Why do you fall in love and do you trust yourself when you do?

Looking back on this question I have to admit there is a small lump in my throat. Here’s the thing ladies… My boyfriend H knows I have a blog… he knows because I told him when I was drunk one night in an assertive pompous tone “glarf memm I have a Blog you know! Glmph snore”… But what he doesn’t know is what it is called and he’s never read it (I think). SO this space is very much mine. I realise at some point he might stumble across it ( I suspect he’s searching for it now and then…) or he may even already have read it, but I am not quite prepared to let him proof the drafts… because he’s IN them. You follow?

So before answering this question I want to take a very deep breath and say this first…

help.

Ha ha… No its fine, he’s the most consistent, calm and stable person I know. So I am sure when he finds this and reads it there will be a raised brow, a rib poke and maybe if I’ve crossed any real lines… a short ‘adult’ conversation.

Cross your fingers for me.

Why do I fall in love and do I trust myself when I do…. Hmmmm…

When I was younger it was all about looks and being slightly obnoxious. If there was a “good looking” guy that needed a chase… I had my sneakers on. It was fun. but was it love? No, I don’t think it was. It was a lot of angst and the odd romantic sleepover (is it rude to say one night stand?) and long drawn out beach walks with my besties plotting, renouncing and celebrating. It was being young. However I think all this kiss-chasey made me very cautious as I grew older. I mean when men would ask me out, without the games I was super confused…

um aren’t we going to tease each other? Oh well I just don’t understand this at all. Im not sure I can commit to just going to dinner because we “like” one another. WEIRD.

The first time this happened and I relaxed with it...I fell in love. It was a rebellious love. It was an incredibly romantic love (read as long distance for two years…plurk until I moved to be with him in Adelaide, where I now find myself). Romantic you say? Swoon…Well there were a lot of letters written, plane flights and weepy phone calls. I guess Hollywood would call that romance, but in retrospect it seems like a waste of resources. This love lasted five years. Five years was a long time. I think I was probably only in love for two and a bit of them, the second and third and maybe a little of the fourth. But I am (unfortunately for young Grace) a big believer in putting work into relationships. As a result I didn’t listen to my gut and the niggling feeling I had, that something wasn’t quite right lasted two years. I woke up one day and it had all been confirmed in my mind. I wasn’t in love.

I will never leave a relationship the way I did that day. I felt so sure of my decision and so desperate for oxygen, I made a surgical and polite break. I think he needed the yelling and the pain because he drew it out for months. He hadn’t really been given warning, he felt betrayed.  Don’t worry he got what he wanted, for months I politely listened to his complaints, his drunken rants and his tears. His aggression and constantly lingering in my workplace months after the break was the deciding factor in me using my “outside voice”. Then time wore away both our edges until one day he apologised and thanked me for breaking up something that he hadn’t seen was so unhealthy.  That experience taught me not to bottle your problems up in a relationship, to have a voice and use it. It’s not fair for the other person to not have chance to fix them. Love doesn’t have to look perfect.

That time in my mid twenties, even considering all the pain, when I awoke from a five year relationship was… glorious. It was golden and it had formed within me a determinedness not to fall straight back in love. This brings us to the relationship where I had to learn to trust myself. It brings us to H.

SO here I was determined not to fall in love, deliciously fit and doing better than ever in my chosen field and I met this guy… I couldn’t shake this guy. He was (to quote Christina Yang from Greys Anatomy) like something sticky that just wouldn’t blow off! For months he sought my friendship. I thought he was quite dull and a bit dumb. Worst of all he was younger than me... SO not going there. But was nothing if not persistent. He would insist on driving me home after work and would follow me in his car when I insisted on walking. He would bring me treasures at work (my favourite was a pie he’d half eaten when he thought I might be hungry…ewh what’s wrong with guys??) and he would always slide a drink in front of me when we were out with our friends. He was incorrigible. It took me ages, well six months to realise that of all of my friends, he was my most consistent, caring and well intentioned. It even turned out he wasn’t actually dumb.  He knew more about domestic politics than I did and I had a degree in it. Butt head. So there we are, the last time I fell in love it was because I learnt to trust. SO no I still don’t trust myself, I question my internal dialogue and my relationship all the time… but I don’t really ever question my boyfriend because he is consistent to a fault (but I’ll tell you about that another day)

So how do I fall in love and why? I’m not sure but from reading back it seems that the people drawn into my life reflect exactly what I am wanting from it. Drama, Romance and Consistency…

DO I trust myself when I fall in love? I guess I must, otherwise I wouldn’t be getting myself in to this beautiful muddle time again. The final thing I want to say is this: To those men, ratbags and boys I dated, I am so thankful for each of you, in reflection you all helped me learn and grow. There is nothing like learning about yourself by looking at the person you are choosing to walk your life with xx Grace

Leverage

My Boyfriend is filthy.

He hasn’t built a cave out of his own faeces yet, but if the occasion arises I’m getting to the point that I would be proud rather than disappointed. I mean a poo-cave would take energy, ingenuity and a dedicated approach.

None of these attributes are currently displayed in his approach to house work. In fact even calling it “an approach to housework” seems to be a little presumptuous.

I don’t think I’m high maintenance, but I’m willing to acknowledge that it is possible…perhaps my knickers are in a twist.

 I understand that my standards aren’t his, and that my chosen life style (featuring an absence of cockroaches, mice and being able to walk with stepping on food) may not be his ideal living situation.  

And that his cleaning suggestions, which have included bringing the hose through the window to clean the bathroom, are not always …. Shit.

However, no matter how I relax my cleaning roster (excluding washing the sheets- this is non-negotiable- which shall always happen on Thursdays… and sometimes Wednesdays if I’ve had a slow week…) my darling and I, we just can’t seem to find a balance.

I’ve yelled, I’ve pleaded, I’ve rationalised.

I’ve stooped to offering sexual favours… he was unpersuaded (Why would I do that I’m a satisfied man…).

 I’ve revoked sexual favours! (His response? He laughed... you’ll break before I do). Damn it he knows me too well.

So what does a girl do? I love my ape, but how does one train them?

This week something happened. I politely told him that it was “crap” that he hadn’t cleaned all week when I’d been ill and working and on teaching practicum. I said it. Just plain like that.

“the least you could do is the washing up”

There was the ticket… The least.  

I didn’t whinge or bully or yell, and it certainly wasn’t rationalizing.. I mean he’d actually completed the least he could’ve done quite successfully, that is SFA.

But no… the washing up was done. I had a little extra time for uni work, what a god send. I’m not sure how this new system will prevail but my goodness it’s nice to have a tool in my frustrated time-stretched belt.  It’s nice to know I have just a little bit of leverage.

I made a point of not saying thank you. I want “the least” to become a standard, an expectation. At least until he masters the art of building a poo cave, then I’ll know the possibilities are endless.

I know I'm your girlfriend.. but WHO are you?

I like to think I know my boyfriend. It’s been two years, one tiny house in the city and many little adventures. I thought by this point I had my man down pat. We work together and live together so you wouldn’t think there was much I would miss. However I’m only just starting to realise there might still be little surprises in the everyday life. Who would’ve guessed. See this is particularly surprising given my boyfriend’s personality… he is (how do I say this lovingly)…highly structured. Yet not in any kind of logical sense (well not logical to me). Here is an example if my boyfriends has fish for dinner on Monday night then he won’t eat fish again until he has had chicken and then beef on the following nights. Oh yes my friends there is an order.

There is an order to everything. He only eats one type of cheese, one type of bread and drinks one type of milk, they have been deemed superior. Any other brands brought home are regarded with a curious amusement; they are put in the freezer or the bin. I mean what else could you possibly do with them?

So perhaps you can understand why I became comfortable in the knowledge that I could anticipate him. On the contrary I’m starting to suspect I know lots of things about him but that maybe that doesn’t mean I know him.

GOD Dammit I know him.

 I think.

But then I had a sleepless night and I decided to read a book to kill the time.  It occurred to me that I had bookshelves in the house with novels I had never read. I had a whole library of boyfriend books. I messaged him for a recommendation. And that is where the surprises started. The passion filled message that came back named the exact spot on the bookshelf I’d find it, the author’s full name and a plea to ‘hold past the first twenty pages’. Like any good girlfriend I became immediately suspicious. My boyfriend reads political books, military books, medical books. My boyfriend is… rather serious.

WHO is this boyfriend imposter?

But that was only the start.

It was a fiction book.

I’m serious. And not like a star wars man-ny fiction book like a fanciful beautiful novel about a young boy becoming a man and the adventure he goes on. And it was a good one. I was enthralled.. for at least eight pages, until this question got the better of me.

Who is my boyfriend?

And then last night it was confirmed.

 We were at our best friend’s birthday party. A night of cocktails, soul music and family. And this man came shimmying across the dance floor toward me. It was my man. My man doesn’t dance like that, well I’ve never seen him dance like that. I’ve never seen us dance like that. But most of all he wanted to dance with me,

slow,

 in front of all our dearest friends and family to soul music. My heart just went to melty mush. Yes. It was exactly like Dirty dancing.. except without all the sweet moves and more spinning and crashing into other couples. It was magic.

So there you have it. I’m living with a stranger.  I’m dating a really beautiful, familiar stranger and it has me wondering. Maybe during this part in our relationship, well do you know the part? It’s the part before children, the part being poor uni students with casual jobs in our late twenties. Maybe it isn’t going to be what I thought.  Maybe somewhere between the rotation of fish, chicken and beef maybe there are more adventures to be had.

I wonder what else there is to learn about my new boyfriend, maybe I’ll bring home a different brand of bread next week just for kicks.