So, yes.  I’ve been on something of a hiatus, and there are many, many, many reasons for that.  They range from the mundane (I’ve been working a lot) to the somewhat exciting (I was travelling for about a month, on business, sadly enough), and ultimately wind up at the somewhat basic (I didn’t really have much or know what to write about).  And quite frankly, there’s always something that’s just pressing enough to defer yet another post, so the short version of all of this is that I kind of just stopped writing because I lost the desire to.

I still don’t have it back–not completely, at any rate–but there’s been enough going on recently that made me wind up turning here at long last.  The larget imperative comes from, I suppose, Curfew Boy, who managed to in the last two or three months, dig himself into a ditch so deep that it may be easier for him to burrow through, emerge at the other end of the world and hop on a flight back before I wind up giving him the time of day.  This is, I realise, something of a far cry from the last few months of constantly wondering how else I could manage to make a long-distance relationship work, and I think (sadly enough) that I’m kind of over the idea of pushing for something that’s just so much effort.  As a wise friend of mine said a few days ago, when I was complaining to him about how miserable Karachi is after returning from abroad (naturally, this segued into Boy talk), he said, very simply:

We go into relationships to feel good generally and to feel good about ourselves. This is not to undermine the giving part of it. If, in the long term, something does not feel good-or more simply-is not fun any longer, then there doesn’t seem much point in persisting with it for the sake of it. I am sure you’ve given it the time and attention it deserves. If it doesn’t come about then maybe it is time to put it to rest and move on.

So, it looks like I’m moving on.  But for once, I’m closing a chapter, or at least book-marking it, with a distinct lack of regret.  I honestly don’t feel that I could have done anything more to make this work: flying to a different city and staying in a hotel at the expense of about half my monthly salary, each month; calling and SMSing at least four or five times per week; going out of my way to make plans for us to spend time together outside of Lahore and/or Karachi…I really did try to make a go of it.

And when you’re away for three weeks, and the person you’re trying to work something out with doesn’t call, text, e-mail or Facebook you even once (except for the single occasion at DJ Station in Bangkok when you texted him), despite the fact that you have a local Pakistani mobile number, so it’s not like you’re inaccessible or anything, and does so after the two or three conversations you’ve already had with him about how he needs to also make an effort to stay in touch with you–to initiate contact, not just respond to it–then really, you’re just bordering on desperation if you suck it all up and say “Ah well, fine, that’s just the way he is, I’ll make do.”

Fuck that.  I will not settle.  I don’t care if I’m fast-approaching the big 3-0 without having been in a “meaningful relationship” of some sort, I deserve better than this.  And that’s not just a random moment of self-empowerment; I neither need, nor warrant blatant disregard for my feelings and my needs, especially after having given way more ground than any reasonable person should.  There is absolutely no reason for me to stay in a relationship for which I have to make excuses to my friends, when they ask me how come I’m not feeling positive about it, or when people ask how Curfew Boy is, and I don’t have an answer because I just don’t know.

Everyone has their own drama, no matter the number of therapists involved.  But you can only help carry someone else’s baggage for so long before you become just another porter.

Which means, I suppose, that I’m back.  For a while at least.

Hey everyone.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 9th, 2008 at 23:31 and is filed under Reprehension. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.