gamble?” Because maybe they are. Maybe one or two beers every once in a while is their new normal. But I’m not willing to gamble.

I was for a few days. Seriously. I wanted to know how Daniel thought, whether any of his thought processes had changed over the year we were apart, how he treated me now vs. how he treated me then, etc. Absolutely nothing has changed. At no time did he consider my feelings before he went right back to saying that we were starting over while also treating me like a fiancée, so which is it? Do you want to pretend that we don’t know each other or do you want the intimacy that comes with being a partner? I don’t share all my thoughts and feelings with just anyone, and I found out that he cannot handle them.

Even after having a talk about the way I process emotions and the difference in the autistic brain, it was still all about how I’m just so mean to him and “putting all this stuff on him.” Meanwhile, he does not have any answers for my questions and no indication as to what “putting all this stuff on him” even means.

I told him that no person worthy of me would ever spend a minute trying to make me think that my feelings don’t matter, and then I blocked him and walked away, while also telling him that I wouldn’t be back. I already have two people in my life that are willing to open up to me and share with me. I don’t need to fight through to be heard, and I have discovered I won’t.

I wanted a partner to build a life with, because Bryn and Zac already have life partners, and that’s unlikely to change. And by that, I do mean that Bryn is also my life partner, but with best friends, it’s a little different. I mean that she’s my off site document repository, because she knows my files better than I do.

Also, I know this sounds crazy, but the idea of marrying your best friend is starting to seem so much more sane than marrying your romantic partner. Like, why would you place something as important as marriage on a relationship that’s dependent on sexual attraction? It doesn’t make sense to me, but that’s how it’s done….. for most people.

Daniel told me that he wanted to be my favorite person, and I told him that he was…. because I didn’t have the heart to tell him that the position had been filled in 1997 and 2013, when my heart expanded to give huge palaces in my head to three women, not shoving Bryn and Dana away in favor of anyone else. When my definition of love got bigger, I did.

There are so many follow up questions that Daniel never asked, just treated me like the classic sitcom nagging wife. I have never been in a relationship with gender roles before, so I made no attempt to understand any of that. If he wants to marry a nonbinary mind, he’s got to understand that I am his equal. He can’t just dismiss my concerns; I will walk and I did, because I will not learn gender roles for anyone.

It was easy for the world to revolve around him, because only I had to respect his time. We had one conversation where we were actually focused on each other, and that was on the phone. The rest of the time, I sat and waited because he said he had time to talk and then everything that could possibly get in the way made it where our responses were 10 minutes apart. I couldn’t focus on anything because I was caught between thinking that we were having a conversation and not knowing whether I should wait for a reply or not. When I said this was irritating, he jumped all over me about that, too, when what I wanted was “sure- I’ll tell you when I’m doing something else because I also value your time.” If I have someone’s divided attention, I’d rather you finish what you were doing and come focus on me. Because it means that you won’t really focus on me. My words won’t resonate because you’re too lost in something else, like having a conversation with someone who is listening to a podcast with the TV on in the background.

I told him that I was excited about the future, but that didn’t mean that there weren’t things to talk about. That throwing problems out on the table and seeing what they look like in the light wasn’t a bad thing. He said, “you’re right, of course.” Then he proceeded to berate me for acknowledging our problems.

In the past, this would have made me start trying to learn all the ways I can move in a relationship that won’t piss someone off, giving up the parts of myself that make me unique to please someone else. I’ve been there so many times, and it doesn’t help anyone. I’d rather keep finding other people who have also gone through that transformation. It says “I am not threatened by another person having feelings.”

One of the things that really got me was the incredible double standard. Daniel told me that he gets so busy with his writing that he disappears for days, so I thought nothing of it when I was in shutdown/burnout mode; I didn’t contact anyone. I can’t think of a single person who has ever chastised me for that except Daniel, as if I should have somehow divined that he was not okay with going a day without contact from me. Although I probably would have said something to the effect of “what I hear you saying is that it’s ok for you to dissociate, but when I do it I’m a bad partner.” What’s good for the gander has to be good for the goose, because again, I am not into being the classic definition of a wife.

He said something about “trying our best,” and I thought, “that’s not what I’m going to remember about you. So far, you’ve taken every problem we need to work out in order to be together and shut down like a steel trap when I wanted to talk about it. You see me as blaming you…. so until you see me as a partner that wants to work with you instead of someone who’s ‘laying all of this on you,’ I can’t help you.” I cannot live with someone who’s in Fantasyland right now, and it seems like he’s changed his mind about moving to Maryland, because originally, we were all going to find a place somewhere between DC and Baltimore, because Daniel is overqualified to work at Johns Hopkins. It’s fine that he doesn’t want to move anymore, but he could have said that instead of just invalidating my feelings. I was talking about Avery moving in with us or something like that…. I can’t remember what. But I said something about DC and Baltimore and he said, “or Dallas or Austin.” I never want to have that conversation again, because it was like he was doorknobbing me. I would never seriously think about moving back to Texas unless the circumstances were dire.

Plus, I don’t like Austin. I just don’t. It looks like Portland, because they wanted to be all weird and stole all their slogans, then just like Portland, big industry moved in and it wasn’t the same place to live anymore. But in the end, to me it just feels like a city full of bumper stickers that say Keep Portland Austin Weird, and The People’s Republic of Portland Austin.

They were also the first Texas city to get a Voodoo Donut, but you will never in your life know how weird it really was. The FDA shut them down for making doughnuts with NyQuil and Pepto Bismol in them, as well as caffeine. You aren’t OG Voodoo Donut unless you’ve been drunk at 3AM on Burnside….. before the second location, before the hype, before the notoriety.

That’s how I feel about Portland and Austin. The donuts will never taste the same, but Austin can imitate the feeling of those donuts………. poorly.

There are better donuts out there that have taken the place of Voodoo in PDX, but for a while Voodoo was this enigma.

I also don’t like moving at all. It was great when Daniel was headed up here already, that we’d talked about him moving here about this time last year. I realized that his PhD put us in the way of that, but I wasn’t daunted. However, I did think that it was very unfair of him to change plans without me and not let me know up front that in order for us to be together, he’d also like me to “come home.” I could have saved him a lot of trouble. That’s not a doorknob conversation. That’s a conversation you have to be up front about, and that’s my whole problem with Daniel and the many other emotionally unavailable people in my life. They call me demanding when I lay my feelings on the table and expect them to do the same so that I know what problems I need to work on in our relationship, too. But, if you think that the problem is always me, it’s not a relationship anymore.

I have always been the unseen child. I do not have to be the unseen adult, unless I just want that. I thought I did. Turns out, I had to let go of a lot of things to make me realize who I was. My destiny is not to belong to one person, but to belong to many so that I never have to put all my eggs in one basket ever again. I don’t want my husband or any of my partners to feel less important than the others, because they’re all a part of my family.

It is cooking, where we all make each other’s lives more interesting. For instance, I love hearing about Bryn’s journey through all her relationships. I love opening up to Zac and knowing that he’s capable of going toe to toe with me. I didn’t reach out to Daniel in a time of need, but abundance.

Daniel had been in a poly relationship before, so it wasn’t like I was springing anything new on him. But he didn’t want to talk about his own boundaries, only that he never wanted me to pit him against anyone else. There’s no way I would or could do that. It would be comparing bananas and oranges and giving up one rather than realizing that they’re both great in different recipes.

I didn’t want a relationship where Daniel lived in Fantasyland, thinking I’d wait around for him all the time while he did whatever he wanted while also wanting to be married while also not wanting to compromise on anything while also saving things up and exploding.

You have been reading about that relationship with someone else on this web site, which made me especially gunshy when I saw that shit coming towards me again. Blame the person for bringing up a problem, find a way to turn it back around on them, and be extremely stubborn about being vulnerable so now I always feel bad about bringing up this problem because I know this is how you’ll react every single time.

So many women learn the land mines because they feel they need a partner worse than they need to stand on their own two feet. I’m not that person, and I never will be.

I know you have your shit. I know I have mine. The difference between us is that I’m willing to tell people the truth as I see it. As in, “this is how your words are making me feel.” Then, they choose how they respond. When it is immediately defensive, I know they’re not ready to compromise on shit. They can’t even be open and honest with themselves, so why would they be with you?

When you know yourself really well, you don’t feel the need to get defensive all the time, because you know that you’re just as fallible as the other person. It’s always a matter of working out compromises with other people if you want a relationship with them. But if your reaction to another person telling you what they need from you is “there’s absolutely nothing wrong with me; how dare you,” then you’re in for a world of hurt. That kind of defensiveness takes years to work through in therapy, and you’re not a hospital for broken people. It’s too much to take on, because you’re either walking on eggshells or “starting fights,” with absolutely no in between.

Again, it took two hours for Daniel to go from “I’m having a bad day” to “you know what? This isn’t worth it.” It took him two hours to blame everything on me in my sleep because I just wasn’t attentive enough. I wasn’t attentive because neither was he. He showed me how to act. I wasn’t going to give him anything he wasn’t willing to give me.

Also, Zac and Bryn and I don’t talk every day, so it wouldn’t occur to me to treat Daniel differently unless he asked me to, and even then, I’d feel like a fuckup when I didn’t want to engage because my autism was struggling that day.

For all Daniel’s talk about understanding autism, it didn’t translate to actually improving communication, because I told him how I don’t social mask and he continued to treat me exactly the same…….. while also saying he got it.

In short, it was too much of a roller coaster, and it was easier to cut him loose and move on, knowing that I am the person I said I would be, and I will never have to play these childish games again.

It’s Too Easy to Do the Wrong Thing

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

I have a lot of people tell me this when they’re in relationships with me, and I have found that it is a fighting tactic of which I’m not very fond. They say “you’re demanding,” but what they mean is “I’m overwhelmed.” That’s because it is not on one person to divine the other’s needs, and there is no way that the problem is always me. However, it is a very effective cheap political shot, as if nothing in their behavior ever elicits my response. I’m just “mean.” When that happens, I disengage. I don’t want to play games. And, I’m hearing Supergrover’s voice in my head as I type this, “I do not have room for that temperature in my life.”

Last night Daniel invalidated my feelings, so I disengaged and went to bed. I didn’t want either of us to say anything they regretted, because he sighed in exasperation, which came across as passive-aggressive in the first place, and I knew it was time to go. It was enough for one day, because I was tired enough that I knew I’d go nuclear on him and I was heading a fight off at the pass. I said, “I don’t want to play your games,” took my sleeping pills, and went to bed.

I wake up, and he’s mad about all these slights, real and perceived, that he has not expressed before, so one of two things is happening. Either he’s actually concerned/angry about these things and has been covering them up, or he’s just making up things to throw in my face so that I’m “forced” to feel bad about the fact that I withdrew.

What I have learned over time is to go to bed angry. Let that shit work itself out in my dreams, rather than taking it out on the person I love because we’re fighting while we’re exhausted. So, I got some sleep, and while I was asleep, he went from “I’m having a bad day” to “you know what, this isn’t worth it” in two hours.

He absolutely spun out on his own because he was anxious, so it wasn’t a real breakup. He doesn’t know what the right thing to do is right now, because he thinks I’m demanding due to old tapes. If everyone tells you that your feelings don’t matter, then you’re going to believe they don’t. If you don’t believe your words have power, then you’ll say anything because no one is listening, anyway. I understand this innately- it’s a trait of all neurodivergent people. But it is not my responsibility to fill that hole inside him and make him secure enough within himself that he doesn’t think I’m abandoning him every time I go to bed.

He asked me to stop bombarding him with messages because it was too much- he, like Supergrover, assumed that I needed answers to everything rightthefucknow, when I was making a list and checking it twice over things that were important to talk about as we plan the next few years. However, because it had been a problem with Supergrover, I was prepared for it. I could never convince her that I wanted an answer eventually, that I wasn’t on a time constraint because I was looking so far into the future that the moment didn’t matter. She could be as busy as she needed to be, as long as she was willing to lay her guts on the table and tell me what was wrong. I cannot divine it over text.

But I would if I could, and often tried.

So, I stopped writing so much to Daniel at a time and started recording my thoughts either here or in a notebook (because I doubt you care about the dull details that create dreams, you care about the dreams themselves). I want to get married to Daniel because the piece of paper has a function beyond just saying to the world that we’re in love and want to be together. We could do that in front of our friends and family without ever filing government paperwork and it would be every bit as meaningful.

But there’s a huge difference in marrying a civilian vs. marrying a veteran. Dependents are entitled to so much more if they’re married to or a child of a service member, even in Daniel’s retirement. There are perks that are thank you for your service all over the place, like not having to pay tax on things when you buy at the PX, getting to fly standby on military planes when Daniel, Cora, and I are all traveling together, and a health care system in which I’d never fall through the cracks. It’s a lot, and it’s a big decision, but Daniel has already offered. I don’t think we’re there yet, obviously, if our communication needs this much work.

But here’s why it does………. God help me. I am marrying myself, and it’s not so easy to be married to you. I do not mean that I’m a selfish bastard, I’m saying that we are so much alike that it’s akin to having a child and thinking, “I wanted you to look like me, not act like me.”

This time, it’s on Daniel to figure out why he spiraled out so fast, and learn how not to do that. Not my circus, not my monkeys. If he’s as serious about this relationship as he says he is, he’ll have to learn to own his half, because I am not here to suss it out for him.

I am in no way a psychologist. I just “speak” psychologist and this is the best way I know how to explain what’s going on without putting blame on either one of us. Medicine and how the brain works over huge population samples gives me perspective that I am not trying to analyze them, but to explain to an audience what I think is going on and how I feel, because that kind of empathy helps me move forward in a positive way. The empathy part is going out of my way to try and prove that I’m wrong. To give people the benefit of the doubt because I can analyze behavior with an omnipotent third eye, calling myself out on my own bullshit in the process.

There is just no room in my life for people who don’t want to know what part they played, because relationships don’t last that way. If one person expresses needs and one person hides, it’s a hard pattern to break……… but I have to, or Daniel, et al, will make me afraid to emote at all.

That is not what I want in a partner. We’re going to be giants together, with room for all our feelings…… no one ever has to hide in fear and spiral out alone.

Daniel seems to waffle on conversations about the future, but it’s for good reason. I’m not saying that he’s avoidant because he wants to be, only that he has to be right now…. but not forever. He’s in the middle of his disability case that could make his pension even more attractive, so he can’t predict things like cash flow and his ability to “move about the country.” At the same time, without any kind of vision, I flounder. And if me wanting some sort of working boundaries is taken as a problem because I am telling you what I want/need and feel like you need to keep everything close to the vest.

I have a huge capacity to love, but also a huge capacity to feel needed. The lovebomb/discard cycle will not happen with me, because I won’t allow it. It’s harder with an addict or a patient with mental health issues like PTSD, but not impossible. It’s not because the person is a narcissist, it’s that their first reaction is trained to be fear and protection of themselves. If you bring up a problem, their first reaction is to try and make their environment safe, and that includes the steel shutdown with the automatic locks, sometimes with the cocking of weapons to show you shouldn’t get any closer. That’s the point at which I know our conversation has come to an end, because I am not going to fight through all that. You’re going to explore why you felt you had to “suit up” and come tell me what you were really feeling that made you react that way. You are not responsible for my reactions, but I am allowed to have them.

I’m allowed to feel pissed off that Daniel once again broke up with me, but he fired himself out of anxiety and abandonment, just like I did with Supergrover. I felt abandoned even though she didn’t feel that way. I didn’t need any more safety and security than that. That way, I’m not counting on a response, but it’s welcome if I get one. I would have treated her like I treat Bryn for her whole life if she had been as honest with me in all of her e-mails as she was in her last one.

Here’s the line that got me. “I could write all night, but I won’t.” In that moment, I knew I hadn’t been lovebombed just to be discarded. That’s because the letter was already pages long, and then after she said she didn’t want to type anymore, she typed for several more paragraphs. It made it feel so much more personal and intimate, because it was like she was saying, “I could write to you all night.” The only thing I worry about with both Daniel and Supergrover is that I have done this thing:

Into the Breech Once More

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

Daniel said, “because you said you were still in love with me, I want to make it my life goal that you don’t regret being that raw.” I told him I was only able to be that way with him because he’d been that raw with me. That he’d told me he’d been in love with me for 36 years, and I didn’t think one would undo it. I was absolutely right.

And then I got to go back to Cora and say that “I told your dad that if he wasn’t strong enough to admit that he’d been an idiot, then it was on me.” I love that I got to make my girl laugh. I get why stepfamilies have family rings. I love that kid like I birthed her, and I didn’t meet her until she was 24.

It’s been awesome getting to talk to her dad, because I am not her primary parent. But I do fulfill a very specific role in her life, and that’s that her parents will never understand her like a bisexual woman with a nonbinary brain. Again, it’s not that they lack empathy, they are just standing outside the queer community when my sister and I have been in it since we were kids. I think that Cora and Lindsay will like each other a lot, because even though Lindsay is a cishet woman, she works in trans medicine. The best part is that I have relatives that live in the same area as Daniel and Cora, so it would be fun to go and visit Daniel, but also be able to check on the progress at my grandfather’s house, visit with my aunts, uncles, and cousins. It is really hard for us all to get together because we don’t have our grandparents to bind us together anymore, nor my mother or her brother, Bill.

But we manage. I learned at my grandfather’s funeral that my late uncle’s wife is getting married again, and I’m so happy for her. I was also very glad to see my mother’s sister, because she said she knew my mom would want her to be there, if not for her, for us. She was right. It was like hearing my mother’s voice the whole time. My aunt speaks in a little higher register than my mother, but the inflections are exactly the same.

I’d get to see people that want to be close to me and aren’t, just by the nature of where we live. It would be so nice to be able to move back to Northeast Texas without incident- lower cost of living and all that. But at the same time, it might be safe for me to be bisexual, especially in big cities like Dallas, Austin, Houston, etc. But nowhere is it safe to be trans. That changes my equation quite a bit.

Plus, I also consider Bryn one of my partners as well. She’s a yellow string, but if you walk with me in such a close way for that many years, you’re someone I consider a partner, because that helps me keep it in perspective that Daniel does not deserve every single bit of me outside of my professional endeavors. It’s a mistake that too many couples make- cocooning to the rest of the world and only speaking to each other, then when the relationship ends, your entire world walks out the door. I can’t do that again.

Bryn and I want it to be so that when everyone else walks out on us, we have each other. That’s what best friends do. To make her less important than someone I want to marry is ridiculous, because I’ve been through so much more with her than with him. It is not that we are unhappy in our other relationships, it’s that you always need someone to have your back. You’ve got your romantic partners, and you’ve got the ones that heal your broken hearts.

The thing that keeps relationships in perspective for me is that even if Bryn goes away, I still have writing. I still have a friend that hasn’t left me, because in a lot of ways, this is still a conversation. I just don’t know the audience. It’s still epistolary, yet I’m going to bet most of us will never shake hands.

I have finally found something that gives me complete and total internal validation, so I am not looking for it in anyone else………… anymore. I am not saying that I like any relationship ending. I like the feeling that even when someone else isn’t with me, I am, and I’m finding out that I’m pretty good company.

I’m guessing I am at least interesting enough that you read to the end.

That’s enough. 😉

Every Day Blogging

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

It’s starting to stress me out that you can’t answer a blog prompt against, because I don’t really have a topic to start from each morning. Today wouldn’t have been a good one, anyway, because I don’t have any more morning/night rituals now than I did the first time around. The point still stands, though, that it was night to have a jumping off point and a tag everyone starts with every day, #dailyprompt and #dailyprompt-x, the number advancing every day. Well, since I have both tags for all of the prompts from last year, that’s why they already look like they’ve been answered this year. I’m sorry I’m on about this, it was just the main thing that kept me from being lazy and not posting something that day.

But yesterday wasn’t about laziness. I skipped yesterday because I was in burnout mode. I was more overstimulated than I’d been in a long time, because my schedule was all messed up. I needed time to recover and I took it. I slept, mostly. I am not as young as I continue to think I am.

If I have learned nothing from going to psychiatrists and psychologists over the years, it’s that medicine and therapy absolutely work and are valuable……… but so are sleep and sobriety. I don’t practice total abstinence from alcohol, because it’s okay to enjoy it once in a while. It’s just that if I am taking an antidepressant and drinking a depressant, I have not made any forward motion.

When I was in the restaurant business, I drank a lot more because that’s what we did after work. But, then after Dana got her DUI, we went to all these classes on medicine and alcohol (legally required for her, I just drove). It sent MY brain on fire. When I realized what was actually going on in my brain when I drank, I had a light bulb moment. It just didn’t feel like an every day sort of thing anymore.

Therefore, when I worked in a pub here in Silver Spring, I rarely drank. Occasionally I took them up on a beer, but they also had Maine Root Mexican Cola. That won nearly every night. It was a pub. None of the drinks we served had ice except for soda. With the choice of a room temperature beer or a cold soda with ice after a 12 hour shift on grill, it was a quick and easy decision. Give me the cold one.

I have shifted my focus into accommodating who I actually am instead of who everyone told me I was. Whoever I thought Leslie Lanagan was, I cannot say from before. I can only say that I saw the expectations in front of me and found all of them easy for a short period of time, and all of them untenable long term. I learned who my real friends were when I stopped social masking, and Doc was the first person who recognized it before I said it. “Do you think the authoritative part of yourself comes from you feeling more confident in confiding in me?” Yes, 100%. The more you allow me to be me without social masking, the more I want to talk to you. The more I want to open up to you.

I can only speak to the fact that the more I get to know myself, the more I learn how wrong I’ve been. Treating myself as perfectly mentally stable and perfectly physically able, just lazy and a drain on society has nearly killed me several times. I know that because I can only treat myself that way so long without realizing it’s not producing results.

Once I started being kind to myself, I could be softer, as well. That’s because I was living under everyone else’s expectations of what I should be able to do. I was not raised to be neurodivergent, and in some respects, not raised to even be fallible, either, because that is opening the kimono. The parish doesn’t get to live in the pastor’s house.

I didn’t “choose to air all of this out on my web site” re: Supergrover. I decided she wasn’t worthy of listening to my story anymore, because she’d told me she was tired of it. That did not mean there was no more story to tell. She just asked to stop listening to it. There’s so much context she’s missing, and what bothers me is that she told me that I’d aired some things she wanted to keep private, and in no way did I know any of that. When I started explaining, I went by the timeline of her e-mails, especially the ones where they said that her stories weren’t mine to carry anymore, that everyone already knew. She didn’t tell me any of it- no anger, no disappointment, no hurt, no anything. She just let it fester and wandered further from me. The thing I needed most was intimacy, but she didn’t want to give it to me. Not my call. It’s perfectly valid. But so is my hurt if that is her response. I am not saying that she did anything wrong. I am only saying that it is not her responsibility to have my reactions for me. If she wants distance, it’s just a different way of ending the game than I would have done it, but I get the same result and cannot be angry about that.

She says it’s a lot, that every letter is so dense. And at the same time, I don’t think she’d be as obsessed with reading my letters if they weren’t so deep and chewy. What brought us together has driven us apart.

Therefore, I went to my only other safe space in writing….. the part where it’s just me in my room, thinking to myself. I am writing these as letters to me in the future, which is why I cultivate this web site as what my friend Kristie called “my pensieve.” I am a really rare breed, I think….. someone who’s willing to let another person read their autistic mind in real time. I think it’s important, because generally, autistic people aren’t raised to be autistic. They know how their neurotypical adults handle the world, but they have no clue how an autistic person does it. And then add to that the large number of older women who are getting diagnosed now because it was entirely missed in their childhood due to having social masking beaten into them early. That social masking, those expectations, are what make an autistic person feel like an alien.

That’s because I am an aggressive taskmaster with myself, authoritative and stern without love because in addition to not giving myself empathy, I am a relentless perfectionist who doesn’t give a fuck about my feelings. I haven’t cared how bad I’ve made myself feel for not being perfect since I was born, because that’s how the outside world has treated me for years as well.

With autism/ADHD, you never “get it together.”

Hopefully Not a Darwin Award

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

If you could have something named after you, what would it be?

Generally, things are named after you posthumously, and I don’t want to be given an award for the most original way to die, like accidentally rocking a Coke machine onto myself….. that’s a classic. In DC, I basically have the option of a museum, a statue, or a gravestone. However, the plots around Gore Vidal are already taken at Congressional cemetery, and I don’t live in The District proper. I’m not sure there are any other requirements to live there. But it wouldn’t matter. I’d rather be cremated because I don’t see anyone needing my body after the doctors with it (I am an organ, skin, and donor). I also don’t have a special attachment to one place, but a lot of them.

I’d like to become one with the Columbia River Gorge, because no one is going to rename that after me, but it’s where I’d like to spend eternity. And if you put me on the Washington side, I WILL KNOW. I don’t know how I will know that, but I do know that I’d take a lot of chances with ghosts, but I’m not one of them. I could outsmart me easily, because I create the logic. I don’t have to follow it. I am sure it is something that seems like a joke to me and yet is the source of all my real problems. I don’t have to follow what I say because I know what I think. I forget about the translation layer between neurodivergent and neurotypical people that makes me automatically sound immature and a little bit crazy because I haven’t thought it out. I’m like “The Doctor” in that way. People spend time with me and wonder how I get so far on half plans. It’s because I’m not threatened when they don’t work out or change. I just assimilate the new information into whatever the plan was before.

I realized I was struggling without Daniel because there wasn’t someone to social mask in the mornings. There was nothing to build anything with if we didn’t take the raw materials with which we started and put in the work. I don’t want to throw raw ingredients into a stock pot and hope for the best.

He told me that some of the things I said made him not want to engage. I said, “that’s fine and we can table it, but these are the important conversations to have and we can’t ignore them. Problems keep revisiting you.” He agreed with me and we moved on. I am not trying to make anyone feel bad, I’m saying, “this is the problem. What do you want to do about it?” Most people do not think of it as a problem unless it affects them. They rarely care when their actions affect you. What’s good enough for them is good enough for you in all cases, regardless of how their first family communicated.

I’m guilty of the same thing, but I’m trying to learn from my mistakes. I do not need everything to be doom and gloom all the time, but I do need for people to be emotionally mature and tell me how they feel instead of attacking me for bringing something up. It’s an easy and cheap shot that I will never let anyone get away with ever again. It’s the equivalent of “it’s not that bad. You’re imagining it. You’re dwelling on the past.” No, I’m telling you the feelings that are coming up for me now because of what happened in the past, and we can either deal with it now, or we can deal with it forever, because if this is always a one-sided conversation and it is important to me, it becomes a dealbreaker.

Yesterday, Daniel asked me how he could show me the most amount of love. My answer to that was twofold. The first is that if he really loves me, he’ll want a housekeeper before I move in…. one of those jokes that’s not meant to come off as a joke because I’m autistic/ADHD and I don’t remember anything going anywhere and I don’t create messes, I maintain them. They are piles, but it is my emotional support detritus.

Here’s why “emotional support detritus” is a thing. The first is that few houses come with built-ins where you can see anything inside. Every cabinet has a door. The neurodivergent brain has to have everything out in front of them all the time, because they do not create memories of where they place things. It’s a need for iron structure and an inability to create it with ADHD. I am a Virgo. Back to school has excited me since the 80s. I have bought every planning system known to God and man. The thing that has worked best is my original Palm Pilot with Graffiti 1. I never got the hang of Graffiti 2, and I am still butt hurt about it.

I might look on E-bay to see if I can find a Palm Pilot and a dock, because the form factor is so much smaller than my iPad and “Scribble” is harder to get used to than I thought it would be.

Interestingly enough, Graffiti 1 works really well on the Apple Watch, but it would be better if the Apple Watch supported the Apple Pencil because it’s so much easier to hand write with a stylus than it is with your finger, especially one as touch sensitive as the Apple Pencil.

I write like it’s Graffiti 1 anyway, because it’s easier than having to get all my letters perfect. It knows what I mean…… except for voice dictation. I have better luck when I’m on Bluetooth headphones, and I cannot be very far from my phone, because I think the voice files are actually processed on your phone rather than your watch.

I want an Apple Watch version named after me, because I have some good ideas. What if CIA gave us those batteries that lasted months without a recharge, and a chip that would fit inside a watch and be so powerful that you don’t need your phone for anything. I have a feeling that would involve creating a larger memory ROM, but surely if they have enough room for as much as they do now, they can put more RAM on the board. The biggest problem would be overheating, but if they can make tiles for a space shuttle to guard against heat, they can probably design something like that to absorb heat in an Apple Watch.

The battery is the main thing, because Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and a 5g connection all take a lot of battery at once, and that’s before it starts processing apps. The one I use the most is “Find My iPhone,” because I can make it make noise from my watch….. unless my phone is dead…. then I’m on my own and that’s not a pretty sight. Although because of the Apple ecosystem, as long as I have a wi-fi connection, I’ll still get iMessage on my iPad. I will still get iMessage on my phone, as well as SMS.

Although I think if I ever get a new Android tablet, I’ll want it to have a slot for a SIM card because I won’t use anything for texting on an Android but Signal, Wix Secure Messenger, and WhatsApp. I use Facebook Messenger because it’s easy, but it’s not encrypted, either. If you want to chat with me on either of those platforms and already have my phone number, please do.

On my author page at Facebook, you can leave all kinds of comments, and the more engagement I have, the closer I am to being paid. It also makes it where anyone can message me, you don’t have to be a follower (although it would be cool, no lie). Sometimes I wonder if I should do an FAQ on Facebook as an introduction, but I don’t know what people would ask. I’ll answer anything, you just have to respect that “no” and “that’s too private” are valid answers.

Anyone is welcome to contribute, from my biggest fans to my biggest detractors. I do not think I am the expert on anything but myself, and your stories are your stories. I often get so many likes on a post that I don’t know what triggered the reception. Is it the time of day, is it my content, is it my characters, etc.?

The biggest surprise is being more popular in other countries than I am here. I have a huge following in India and the UK. Plus, I have flags all over the world where I know who they are. If you don’t want me to know who you are based on geography, I would suggest a VPN. 🙂 I have so many people addicted to this web site that know me in real life, because they’re in the position where they don’t want to be written about, but they inhale everything I’ve written as truth because it is interesting and presented in a way that hopefully everyone can understand it. That I try as often as I can to use universal examples so that I’m not attacking anyone. I am laying down the facts as I see them.

Very few people are willing to stand by and let themselves be written as a villain, because that’s how they see themselves in my writing- not that I intentionally portray them that way. I have made it a point to record every up and down in every relationship, so that you don’t see me as paining anyone as perfect, not even Jesus.

Speaking of which, I am watching a docudrama on Netflix called “Testament,” and it’s all about Moses, starting with the story from when he was a child. The documentary part is interviewing all kinds of scholars from the Abrahmic tradition because he’s the only “character” that appears in all three holy books. There is a lot more information about him that way, and the Jews in the conversation have been very enlightening, because Jesus was a Jew. It’s fun learning about the traditions he would have been taught as a child, before he started branching out……. because in order to understand the future, you have to understand the past.

I can absolutely believe that as a historically known INFJ that his divinity started the moment he started arguing with the rabbis in the temple when he was 12 years old. That his divinity does not come from resurrection, but about being able to go toe to toe with the best theological minds in the world when he wasn’t even a man yet. His bar mitzvah was still a year away.

To me, I believe as Pete Rollins has said, that “a/theism is the greatest love story ever told, and the truth is in the slash.” To me, theology is not the end goal, whether there is a heaven and a hell, whether there is an afterlife at all. It is the ritual and the argument.

I got sidetracked when I was talking about Gordon Atkinson, who used to blog as “The Real Live Preacher,” as if he was a carnival act. I have never related more to anything in my life. He really opened up to me in those essays, and I understood myself so much better after reading him. I didn’t grow up to be a pastor, but I grew up with a pastor dad. It was hard not to feel like “The Real Life Preacher’s Kid,” because when you are a public figure’s family, you’re all in the fish bowl together……. and sometimes, two things happen…… severally or jointly. The first is that people think preacher’s kids are somehow better than everyone else. I mean, I am, but let’s not talk about Lindsay. (KIDDING)

I only say that because I really bought in. Lindsay was a walking wild hair, and I envied her for half my life because of it. Still do on days when she has to be “on” and I’m in burnout mode. I do my best work by standing behind her and just listening.

I did not have the strength (and sometimes still don’t) to have equal relationships with people by calling them on their bullshit. She learned it at three. I learned it at 45. There is a slight difference between those two ages, and I have to say that it probably comes from birth order. I was almost six when she was born, because her birthday is in June and mine is in September.

Therefore, I don’t have a lot of memories of what it was like to be an only child, but I do have quite a bit more than someone whose younger sibling was born when they were a toddler. I was blessed to have a sibling, because I was that kid. I talked about different stuff than most kids. I had the vocabulary of some adults by the time I was two or three because no one ever talked down to me. I was expected to keep up, and I did. Before Lindsay was born, I didn’t have that mostly neurotypical kid to intervene on my behalf. My main interest and what served me all through school was finding an outcast and sitting next to them, because I only wanted to talk to one person at a time.

Everyone thought it was because I was a preacher’s kid, and I’m sure that’s definitely part of it, but it’s not the whole story. I hate small talk, and if I was only sitting with one person, it wasn’t a good bet that we’d be doing small talk for very long.

That’s how Daniel became my boyfriend in 2nd/3rd grade. We were both “that kid.” We had more to talk about than basic 2nd grade shit, because we were both way beyond our peers with reading and music.

I will say something again that is meaningful to me about choosing Daniel. Not only did he know my mother, she taught him music for at least a year. So, that meant that Daniel was in some of my school plays with me, and my mother trained his voice. I can’t wait until we have our own house that will fit a piano, because I want to hear Daniel play my mother’s piano, as well. I am sure that it will become four-handed duets in no time, because I can’t keep the left and right rhythms going at the same time. If he doesn’t already play piano, I can at least teach him “All Blues” by Miles Davis.

Yes, Jason Moran. I know you’re terribly impressed right now. It is almost like I’m the savant you missed in taking on students. A pity, really (it’s got an easy bass line and like two or three chords). Although I’m pretty sure I’ve heard him play keyboards in his music, so I might get an accompanist out of this deal. 😉

I might get an accompanist, anyway, if Colin wants me to lay down some tracks for his band. I think we’d have a great time together since he plays guitar and I sing, plus he has professional recording equipment in his attic. I can’t wait to show Lindsay that room, because I think it would be her heaven. Maybe for once we could be in the same band. 🙂

Lindsay was in a band in college that I really liked called “The Cosmonauts,” and my favorite t-shirt at that time was “I’m with the band.” It went over really well with my in-laws…….. because I was wearing a nice sweater and when I took it off, it sort of amused and horrified them. I explained that it was my sister in the rock band, and I can’t tell whether that impressed or horrified them, either.

I have never been in a family that was really accepting of me, because I always felt like I had no right to take up room. When I felt like I had enough clout with Dana’s family to have my say, Dana was horrified because I was changing her family dynamics. Well, of course I was. You are introducing a whole new person.

With Kathleen, I think she really bought into the fact that she only wanted to have babies with men. And, to be honest, I think she was afraid of me becoming even more psychiatrically unstable because the research on taking antidepressants while pregnant suggested it would be dicey. But I didn’t care if Kathleen was the biological mom. I would have been happy either way. We just didn’t have enough money to swing it, or blamed it on that, anyway.

I think eventually I realized that I didn’t want to have kids with her, because even if I wasn’t the extra kid, she’d always treat me like that because that’s how she treated me currently.

My biological clock went CRAZY when I got together with Dana, because she was the right person to have kids with, even in retrospect. I would have preferred her to carry the baby, but she wasn’t buying it. She said she’d do it as a last resort. But by the time wee got to the OB/GYN, the phrase “geriatric pregnancy” did not sound appealing and we just kind of put the idea away.

I don’t think either one of us were actually capable of integrating an infant into our schedules without major changes, most notably getting out of cooking because Dana would never make enough money to support housing for both of us if we were depending on me to make all the money. My job history isn’t that stable with all the medical conditions I have, and it’s hard to integrate just how many doctors’ appointments I have without a cooking job, because my days off weren’t generally Saturday and Sunday. I could schedule my appointments in the morning and still be on time for work.

However, I have IT to fall back on, and as far as I know, Dana doesn’t. I didn’t pressure her to go into it at all, Aaron just noticed she was a great coder. She wanted to be a teacher, but didn’t make that a reality, either. We moved to Houston so that she could teach, because you didn’t need a Master’s there. She was rejected by one program and didn’t try to get into any others. It’s a shame. She would have been a marvelous teacher. I just don’t think she was in any shape to be a teacher by the time we arrived in Houston.

I don’t blame her in any way, shape, or form. The only appropriate reaction to an abnormal situation is an abnormal reaction. She was very depressed and I understood intimately. The problem was that I was also very depressed, and I couldn’t handle Dana’s depression at the same time.

Then, I got an influx of “new relationship energy” that was supposed to be clean, light, and fun. Well, since I was a jackass and told her my feelings were starting to change, she started not telling me things, as if that would make the situation better. I was guessing too much of the time as to what would make her happy, all the while making her ridiculously angry and not knowing why.

Enter Daniel.

“Oh, wait. You’re autistic. That changes EVERYTHING. If you’ve told me this before, I don’t mean to make you rehash, but tell me again how your autism affects you.”

It was the end of all the feeling like he was being bombarded by questions, because he’s a Doc. He saw which way that train was going and hopped on.

As we were talking, he said, “do you think the authoritative part of your personality is that way because you feel safer to express what you feel to me?” That was a lightbulb moment for me, because it’s exactly the thing I’ve been trying to explain to everyone for all time. If I don’t think you can handle my feelings, I won’t tell you what they are. If you don’t like my tone, you can tell me to rephrase something. But the more I don’t feel like I have to social mask around you, the more I let my guard down and I start writing like I’m blogging- to an international audience and not an audience of one. So, even if it’s not a personal attack, it comes across like one because I am not running what I say through every filter ever. I want those closest to me, especially someone I want to build a life with, to be able to take me at full strength. Daniel has agreed that he’s just as intense as I am, but the thing that was the most valuable about this conversation was feeling seen. And not just seen by Daniel as my partner, but seen by Daniel the doctor as well.

Otherwise, he wouldn’t have said, “oh, shit. This changes everything.”

It does, and I’m looking forward to every fucking minute.

Thankfully, Things Have Calmed Down

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

I feel a sense of peace this morning that I haven’t felt in a long time. I found a great house, and I’m moving in roughly two weeks. I think Colin is okay with our first plan of me moving in on the 13th, but he needs some time on his end to get my room ready, too. The only thing I was trying to avoid was being home while my landlords show their house, but it won’t be the end of the world if I have to wait.

In the meantime, I’m on pins and needles waiting to see Zac, because it’s been a while. Nothing is wrong between us, just jacked up schedules right now for both of us. But again, we’re going to see Jason Moran on the 10th, and then that weekend is drill for him, so he’s going to help me after work both days (if needed). I told him if he wanted he could stay at my house on the Saturday, because drill weekend is at Ft. Meade, which is 20 minutes from my house and quite a bit further to his (Zac lives out in Virginia at the end of the blue line). I’m hoping we can get it all done in a few hours, and I don’t think that’s impossible as long as I have everything boxed. I only have four pieces of furniture.

Other than that, I think I have everything I need. My dad sent me some canvas moving boxes, and I think I’m just going to fold everything as opposed to trying to find a hanging box for all my button-downs. I hate packing. Anything to make it easier. Thank God I don’t have many dishes.

Speaking of dishes, I’m out of coffee and I’m a bit peeved about that. The only reason I’m not a full-on maniac is that I have Stash English Breakfast tea if I get desperate. I wonder if I could go door to door begging for someone to take pity on me. It’s 0551. Surely someone is up.

They are.

I could get coffee from Hayat, but I’m lazy and upstairs. Hayat (and the coffee) are downstairs. Don’t you see it would take ALL THAT WORK? 😉 Hayat has gotten up at 0400 since the day I arrived, and I started waking up early because of her. Originally, I was such a light sleeper that her coffee grinder would wake me up, so I just started going to bed earlier and earlier.

Now, I’m on my own schedule, which seems to be “be lazy. Sleep in until 0500.” So, if you get a message from me in what seems like “the middle of the night,” I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I just write things when I think of them and forget about things like notifications. I’ve gotten good about asking people if they leave their notifications on at night or if my texting them is going to bother them- leaving notes rather than expecting a reply.

This gets problematic because people are programmed to respond right away. So, they’ll say that the notifications don’t bother them, but they weren’t serious. And now they don’t want to hurt my feelings. PLEASE hurt my feelings, because if you tell me that I can text you at any time, because you have your phone on “Do Not Disturb” or whatever, I’m going to believe you. If you change your mind and it is indeed annoying, then don’t let me think it’s fine when it’s not, because I will not pick up on your subtle cues to stop.

I mean, sometimes I will. But not if you only text me back and I can’t read your voice and it’s too polite to really tell anything. I have problems with polite, because I take things literally.

Well, when I’m not being sarcastic. Sarcasm I can do. One of the many services I offer (that tends to get me in trouble). I’ve thought I’ve been weird a lot of my life, but as it turns out the autistic sense of humor is often dark to deal with the pressure. I’m not weird in a crowd of autistic people, because someone is likely to make a darker joke than me, and that’s hard to do. It’s always a slow clap moment for me when someone manages to out-dark me.

I will be taking no further questions. 😉

Making things right with The War Daniel needed to happen, even if we never get further than we are right now. Our future plans don’t matter so much as being friends again, and being able to be there in lockstep for Daniel’s daughter, Cora. I think that’s been the hardest part of this whole separation from Daniel, because Cora is 25 years old. Trying to judge the parent dynamic from the friend dynamic is tough, because I didn’t want her to know how I feel about Daniel at all (she does now, I’m talking about when we weren’t speaking). It wouldn’t have been fair or sane to make her “monkey in the middle,” and I am definitely sane/brave enough not to do that. It’s basically the only piece of our relationship that does fall under parent/child dynamic, because no matter what happens between Daniel and me, Cora is already an ironclad member of my family. I’m never going to walk out on that kid, so all I ask from Daniel is that he just let me.

No matter what his relationship with me is, just let us be, because my relationship with Cora cannot be dependent on him. I know she’s my kid, not just my rainbow kid, because I don’t believe I’m going to get out of this without becoming her stepmother, even though we’re all adults, because she already sees me that way. That’s how she was introduced, and was overwhelmed that I am bisexual, because all of the sudden she had an ally in the house. Trust me that her parents are doing the best they can, but it’s one thing to be in the queer cultural zeitgeist and to be standing outside of it.

Daniel and I are already talking about getting married again, but on the delayed timeline of his doctorate. This is because we both want to travel, possibly live overseas, and the easiest way to do that is to fly standby on military bases, which Cora and I can do as long as we’re military dependents. The only time we would have to fly commercial is if Daniel wasn’t with us. You cannot fly unaccompanied using the service member’s benefits.

Last night, we were talking about places to move where we’d be able to get back easily, like Manila. We were trying to think of places it’s less expensive to live, but still has protections for Cora.

Daniel and I had the sweetest conversation last night. He was telling me how much cheaper UAE is than the US, and I said that I was great with going to UAE and seeing if we liked it enough to stay, but that I didn’t think it was safe for Cora or me. That I could pass as straight, but that’s not me and I’m not down for it.

He said, “sweetheart, why would you ever want to pass as straight?”

I was very touched, but I said, “to get by in a Middle Eastern country, no other reason.” Instantly, his tone changed into the English professor he is and he said, “I’m not moving ANYWHERE my women aren’t welcome.” He’s on board.

I love him. I really do. If the stars line up, we’re going to go back to Caldwell Zoo in Tyler to take pictures, hopefully recreating a few. I remember one that we need to do, and it just flashed into my memory (Achievement Unlocked, MASSIVE XP). I don’t know if it’s still there, but they used to have a playground. My mother took a shot that day of Daniel and me sitting under the play structure. I have no idea what we were talking about.

Probably Sartre or Proust, who knows. But we were definitely THAT KID.

I’ll get to show him where I was born- in Tyler, at Mother Frances Hospital, with “the statue of Jesus directing traffic.” I could see how things are going at my grandfather’s house.

It’s interesting, my grandfather gave his house to my cousin Jason, because his whole job is refurbishing homes. The plan is that once Jason is done overhauling the place, it will serve as a lake house for all of us. It’s out on Starlight Lake in Lone Star, where interestingly enough, my mother’s sister also has a house. So, we can go back and forth between relatives like we used to do when we were kids in NE Texas as well. My grandparents lived at most five miles from each other, if that.

I honestly stayed at one house til I got bored, then called my other grandmother to come and get me. I can say that because they’re no longer with us……. but they saw what I did. 😉

The vibes of the houses were so different, because my dad’s parents were Anglophiles and have a million video tapes I’d love to get my hands on with a video production server. They have stuff that Mike’s Movie Magic doesn’t have, and I swear it. Old PBS showings of BBC plays and TV shows that no one would ever find again. If those tapes still exist and I have room for them, I’l put them on a server and give access to my family.

At Christmas we usually watched “A Child’s Christmas in Wales” or Gene Wilder’s Willy Wonka, who was terrifying…. yet not as terrifying to me as “The Wizard of Oz.” Never again if I can help it (I do like “Wicked,” though, minus all the stage theatrics that really made me jump. However, I think the age at which I saw it is directly responsible. Three or four is too young for flying monkeys.

In this case, anyway.

I am terrified of Oz on some days, and some days it’s all Glinda, all the time.

Answered

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

I’m getting tired of the daily blog prompts saying I’ve already answered them, because I often have new ideas the second time the prompt comes around. Today, though, I’m glad I got nothin,’ because there’s been a change, and I really can’t tell you why. Magda decided that she didn’t want to move with me, and told Colin she wasn’t coming. I don’t know why. So, I was very scared that all of the sudden, I didn’t have a place to go, either, because I couldn’t afford to pay for both rooms all by myself. Colin said not to worry, that I could still move in, and my body relaxed. I think he hopes Magda will change her mind, but I have never seen it happen. I feel bad, that maybe we’ve done something to alienate her? But that’s impossible because neither one of us have had conversations since the last one we had together.

So, I have to stop worrying about all of that and just be glad that when my boyfriend arrives to be the muscle in the operation, I still have an address to point him.

That struck me as funny all of the sudden…… that if you never really thought you’d ever have a boyfriend, God laughs and you wind up with two. 😉 Two that know about each other, and aren’t threatened by each other………. very much like I wasn’t threatened by the idea of Michael for Supergrover even at the height of feeling absolutely waylaid by an arrow to my Achilles’ heel. We had two completely separate roles in her life, and I was incredibly far away. He was on the ground. It’s the same now. Daniel is incredibly far away. Zac is on the ground. Neither of us should expect the other to be monks for years on end, and that’s not what poly is, anyway. It’s not being able to divide love up between more people, but to love multiple people 100%. That gets tricky in terms of time, but not feelings.

I have never told Bryn that I loved her INSTEAD OF Supergrover (nor told Dana I loved her INSTEAD of Supergrover, or vice versa), so I wouldn’t do it to anyone else. Bryn doesn’t tell me she loves me INSTEAD OF Dave, and I’m glad because again, two completely separate roles in Bryn’s life. W

e’ve been through so much together, more than I’ve been through with either guy, she’s been through more than she’s been through with Dave. I just don’t care whether it’s a yellow string or a red one, if you’re connected to me, you’re important. My time is just as sacred for my close friends, and always will be.

It helps that The War Daniel is in the Navy, because since his classes are online that does open us up to him being able to visit on standby. As long as I have a way for him to watch wrestling on Wednesday nights (God help us all).

Colin has cable, but he’s interested in cutting the cord. I wish I still had my old computer. I’d have a media center set up for him within the week, because I already know how to cut the cord effectively. You can have everything, including a DVR, for the cost of a cheap computer. Well, I suppose the DVR also depends on how good the signal is from your antenna, but the point stands. I can also install Kodi (media center software) on my FireStick with a little bit of hackage.

And yet, all of that is a story for another day because for right now, it’s about how to fit all of my stuff into my new moving boxes. I want to pack everything except for the sheets/blankets and some clothes. Boxes stacked in here will be easier to keep clean and neat should we have visitors. The visitors are by appointment only, but I’d like to mitigate my ability to be me as much as possible.

No one was here to rescue me on this one. I had to do it all by myself. I had to reach out to people and tell them I was interested in looking. I had to be brave and make phone calls, which seems ridiculous and yet Gen Z just went, “oh my GOD, are you okay?” I ended up in a wonderful situation with more space than I thought I would get (at first, I’m sure someone will move in). The other thing is that I get to stay in my neighborhood, and it turns out that’s pretty important to me, too. I’m a Marylander now.

That may not always be the case, as I love Virginia, too. I just feel that it’s easier for me to own my space up here. I will never run into anyone I don’t want to see, and that covers a hell of a lot of ground. You cannot imagine how relieved I was to learn that there’s a Waffle House on my side of the river, as poorly as that trip turned out.

It is definitely time for a change, but not one so big that I meltdown and burnout in a cycle until I relearn my surroundings. I wanted to avoid all of it, and I think I’ve managed successfully…….. because did I mention that Colin lives two major stoplights from my current house?

Wrestling, though? WHAT WAS I THINKING?

I’m On My Own Today

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ 1 Comment

Apparently, when you answer one of WordPress’s prompts, it remembers. So, even though I answered the prompt when it first came around, I’m not eligible to answer it again. The prompt was “what’s something that most people don’t understand?” If I remember correctly, I wrote an entire essay on how most people don’t understand themselves. How blogging is kind of a superpower that way, especially when you write every day. I understand myself because I go back and look at the entries from the last few days before I write the current one. That way, I can see if what I said then is still true. My mind works very fast, and is a busy place. I’m also not afraid to admit I’m wrong, so a good bit of knowing myself is saying, “Ok. I felt this…. but I don’t feel that anymore…. this is still good…. that can go in the back of the closet, etc.” It is a quilting of my life, because not everything is bad and not everything is good. But in order for me to see perspective with clarity, I have to be brave enough to read my own writing.

That’s the hardest part of blogging, the reading your own writing. Even when what you’ve said is embarrassing, you have to stand next to it because it was all how you felt in that moment, even if you don’t feel that way anymore. Also, processing my feelings about other people makes me feel closer and further away from them, too. When I think about what has happened to me over my life, none of it compares to my reaction at what I’ve allowed. No one affects me more than me, and I have not done things I needed to do to protect myself, and have also done too much. Apparently, I don’t know a whole lot about balance, but I don’t know many neurodivergent people who do.

For instance, yesterday I told The War Daniel that enough time had passed between us and we should start talking again. We agreed that we were assholes to each other. That I hoped he realized that I was never going to abandon him in rehab, and he told me he didn’t feel that way. We’re healing, a day at a time, and I get pictures of “my kids and grandkids,” who are apparently cats, a service dog, and a snake (between The War Daniel and his daughter, Cora). The War Daniel is getting his PhD in English literature, and it’s fun to hear about that project, too.

I realized that if The War Daniel wasn’t brave enough to come to me and say he was an idiot, then it was on me. Because it wasn’t a matter of losing or winning a fight. It was a matter of losing or winning Daniel.

I told him that I’d lived on something Cora said for a year….. “I don’t think your faith in my father is misplaced.” He said it was such a relief. I am not rushing for any specific outcome, I’m just glad to have the big rift healed. We’ll either end up moving in together or we won’t, but that’s not my main goal. My main goal is getting us stable enough to be able to communicate every day without leaving pricks on the other’s skin that won’t heal anymore. I don’t have time for things to fester, because I don’t want to live with that level of insecurity in my life.

So, at the very least, I have solved the most important rift in my life, and that is enough. Two important rifts, if you count the peace I feel after getting Supergrover’s letter and letting her go back to what she’s used to with her own family. I feel like that rift is fixed, because she’s welcome to show up with real feelings just like she did previously, she’s just not welcome to kick the can down the road and make me think we’re fine when we’re not.

I am stronger than that. I can take it. Whatever our real problems are, that’s what I’m built to solve, not to figure out the neurotypical games that come with talking around being anxious/upset/angry.

I’d rather just get back on the same page with someone, even if the writing we’ve previously done is good and we have to scrap some. Daniel and I have a new timeline and a new vision, but I decided that if I was quiet, I was part of the problem.

Now, there is hope where there wasn’t before.

Hope that I didn’t know was there, but had to ask and see.

I promised both you and The War Daniel that I would not give up until he’d been out of rehab a year and his brain wasn’t fuzzy anymore. I kept my word, and I was right. That was the surprise, that I was right. That we’d both been assholes under extreme pressure but it didn’t mean we didn’t love each other.

Other than that, though, nothing changes. He’s in grad school in NE Texas and will be for the foreseeable future, though his classes are online because his tuition assistance also comes through Texas, but once he’s done with school, he’d definitely think about moving here, because he wanted to last year as well. Cora has also said that if Daniel moves here, she wants to come with him because trans laws in Texas are terrible. So, all of these are things that need to be discussed a little bit at a time, while our timeline is long enough not to miss anything.

I have found that Daniel and I are both driven to write, and we need to cut that shit out. For instance, I think we should start video calling at least once a week to FORCE ourselves to stop being writers. This seems like it should be a joke. It’s not. Writer personalities are real and deep.

Supergrover and I have rarely ever gotten out of it, and if the same were to happen with Daniel, I think our relationship would go the same way- not feeling it as secure and real because it’s just text.

I learned the difference with Zac, who sends me pictures of him and Oliver, who leaves voice notes, etc. It helped me get out of my writer personality with him because there were more than just paragraphs to our relationship.

Supergrover doesn’t have time to send me pictures of herself and her dogs on a schedule, nor does she have a committed time for voice notes. The ones I’ve got, though, are priceless. They indeed made me feel close to her in a different way, an added layer. Getting to know the way she talks felt intimate- the mask in front of all her words after I’d internalized them.

Therefore, in online relationships I’m different now. This is not an online relationship because I’ve known The War Daniel since we were seven…. but it’s online now because that’s how we can communicate across states easily. I want voice notes. I want video calls. I want everything to feel as grounded as humanly possible.

So that I do.

Hardly Ever

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

How often do you say “no” to things that would interfere with your goals?

The thing about being a writer is that nothing interferes with your goals if you don’t allow it. In my particular case, dropping everything to do something for/with a friend adds to the richness of my writing, not a distraction to it. I think of my blog as one of those video games that you can get lost in, because even after you’ve finished the main quest, you have so many side quests that you keep returning to that world. In this case, the main quest will be over when I die. My “stories that are all true” won’t end unless I do. Therefore, my blog is entirely driven by the way the B plots of my life work out. Everything is a B plot when the A plot is just my time on earth.

The main reason I started writing every single day was just to see if I could. If I could be dedicated to such a thing. That I wouldn’t even take off weekends, that blogging was serious business not to draw people in, but to heal me. I have said this before, but this blog is almost entirely my therapy, because a therapist only spends an hour a week with you. You don’t get well on an hour a week. I began to view writing as important as my medication. I have to take my medication every day to make me feel better, so I process my feelings as well.

Sometimes I wait until the afternoon, but most of the time I wake up, fill my water bottle, take my medication, and start writing. It is now 0524. I have been up and down since 0300, and I don’t know why. Oh, yes I do. When I knock myself out with sleeping pills, I go so deep that I don’t need as much. So, if I go to bed at 2100, I’m guaranteed to be up at o’dark hundred.

Generally, when you get entries later in the day, it’s because Zac goes to bed a lot later than I do, so our day starts later when we’re together. It’s an interruption I’m gladly willing to make, because as a boyfriend, he is killing it. Our next date is going to the Kennedy Center to see Jason Moran, and I’m so excited. I’ve known Jason since he was a senior in high school, when I was a mere freshman. He taught me to listen to jazz and analyze it so that I could repeat it, but he didn’t say that. He said, “never take your headphones off. Listen at home, between classes, have a radio under your pillow.” Guess what. I can analyze jazz now. If I see which way the band is going, I can go with them…… and I got that phrase from Konrad Johnson.

Konrad Johnson was a high school jazz band director in Houston, Texas who made fame. Kashmere’s Jazz band is known all over the world now, because one of their charts is on the soundtrack to “Baby Driver.” The way I know Konrad is that he was my director at Summer Jazz Workshop. I cannot believe that I got to work with the two greatest jazz educators in the history of the world, because my jazz director at HSPVA was Robert Morgan.

“Doc” is directly responsible for Jason Moran, Everette Harp, Eric Harland, Robert Glasper, Jon Durbin (The Suffers)…….. the list is endless, because if you studied jazz in Houston, it was probably with him. Everette was before my time, but Robert, Jon, and I were all in the same band. I didn’t choose to continue with trumpet, but I sometimes wish I had. I enjoyed it, I just didn’t enjoy it as much as my dad did, because he didn’t have the same problems with pain in his embouchure that I did.

I could play for about half an hour at a time, and was pushing myself through every concert ever. I could have corrected it, but there was no time. I was either right before a concert, a jury, a something important I couldn’t miss.

My voice is trained much more than I ever trained as brass, and in retrospect, I should have gone the choir route. I think I would have gotten along with Mrs. Bonner, because I definitely did with Mr. Seible (who was my conductor at Bering UMC). That’s because Mrs. Bonner was also a Methodist. 😛

However, I still wouldn’t have been in class with Beyoncé, because my dad was transferred from The Heights to Sugar Land, and I chose to go to school out there. I was grandfathered in terms of the new rule that you had to live within HISD to go to HSPVA, but I didn’t want to commute. It would have been hell every single morning for two years. For reference, it’s about 27 miles, so half an hour at three in the morning and two hours at 8:00 AM.

It worked out. I had a best friend that picked me up for school every morning, in which we listened to the same tape every day. It was “Three,” by Blood, Sweat, and Tears. As a result, I still listen to that album all the time. “The Battle” and “Lucretia McEvil” are my favorite tracks, particularly Lew Soloff blasting the top off that trumpet solo in “Lucretia.”

I met Lew at a Jon Faddis concert in Virginia in 2002. It was great, because he assumed that if I knew who he and Jon were, I was probably a trumpet player. Good guess, but not currently looking for work. He told me I should audition at Manhattan School of Music, because that’s where he was teaching. It was sweet, but I told him that I just liked watching him and Faddis now. The great thing is that Lew was just a fan. He wasn’t in the band that day, we were just making small talk before we could get on the bus to see Faddis.

So, I was charming to Faddis, and the other guys on the bus started busting his balls because he had a fan. It was great.

So is “Into the Faddisphere.”

It’s all B plot. It’s all richness. It’s all side quests.

Nothing distracts from my goals. Everything is a new layer of complexity. I am aging like fine wine, which often takes on new character as the years roll past.

Pickpocketing

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

What’s a secret skill or ability you have or wish you had?

I love Skyrim. When you pickpocket someone, you get to see the inventory of their pants.

For me, pickpocketing would be about magic, not stealing. It would have been a hit at parties if I set it up in advance…. that someone will lose their wallet, and can claim it later.

I will have all the wallets in five to seven minutes, because that’s how long I’ve got. Take longer than that, the easier it is to catch you in action.

In real life, I’m not comfortable racing against the clock, even in a video game. The exception is the kitchen, because I’m not solo. This is unacceptable to my ADHD. I thrive on ironclad structure and the other half of my brain hates my fuckin’ guts. This is because when I create iron structure, I cannot maintain it. I am happy for a little while with rigidity, but the longer it goes on the more my ADHD can’t handle it. That’s why my energy levels for tasks are different all the time. My ADHD makes it its mission in life to ensure my autism is miserable.

I have demand avoidance down to taking care of myself. Yet, at other times I can be the life of a party. I’m sure depression and hypomania play a role in my energy levels, but now that I know so much about ADHD and Autism (through endless panels and lectures on YouTube), I am finding that maybe I’m not depressed. Maybe I have been mistaking depression for autism. Every one of my symptoms of depression and hypomania feel like what the psychiatrists and psychologists are trying to explain about how AuDHD works. To me, it’s a reframing, because it doesn’t feel like depression and hypomania all the time. Sometimes, I am very stable and still have demand avoidance down to taking a shower.

I am fairly certain that I have pathological demand avoidance syndrome, because it takes a Mt. Everest amount of energy for me to do anything. I’ll know once I go through the autism diagnosis process. Basically, they treat you and if it doesn’t work, then it’s pathological. “Pathological” is a scary word, but yet it’s not. It just means it can’t be treated. It’s more scary to tell someone you have something pathological because they don’t think “pathologist,” they think “serial killer.” Not a good look.

Yet, that’s still the name of the condition, and it’s already on the spectrum, just a major part of some people’s cases of autism. If you’ve met an autistic person, you have met one autistic person. For instance, I’ll talk your ear off about The Cold War, but I don’t have food issues and I don’t have too many sensory issues. I don’t have emotions like neurotypical people, but I do have them. I just process them quite a bit differently, and writing gives me an outlet to do it.

So, honestly, I don’t need some mythical power to be a “Super.” I’ve got my superpower right here.

Why Mansplaining Isn’t Always a Thing

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ 3 Comments

I found a meme that explains all of this better than I could, so let’s start out with it:

I am not saying that mansplaining does not exist. Far from it. But what I am saying is that as you get to know a man, it’s easier to tell whether they’re egotistical or neurodivergent. For instance, I would never accuse any of my male friends of mansplaining, because I’m just as likely to mansplain to them, because we are all working from a neurodivergent brain. I have had many men who worked from the first paragraph in my life, and they aren’t my friends.

In fact, a very effective way to get a man to stop “mansplaining” to you is just to ask them what’s up. Say, “are you telling me this because you think you’re the expert, or are you ADHD/autistic?” That’ll shut ’em up…… or you’ll get a real moment of authenticity and a breath of relief that will almost make them cry…… because they feel seen. That’s because I asked him a question that, dollars to donuts, no other woman has. They automatically assume that man is trying to one-up them, and don’t even think about that man’s self-esteem. That maybe he’s not trying to be an egotistical bastard. He has a processing disorder, and he thinks you think he’s dumb, not the other way around.

I feel like I know this better than most because I am nonbinary. I have told Supergrover over and over that I don’t write to her, and I don’t write for her. That my writing would exist whether she was here or not. This is the one exception. This meme is definitely for her, because I have a feeling that she’s been reading my e-mails like “I’m the expert,” and because of it I think I’m doing a terrible job of explaining myself, so I overclarify until “the cows can tape something by now.”

I feel this way because Supergrover has called me a “judgmental dickhead” for 10 years, and in her last e-mail said that I should stop thinking of myself as the expert on everyone and everything. “Not a good look.” So, my reaction is just to leave her behind. Fuck that noise. I will never in my life put up with that shit again. I talk how I talk.

I was absolutely moved by her e-mail, but after some time, I realized that she’s just as shitty a friend as she said she was, because the e-mail opened, “Ugh. I vowed never to respond to another of your e-mails.” Opening with disgust didn’t win her any brownie points, especially when I came to hear heart in hand and asked her for help with something she knew intimately.

Granted, she answered all my questions and even clarified within herself what she’s meant all these years, and it was basically “I hide all my feelings about you so that you can just twist in the wind.” It’s easy to keep someone feeling desperately insecure in a relationship that way, because they don’t know how to act. What is real? What is not?

I have been saying over and over that I’m not the expert on anything but the way I feel. If someone feels differently than I do, there is room for both our opinions in the world. Me telling my story and you hiding yours is just a shortcut to calling me a dictator and blaming me for everything when you’re the one that’s emotionally unavailable at every turn. It’s a stalling tactic, and a good one, because it makes me feel like shit.

The reason I had to get her out of my life is that I’ve been in relationships with too many women like this. I am attracted to emotionally unavailable people and they’re attracted to me. It’s because we each have something the other lacks. I lack pragmatism and logic, They lack the ability to feel as deeply as I do. So, in the beginning, it feels like you are each meeting each other’s greatest need.

Without fail, in every single relationship I’ve been in that works this way, over time it devolves into division of labor. They do all the thinking, I do all the feeling. It leaves me anxious and insecure, because in the beginning, they weren’t like this. They were high on new relationship energy and not so opposed to letting themselves feel. After that, they go back to what they know, which is not letting anyone know how they feel so that you have to walk on eggshells…… because they won’t tell you that they’re angry. They’ll say nothing is wrong when it clearly is by the way they treat you.

That has been my life for 10 years, and I’m done unless I actually feel some empathy for the way my brain processes information, because I am not an expert.

I’m a train wreck.

Teachers, and an Update on the Move

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

Who was your most influential teacher? Why?

Before we get started on influential teachers, Here’s a basicl life update. Colin has said that he really enjoyed meeting both Magda and I, and he promised to get back to us by next week. We’ve continued to taxt- he sent me a message saying that he enjoyed meeting Magda and her daughter, And I said, “I was on pins and needles waiting to see how it went, and I’m so glad you like her.” He apologized to me, as if how he got along with her was his responsibility to tell me. I thought it was sweet, and said, “no need to apologize, you said it would be a while before you made your decision, and I watned to give you your space.

He told me that he was disappointed I couldn’t come up in price, because that would solve all his problems, but that he’d run the numbers and see if he could take my offer. Because it really was me reaching out and asking about the house. He told me he wanted $1230, and I said straight out I can’t afford it and tried to walk away. He still wanted to meet me, anyway. So, when he said that, I went over and met him and his dog, and really liked the place. He also mentioned that there might be enough room to rent to two people, but he wasn’t sure because he thought three people in the house would be cramped.

So, the next day I asked Magda if she needed housing, and she said yes. So, I went back to Colin and said, “I have an idea. Do you have time for me to run it past you? He said, “I’m going into a meeting, so just leave a message and I’ll get back to you when I can.” I told him that one of my housemates herre also needed housing and we love each other and want to stay together (she’s like my mother, she’s 73). Three minutes later (probably in the meeting 😉 ) he said to give her his phone number, just to make it clear he hadn’t decided anything yet.

We made an impression, and I can tell. I joked with him that he wouldn’t have to work so hard at keeping up the house. He said, “I thought everyone would just clean up after themselves.” I said, “that’s not what I meant. We’re both handy. If you want to turn the basement into usable space, we would help you. We also know how to do basic maintenance (Magda’s father was a carpenter and I’m a great assistant), as well as knowing what materials are good/worth the expense and where you can buy any brand. He said, “I hadn’t even thought about that aspect of it.”

By the time Magda left, she couldn’t say enough nice things about Colin and neither could I. If we don’t get this house, it will be sad, but not the end of the world. I have until May 1st to move out, so whether I have a place by April 1st doesn’t matter. I am best off prorating rent at both places if I do get the place on April 1st, because I want Zac to be able to help me move and he’s not free until the 13th or something like that. Plus, I told Zac that I never wanted to move into another place where he wasn’t welcome. He’s never spent any time over here becuase I wouldn’t let him. I didn’t want us to be on camera for shit, and there’s cameras all over the house. I don’t even know where all of them are. But this is a new development, and I’m certain it’s because they don’t want another fire. However, the fire was caused by an electrician drilling into a live wire in the basement. None of the housemates had anything to do with it, but for all of us it’s starting to feel like a jail.

So, it was a good time to move, because even though all three of us are freaked out beyond believe and feel locked in our rooms all the time, It wasn’t always like this. For me, the last straw was not getting any support in my quest not to clean up someone else’s pubic hair.

Then, I was cooking, and I heard them talking to a real estate agent in another room. I asked Samantha if they were selling the house, and she said, “I don’t know,” but it was very, very obvious that she did.

Not five minutes later, Hayat calls me down to talk to her and says that they’re getting the house appraised. She turned out not liking that guy, so called in another one. She told me that she wasn’t even sure she wanted to sell, she just thought that the house might be an easy way to fund her retirement….. she just didn’t know for sure because the first guy undervalued them so much. This was Saturday or Sunday, and the photographers came yesterday. So, apparently it was an easier decision than I thought.

I think it was Monday or Tuesday when she officially told me I had 60 days to move out, and we both cried together. It’s been nine years. It’s a huge transition no matter how I feel about the situation now.

So, anyway, I sspent a little of Tuesday and all of Wednesday preparing for photos, I was so glad I was done by Wednesday night, because I could go to bed without setting an alarm. I don’t, usually, because when I go to bed between nine and 10, I automatically wake up at five or six.

The photographers left, and I shut down. I couldn’t write, I couldn’t think, I couldn’t do anything but lie there. I am processing a thunderstorm of emotion, and it’s too much in its immediacy. I know I will feel more and more calm over time, even if we don’t get the house with Colin, because the shock will have worn off. I am so glad that they were talking loud enough that I could hear without eavesdropping, because I wasn’t trying to be intrusive. I was making dinner, and their kitchen is only separated by a wooden door from mine….. the real estate agent was especially loud.

But the reason I’m glad is that if I hadn’t confronted them, who knows how long of a notice we’d be given. I don’t think that Hayat would have left all this to the last minute, but at the same time, you’re never sure about things like that.

So, as I told Colin, Magda and I have decided that we want to live with Jack, who is a dog, and he’s just an accessory. He got a big laugh out of that one. I do think that Colin will come through for us because he’s alrewady invested in us….. and that’s a great feeling. It’s also amazing that my rent won’t change in the slightest. Since I told Colin I could pay $795/month, Magda said that she could pay $700 and I could have the bigger room. Colin said, “I think the rooms are the same size. I should get out a tape measure.” It’s the only appropriate neurodivergent response. I said, “it doesn’t matter. She thinks mine is bigger. Don’t take all of that upon yourself. We’re very happy with everything we saw and we like boht you and Jack.”

That’s because he said it wouldn’t be worth it to him to only get $1230 for two roommates, but he would consider it if it were $1500-1600. So, I found him another person who could get him up to $1500, because I’m so sold on the house. Then, so was Magda. Now the ball is in Colin’s court, but as I said, he’s really already made us feel welcome.

When Colin moved in, and I know this because of pictures on Redfin, the front of the house looked German, because all the wood that would traditionally be on a Tudor house was painted green. Now, it’s back to black and it looks AMAZING. It’s also a quiet street and only a 10 minute walk to the bus, with maybe another 10 or 20 to the Metro. I basically found a house two major stoplights from this one. It’s a miracle.

Plus, I hate moving. I really hate it. So does Colin. Both of us are interested in long-term, not six months. And because it’s possible that my futon won’t fit in my room, I said, “if we make a man cave downstairs, I will be happy to donate the couch.” I could sell it, as it’s worth a lot, but it was a gift from Hayat. I might tell Colin to take the bed out of my room so I can keep this one, but I’m not sure. There are too many possibilities to just concentrate on one.

My shutdown hasn’t been better today. I haven’t been able to do anything except lie here and think about all the moving parts in an actual relocation. It’s overwhelming to an enormous degree, and my reaction is to shut out the rest of the world. I’m not even listening to music or have the TV on. All I want is quiet.

My most influential teacher was Robin Stauffer (grade 11), because she taught me that my life was going to be hard. She invited me to do things with her, like put up bulletin boards or something, and then I came out to her. My grades dropped immediately and I was transferred into another class. There’s more to the story that includes sweet revenge, but it wasn’t until years later and I can’t really talk about it for privacy reasons. Let’s just say it was epic, but it’s not my story to tell because the comeuppance wasn’t from me.

In terms of love, I thought my grade four teacher, Jan Forrest, hung the moon. I was one of her stars because she was an English teacher. I won a couple of competitions for poetry reading that year…. not analyzing it. Getting up in front of the class and reciting them.

My father being a minister probably had nothing to do with this……. #eyeroll

Reeling from Feeling

~ Leslie Lanagan ~ Leave a comment

I have to, but let’s be clear. I don’t want to move. Mike and Hayat are just getting older and can’t manage the stairs anymore. They want a smaller, one-level house. I get it. However, it doesn’t make me any less sad. I have so many memories here, but none so great as “The Homo and the Hijab.” It tells the story of Nasim, one of my first housemates, and her journey from not knowing what a homosexual was to being friends with me. I nearly knocked over two people trying to get to her when I heard she was from Iran. The one thing I didn’t do is tell her that “Argo” is my favorite movie, because Iranians are touchy about that. I know, because I’ve talked to many. They all think it’s a commercial for CIA, and it is. Full stop. That’s because CIA’s reputation was in the shitter and they needed a win. George Tenet asked Tony Mendez to do “Argo,” and he said, “I can’t. That’s all classified.” Then, Tenet waved his magic wand and all of the sudden they had a story.

However, I do think that the movie starts out with incredible empathy toward the Iranians. Maybe it was the right choice to ex-fil the Shah, maybe it wasn’t. I can’t pass judgment on that. But I do hear the outrage of the Iranian people, and judge it “NAH.” That’s from the r/AITA subreddit, where people post questions and you tell them whether they’re the asshole or not. YTA and NTA are easy. The others are “NAH,” or “no asshole here,” and ESH, “everyone sucks here.” CIA needed the Shah for whatever reason. I don’t know it, but I’m sure they had more intel than I did in the 70s. I wasn’t even born until ’77. So, when the houseguests were rescued, I wasn’t even out of diapers. I don’t have a horse in the race, so I feel that both countries have a legitimate point and I’m not sure CIA would have gone that direction, in retrospect, given that we haven’t had diplomatic relations with Iran since then.

And that’s all cover-up for the fact that I’m dying inside. Hayat was there for me when my mother died. Mike took me to church and loved it when I sang next to him. Samantha gave me a Dr Pepper the moment I moved in and said, “since you’re a Texan, I thought it was probably your blood type.” Every housemate has been unique, none more than Magda, who took me under her wing from day one. I’ve checked with Colin to see if we can both move in, because that way he would get all the money he wanted and we could stay together. Magda is going to meet Colin tonight, so I hope they hit it off. If not, it doesn’t matter. I can find another place for one or both of us. I just hope it has a backyard as big as Colin’s, because our garden here is so beautiful- and Magda did all of it.

So, the idea of finding a place with one of my current housemates seems like a good deal because it’s someone I wouldn’t mind sharing a bathroom with. That’s so important, after having to clean up after two people for nine years….. myself and my Indian housemate who will not touch anything I have touched, including bottles of all-purpose cleaner. So, she won’t clean the bathroom. Ever.

I will miss her, because we used to get along. Then, she wouldn’t talk to me about the bathroom issue and I said, “WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT THE BATHROOM.” I raised my voice because I left her several notes saying, “please clean up after yourself,” and absolutely nothing changed. Well, she was freaked out that I raised my voice and has never spoken to me again…… after leaving my notes on the sink and walking by them for several days until all the ink was faded…… and her hair and water were plugging up the sink. That’s been my life. Nine years. I’m done.

I am over half done in getting my room ready for pictures tomorrow, but I had to take a break because I thought I needed more caffeine than I actually do, and now I feel, um…. not good. I’m hoping that by sitting down for the length of time it takes to create this entry that the feeling in my stomach will go away. We can mark this under “not as good an idea as thought previously.” I’ve got a few more hours to go with finishing touches, but mostly what I had to do was get rid of stuff I don’t want to move.

Zac is coming over the week of the 13th to help me move, which is the earliest I can get out of here because no one else has offered. I’m sure I could put out an APB, but I’m not bothered. If I had a ton of stuff, I’d be panicking. But most of my stuff can fit in Zac’s car in one trip….. minus the furniture, and I don’t know if I can take all of it or not. I mean, I can, but my new space is also likely to be furnished. We’ll just have to see. I’ve already looked at the space at Colin’s, and I don’t know if even my futon will fit because there’s already a bed in the room. However, I might be able to back it up to the bed so I have somewhere to sit while I’m putting on my shoes, etc. Again, I have no idea, and I have other spaces to look at before I sign anything, as well as Colin wanting some time to make a decision. He’s not sure that he wants to rent out his space at all. I think he put out an ad and didn’t expect to get a response so fast.

I don’t know why. He and Jack, who is also a dog, are delightful.

I’m really glad that we cleared up the moving in and being friends being two different propositions, because I would think it was terrible if it didn’t work out and he thought that meant I didn’t want him in my life. The truth is that I don’t have that many neurodivergent friends in the area. It was nice to meet one. So, the bottom line is that I’m hoping, but not a lot. Colin has lived alone for a long time, and so have Magda and I in terms of how much time we each spend in our individual rooms.

I just hope I didn’t come across as too talkative because of course when I got to his house my social battery was full. I think it was fine. I was just impressed by a lot of stuff, especially the music studio in the attic, because I’m a music person, too.

And exactly none of that means “an easy transition.”

It’s been nine years. I would say that it’s time for a change, and also one I desperately don’t want to make. This time, though, I don’t have a choice. It’s heartbreaking, but necessary because I understand all the moving pieces.

Especially me.