conversations

Ever since Thanksgiving when RC really upset me with his aloofness and inability to communicate when he's stressed out, he's been really serious about us. He came over on Thanksgiving day, crying, asking for me to forgive him and telling me that he really thinks that I'm the one for him, that he wants to go down that direction toward the big M-word.

Me, I felt really serious back around Thanksgiving, but the feelings definitely have gone up and down since then. One minute I feel like I could give up the world if only I could have him with me forever, regardless of whether he's standing up or paralyzed. The next minute, I get frustrated that he's not more assertive. Sometimes I even wonder just how much I love him, and whether or not I'm actually in love with him rather than trying to convince myself that I am.

Before his visit, despite all my anger at my parents, I felt like I was ready to throw in the bag and just let things go, but I wasn't going to let my parents in on that. I started thinking about Willow, about how ironic it would be if after all these years, I start dating my high school crush, but also about how that would be a completely long-distance relationship. I sometimes get really frustrated with myself and how I evaluate every guy around me for relationship-potential, and specifically for marriage-potential. A couple of non-dates with Willow, and I'm already lining him up for in case RC and I go kaput.

One thing we talked about doing during RC's visit to my hometown was to go ring shopping. I know, I know. Big gasp, what the hell am I talking about? I think this all started because sometimes, when I was feeling very serious about us as well, I would egg RC on, telling him that I, too, want to see us married. He once asked me what the next steps should be, how he needs to go about getting this I would sometimes egg him on, when I felt serious about us too. I would ask him if he even knows what kind of ring I like (he said it first that he wants to put a ring on my finger), and he would admit that he doesn't. Thus started the conversation that we can go ring shopping together, and hey, why not do some of that when he's visiting me over the holidays?

It's hard for me to tell how much of this is serious, and how much of it is joking. I don't even know if I'm serious or if I'm joking. So on New Year's Day, we walked around a big shopping center near my house and looked up a jewelry store. We walked in, and the salesperson immediately asked us if he could help us (we were the only people in the store), and RC answered "No, thanks. We're just looking around." So the guy asks us if we're looking at anything in particular because if so, he can point us to the right sections. I stood there, not saying anything, and RC answered, "No, nothing in particular. We're just browsing." We walked around the store for about a minute and left.

Later that night, when the house was all dark, I sneaked over to the guest room into RC's bed to talk to him. We're just whispering, joking around, talking, and I brought up the jewelry store
scene. I said something along the lines of "You didn't want to tell the salesman we were looking at rings, huh?" My comment was very lighthearted, but his response was very serious: "Are you upset that I didn't want to talk to the salesmen?"

I really wasn't upset. The initial idea of going ring shopping was rather silly anyway. As much as I want the exact ring I pick out, I want the surprise more. I want something that he thinks I will like, even if it's not the most ideal one I would have chosen for myself. Besides, I told him that I totally understand that it's one thing to say you want to marry someone, it's a totally different ballgame when you're actually there holding rocks in your hands asking HER which one she likes.

Then I asked him if he's sure about me, and that opened up a long conversation ...

In summary, neither one of us are sure about each other. He is unsure about me because he feels that he can't talk to me about everything, specifically when he's upset about his accident, when he's pissed and bitter. He doesn't feel like he can talk to me about this because he feels resentment from me, and he would want to be able to talk about everything with the person he marries. This resentment issue has always been there, ever since the beginning when he asked me lightheartedly what I would change about him if there was one thing I could change. My answer was that he would be who he is without having had the accident 8 years ago. That really took him by surprise, and ever since then, I've felt like he's kind of held that against me.

My doubts about him revolved around his un-assertiveness. I told him that I sometimes wonder if he can take care of me, not in the big picture sense, but in the everyday sense. For example, if we take a vacation somewhere, I feel like the job of planning that vacation would fall to me. I would map out our itinerary; I would look up information for train schedules or park opening times, etc. etc. Or even more everyday, if we need to go run some errands, I would make the suggestion of "Okay, it makes more sense if we do this first, then do that, and then we'll go drop this off" etc. etc. I'm tired of all that; I want someone who can tell me how best to go about my day when I want a vacation. With RC, I feel like I'm always the planner still.

He agreed with my observations. I tended to disagree with his. I feel like at this point, I've made peace with his accident. While I certainly would prefer that he never got into that car, but in the end, this particular issue is not something that would break our relationship (though I'm sure my parents would have a few words to say about that). If RC and I break up, it would not be because I resent his accident or that I can't live with his physical handicaps.

So I guess for us right now, these two are the big things on our minds, our big doubts about each other. I asked him if he thought more time would help him erase his doubts, as in, is this something that can be changed over time. He said mostly he didn't know, but he didn't think it was likely that his doubts would fade away. Naturally, he asked about mine. I told him that my doubts wouldn't go away either, but I think his non-assertiveness is something I can live with. He said that I shouldn't settle; I shouldn't be okay simply to have something that "I can live with".

After a long silence, he asked me what I was thinking. I told him that I was thinking what this meant for us, if it means that we should say our goodbyes, and if so, if tonight was the night to make that decision. He thought it was, because dragging it out would only make it more painful, and if those doubts don't go away, we wouldn't work together no matter how much we loved each other. I asked him what that meant for us, how we interact with each other ... I didn't ask the dreaded question of "Can we still be friends?"

He said that we can still be friends, that we would still hang out, that we would still care about each other. I told him that we ought to be realistic, that really we would only hang out until one of us starts dating again. He agreed. We laid there in silence for a while, and I got up to go back to my room and sleep...

... to be continued ...