It’s not you…
The T-Rex as some of you may know married Solid Wifely
Potential. He called me pretty
much the day he got back from his honeymoon.
Not once in all the time we were seeing each other did he
mention he was actually ENGAGED-TO-BE-MARRIED.
I knew about his girlfriend but engaged?!?
Love at first sight aside, I would not have spent two
minutes on him (okay, there were some damn fine columns out of it, but that is
besides the point!) and he damn well knew it, which is why he never told me.
I’ll put my hand up right now and say I made a complete
ninny out of myself telling the entire world about my thunderbolt moment with
that man. Jesus, Mary and
Joseph.
Well, I’m chalking it up to experience.
At least I know first hand that whole, love at first sight
thing is actually possible. It
actually happens sometimes.
Doesn’t mean it’s a good idea for the rest of your life, but boy it was
pretty cool anyway.
And speaking of things that are not good for the rest of
your life, as ya’ll have probably gathered, The Man and I have broken up. Or rather, I broke up with the Man.
Sometime in the middle of June, he, well, we were talking
very seriously about the future.
What brought it on?
Well to say I am an extrovert is the understatement of the
century. I love, love, love to
throw a good party and I also sing for my supper/cocktail and I get invitations
to lots of parties.
One of the many parties I took The Man to was my Gay Best
Friend’s (GBF) summer bash. He and
his partner have this amazing flat in Camden and a roof terrace from where you
can see most of London.
I was a little concerned taking The Man. There would be all sorts of people
there, from married friends (straight and gay), artists, directors, a few 7
foot tall drag queens, you know your typical fantastic London arty crowd.
I told my GBF I was worried about bringing The Man and he
was like, Love, the last guy that didn’t have fun at one of our parties you
divorced.
Good point.
For all of the wonderful things that make him The Man (oh
you know, kind, warm, thoughtful, generous, hardworking, gorgeous body, did I
mention his body?!? I could go on but ya’ll would need a sick bag), the one
thing he ain’t is a party animal.
Not exactly a wall flower either, but he’s very steady, warm
and quiet.
An occasional, dry sense of humour but not an attention
seeking one.
Some of ya’ll know me personally and to say that I am an
extroverted attention hog is putting it mildly. For an American, some would even be kind enough to say I am
funny.
While The Man would climb Everest in a heartbeat, he would
never do a body shot in a million years.
Mr. Magnolia and I were doing body shots at 3am in the
marquee at our own wedding.
Did it make a difference?
Did it make us perfect for one another (in a way it did but
…)?
Did it save our marriage 10 years down the road and two kids
later? Hell no, hell no it didn’t.
Just because your partner loves doing body shots, does not mean it makes
for a good, balanced life together.
So knowing that, I was figuring all the things that were
right with the Man, body shots aside, it would be ok.
We went to the party.
By about 10pm, even the yukka plant he stood next to most of
the evening was worried about us.
My drag queen friend Dom was like, sweetie, who is that divinely
handsome man over there, the one that can’t wait to get out of here?
I was like, erm, that would be my boyfriend.
Now, even before this party I was a little worried about our
extrovert/introvert mismatch because we were talking about pretty big ticket
stuff.
Moving in together.
Trekking in Nepal next fall.
What I wanted to do for my 40th birthday….TWO
YEARS FROM NOW!!!!
But the one thing that didn’t come up was my little pipe
dream to move to Ibiza with the boys and buy a villa and grow old
disgracefully.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
Talking about the future with someone like that, come on
ya’ll, I don’t care who you are, knowing someone wants to spend a good chunk of
the rest of their lives with you, its flattering.
It feels nice.
Safe.
Okay, so he wasn’t talking about dancing barefoot at Pacha
when we were 60, but a lot of things worked with The Man. Any woman at 38 with two kids would be
thrilled to be dating him.
He is the proverbial good catch.
I was trying to take the balanced, 30,000 foot view.
But try as I might er, its me we are talking about, so of
course I panicked.
And I called the biggest commitment phobe in the Western
Hemisphere (recent marriage notwithstanding and that is the next column, so
stay tuned).
He has been round the block and had that ‘its not you its
me’ conversation so many times that I am sure he has lost count. This guy wrote the Toxic Bachelor
handbook.
I knew I could trust his judgement.
For him to tell me honestly if I was ahem, turning into a
Toxic Bachelorette.
Yes, I called the T-Rex.
I told him everything I have just told ya’ll.
Being ex-Sandhurst, the boy has perfected the art of compartmentalisation.
Breaking stuff down into what is possible and what will end
up getting a regiment killed. His
brain is a little scary like that.
His 30,000 foot view went something like this:
The guy is not gonna move to Ibiza with you.
He is uncomfortable around most of your friends, even the
straight ones.
You can’t get your nails done half way up a Scottish
hillside not to mention a decent blow dry.
You have to end it and no, you are not a Toxic Bachelorette.
Deep in my gut, I knew he was right but I was still
thinking, what?!? Are you serious?
How do I do that?
I have never broken up with anyone as a grown up. I mean I married my first truly serious
boyfriend and spent most of my adult life with him.
In college, a break up was so easy. All you had to do was kiss someone
other than your current boyfriend in his full view on the deck of the Tri Kappa
house during Greek Week.
Break up accomplished.
Not subtle, I grant you, but effective.
As an adult (humour me), it’s a little more serious. Kids, houses, mortgages, school fees
and school runs, jobs, commutes.
Where will we retire? What
sport will be play together as we get old?
Of course you can dump by text. But you really shouldn’t.
Okay, okay, maybe you can dump by text if you have only been
on something like two dates, but you really cannot just dump a serious
relationship at the 7 month mark by text.
The world has enough bad karma in it without that going on
all the time.
A slightly more grown up alternative to the text dump is the
avoidance, being very busy technique.
Oh darling I would love to have you cook me dinner but I am busy for the
next three weeks! I actually tried this with The Man and it didn’t work.
As the T-Rex and I talked through the options he stopped
me. He said, you know what you
have to say.
‘Its not you its….’
Of course the way he said it made me laugh because he was
right.
It was me.
The Man had done nothing wrong.
He just was himself and as lovely as he is, we didn’t and
don’t want the same things and probably never will.
To try and change all that it would be an uphill battle from
here on out.
We’d end up together in some half way house of his fitness
fetish and him standing in a corner at club while I dance on the podiums in six
inch gold lame wedges with a drag queen.
I’d end up spending less time with my loud, eccentric, warm,
loving, exciting friends that I love so much.
He’d still cycle 100 miles a weekend and feel guilty about
it.
And that’s before manicures and blow dries come into the
equation.
All the cups of tea by my bedside in the mornings wouldn’t
fix that.
In the end, did I use the T-Rex’s line? The line loads of
people use every day all over the world in a million different languages to
break up?
No I didn’t.
I said, ‘I think long term we want different things from our
lives.’
And that was the truth.
Ms. Magnolia
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