a winter machine

 And then I spotted Asshat at the Boston Festival of Indie Games.  I'd managed to somehow remove his face from my brain, but forgot to block out the way he walks and the way his hands move when he talks.  I have no idea if he spotted me

 

For a little bit, all I could hear inside my brain was something like "he threw you away like trash" and I felt like it again, small and meaningless and worthless.   And apparently autopilot me sits down to demo games, digs her fingernails into her hands, and thinks in elaborate unexplainable metaphors.  Light and Abundance wanted to know if I wanted to stay or leave the festival, and I simply could not decide, all my power went somewhere else, not quite not crying, but not quite not not-crying either.  Seeing him felt like already losing, and so leaving and staying just meant different kinds of defeat. 

 

I had hoped he'd moved back to the midwest.  I'd hoped nothing ever worked out for him again and that while I'd made the mistake of showing him some of my favorite places they were safe again because it had been years and years since I'd seen him. I want to be philosophical, say things like we weren't meant for each other, or we helped each other out at a bad time, or something kind and charitable, but I don't think it was either or it wasn't enough of either to make up for the bad parts. He used me, dumped me, lied to me.  

 

There's a little piece of me, some calcified thing somewhere in the pit of my stomach, that has been screaming since I saw him.  I spent all evening yesterday doing chores while Light, Boisterous, Prof and Abundance played a game, and even if I preferred what I was doing, it's hard not to feel a teeeny bit grrr.  Zenni charged me a surcharge on my glasses because my prescription is too strong (but I have two silly pairs coming to me).  I really, really, really need to find someone new to prescribe my meds.  I have a colonoscopy next week that I'm really not looking forward to, but will be glad to have over.  After my previous doctor very sternly cutting down the amount of omeprazole I was on, my new GI doctor doubled it up to twice a day and added ranitidine.  So I don't know what will happen on the other side of this, if the meds will change again, but it's been awesome not to get up most nights with stomach/esophagus pain.

 

I'm reading a book ostensibly about a trauma cleaner, and it's a lot about endurance and manipulation and for some reason, it's been making me think about what my future holds (not that I could go into trauma cleaning, though I still sometimes dream of being paid to organize people's stuff) but more of the background vs foreground roles and is what I'm accustomed to different than what I'd be happy with, and in my life whose needs get met and why, and if it's that I need to be able to state my needs with more clarity and certainty (which would require figuring out what they are) or if I just don't want to be that out there, not because of childhood trauma, but because of what kind of person I want to be in the world.