If we censor one letter, what's to stop us from going down the slippery slope and getting rid of all except one? It's tough enough to read my postings here I'm sure without them being nothing but "oooooooooooooooooooooooooooo"
That's the problem with you thinkers! I know that letters aren't innately evil, but you can extend that logic to entire words. What would we do then?
Originally Posted by AndrewP
A language where words have sex?
When the words have sex, are they making little baby words?
" Certainly posed and directed to me specifically rather than a generic picture for social media and undoubtedly her kids were well aware of where the picture was being sent."
I'm confused. How did the kids know she was going to send this picture to you??
Happy New Year, Andrew! I hope 2019 brings you all of the things that you desire and deserve.
I want to let you in on a little secret. You are a catch. You don't seem to realize it but you are a catch, indeed. You are intelligent, caring, hard-working, and come across as a true, sincere gentleman (which I am pretty sure is who you really are IRL because that kind of thing is a bit hard to fake). I think CL uses you as a soft place to fall because you are comfortable for her. And, you kind of feed into her ego a bit because you are readily available to her at her whim. You speak to us of talking to other women and possibly even having an interest in dating others, but I would bet that, to CL, you NEVER present any of that information, so you kind of look like that single guy who is sitting around waiting for her because you are always there for her. Stop being so "there" for her. Start pursuing all these others that you mention. You are a catch, so get out there and start being caught. Did I mention that I'm on team flower shop lady?
Awe shucks You're going to turn my head with that purty talk.
I know intellectually that you are perhaps right. Anecdotally there does seem to be a shortage of established, stable middle-aged men. I've got good teeth (just had my check-up this morning), the bank and I own my home, I have a reasonably well paying job and no debt outside my rather modest mortgage. And yes, I was raised to be polite and respectful, especially to women and open doors, give my seat to an older person and such-like.
I do know that unlike some here that my ex was largely unable to enunciate why she had to leave me - as I didn't understand that she was running "to" something and not "away". Even the usual list of ILY But .. never happened. I do recall having a big smile when Westo refered to her as "daft". I do know that a number of women of my ex's acquaintance were jealous of how well she was treated in comparison to the norm. Regular comments of "you need to keep that one" were made - some sadly during the height of when she still lived here but was rubbing her affair in my nose. The only ones who didn't seem to care for me were her siblings. Both of whom had had affairs and undoubtedly helped grease her way down that path.
I was closely kept under her thumb but she did perhaps do a moderately good job of "training" me. I joked to a friend the other day that just because the rider fell off, this old horse still knows how to pull the plow. I've even picked up a few new skills in the last couple of years becoming a better cook than I was, discovering that I like making small talk with people.
My problem perhaps is that I am still so used to the idea of being secondary in a relationship that taking the initiative is hard for me. That's where a woman like CL who at one point seemed to have a clear plan for me had an advantage. It allowed me to shrug my shoulders and go "ok". Looking back over the past, every single intimate relationship I've ever had was one where I was the pursued and not the pursuer. Those ones where I was more active turned in to some very nice more or less platonic friendships. When I met my ex in 1988 we had been set up unknown to me and when I walked her home (it was late) she literally never let me out of her grip.
As you've undoubtedly seen me speculate - I do sometimes wonder whether she has divorce or not.
On BD H52, W50 T27, M26 S21, D23 BD-9-Mar-16 D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18 I am a storyteller. The story may do you no good. But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
When the words have sex, are they making little baby words?
That's German you're thinking of and the resulting words are big bouncy new words, not little at all.
DREAM!!!! Happy New Year!
Originally Posted by dream
" Certainly posed and directed to me specifically rather than a generic picture for social media and undoubtedly her kids were well aware of where the picture was being sent."
I'm confused. How did the kids know she was going to send this picture to you??
I can only presume this but since it was a Messenger message I expect it was a safe bet. She's not posted anything at all on any of her other accounts - probably keeping a low profile because she never bothered to get her STBX to sign off on her taking the kids out of the country.
On BD H52, W50 T27, M26 S21, D23 BD-9-Mar-16 D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18 I am a storyteller. The story may do you no good. But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
But why undoubtedly did the kids know where it was being sent? She might have taken a nice picture and sent it to some friends since she didn't want to put it on social media, and that is nice she thought of you.
2x4 coming your way....
STOP MIND READING! You make up a lot of scenarios that could be true or not but there is absolutely no way of knowing.
Take things for face value. No more, no less. It leaves things for a lot less making things up in our head that probably aren't accurate at all.
And you need to change your thinking of being secondary in a relationship. Get unused to that. Get used to being an equal, someone who wants to be with you just as much as you want to be with them. I tend to bend over backwards sometimes to make my loved one feel loved and needed and ignored my own needs. That pretty much got me no where. And please don't hate me for saying this. But you are not in a romantic relationship with CL. You are in a friendship, which is indeed a form of a relationship, and you should not be secondary in a friendship either.
You're a good guy. Treat yourself like on and someone will treat you as one right back.
But why undoubtedly did the kids know where it was being sent? She might have taken a nice picture and sent it to some friends since she didn't want to put it on social media, and that is nice she thought of you.
2x4 coming your way....
STOP MIND READING! You make up a lot of scenarios that could be true or not but there is absolutely no way of knowing.
Take things for face value. No more, no less. It leaves things for a lot less making things up in our head that probably aren't accurate at all.
Totally agree with Ginger and I share dream's confusion in that you really have no idea if the kids knew the pic was directed at you. And, just because she sent it in a messenger message, doesn't mean she didn't turn around and send the exact same pic to any number of other people. Way too much mind reading in this whole scenario and I don't think it is healthy to assume that the kids know anything of you or that they are "coming around to your existence". Honestly, I doubt they know anything more of you than they know of any of her other friends, as I think this is how she sees you.
I'm glad that you recognize that I could be right in what I said. Being a gentleman and having all your teeth are HUGE bonuses, particularly here in the land of the hillbillies where folks tend to think that we are toothless, shoeless and stupid, but I digress. I also agree with what G said about getting yourself UNUSED to the thought of being second place. You deserve so much more than that, Andrew, and you know it. When you start acting "as if", I think you will find that you might discover a different caliber of women who are interested in you. Not that there is anything wrong with the caliber of those who are interested now, mind you, but to use a phrase that my daddy uses all the time "act like you been here before, kid!" You have a great deal to offer a lovely woman so quit allowing this particular woman to put you on a shelf like a toy that she takes down and plays with when it suits her fancy. YOU DESERVE MORE!
Me 52, H53 Bomb drop 9/29/2014 Divorce from XH final 12/17/2014 Marriage #2 12/31/2019 5 adult (step)daughters (3 from XH's first marriage, 2 from current H's previous relationships) 6 grandkids
As I will often say "I'll stop you when you're wrong" - thanks Ginger and Dawn for the whack upside the head.
I think your daddy and I would get along well Dawn.
One of the ways that my brain works is that it looks for patterns. And just like those blurry dots that suddenly coalesce into a large bill from your therapist, I do sometimes see things that aren't there. And sometimes I see things that are like another thing that I think I understand.
What her kids know or don't know, think or don't think is indeed immaterial at present. I do still think that in the summer she had specific plans that included me. But as you will all agree it doesn't matter what her plans are but rather what my own desires are. What her own plans and thoughts currently are - well - she's not told me.
I'll never be that dominant "make me a sammich" kind of guy. And yes, my ideal woman is one who has a clear vision of who she is and what she wants. I am fortunate in that I have no burning need to be coupled and I've learned an awful lot about people by watching in the real world and the more revealing anonymous world online here and elsewhere. I've read so much about bad relationships that it has made me perhaps a bit gun-shy.
And yeah - I'm bored working from home today.
On BD H52, W50 T27, M26 S21, D23 BD-9-Mar-16 D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18 I am a storyteller. The story may do you no good. But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
My dad is full of little words of wisdom like that, but that particular one popped into my head when I was reading your post. Another of his favorites is "if you can't dazzle them with your brilliance, then baffle them with your bull sh!t". That comes into play way more often than I would care to admit in my work life. LOL
I totally get what you are saying...truly, I do. And, I don't even think there is necessarily anything wrong with you NOT being a dominant guy (which I think most of us totally could have told you without your confirming it, but you are who you are and that is great), but there is a difference in being non-dominant and being a doormat. I also get what you are saying about not feeling a burning need to feel coupled. I know it is odd, particularly coming from me when I just got engaged, but one of the reasons I am with Sparky and I said yes when he asked is that I didn't feel that burning need either, but Sparky is my person. I fell for him because of this casual ease about our relationship that makes for a very pleasant place to be, talking, laughing, sharing adventures. On our first date (which was a lunch date, for what it is worth), we just talked and laughed so easily, as if we had already known each other forever and in a way, we had known each other for a bit because we'd talked on line, through text and over the phone for nearly 2 months before we actually met in person (partially because of the stuff going on with his dad, who subsequently passed in early January and partly because of how his last relationship ended and his being gun-shy).
You like who you like. I think most of us said this to J9 too. Don't apologize for your type and how they affect you....that is all you. But, just be aware that a woman can be that dominant type you appreciate without being a user and toying with someone. We've all had our share of bad relationships or we wouldn't be here, quite frankly, and there are lots of horror stories out there. I like to think that I'm the strong, independent type of woman you say you are attracted to but when I love someone, I also like to take care of that person and do things for them, spoil them, just like I like them to do for me. It's a mutual thing, in my mind.
I think you hit the nail on the head when you said her plans are irrelevant and it is really about what you want, need, desire. I'm sure she's a great lady, based on your description, but my point all along (and likely the point of others as well, though I don't want to speak for anyone else) has been that she's not capable of giving you more than friendship and she continues to show you that through her actions. So, stop worrying with her, mind reading her and move on along. She may circle back and take you down off the shelf again, but you deserve to be permanently off the shelf.
Me 52, H53 Bomb drop 9/29/2014 Divorce from XH final 12/17/2014 Marriage #2 12/31/2019 5 adult (step)daughters (3 from XH's first marriage, 2 from current H's previous relationships) 6 grandkids
Well - It's Saturday. Time for another long rambly diary entry.
Busy weekend this weekend. The first weekend of the month is when I usually do my full clean of the house and it needs it. 20S is going to be moving her excess furniture and probably a bit other stuff in on Sunday so I had to clear the brush out of the utility trailer for her boyfriend to haul. While I have the trailer empty I figured I'd pick up a sheet of 3/4" plywood to build some blanket boxes. I have plans from years ago from the Canadian Plywood Association that do one big and one small box out of one sheet. When my son was little we did a father/son build and made one for him as a toy box which he still has in his closet packed with childhood things. As those who are playing the home game may recall my ex was a bit of a hoarder. Not as bad as some, but there certainly were piles of whatever all over along with far too much "stuff". As a birthday present I made her a set of these boxes. I think she was slightly offended (whatever) but she did fill them and they certainly left with her.
The spare blankets I currently store in an unused closet and they are getting a bit musty. So I'll build some new boxes. I think I have some cedar veneer around that I may use and store the blankets.
Speaking of 20S - I did meet her boyfriend a bit earlier in the week when they stopped by. I must say that I don't like the kid. My general impression of him from the hundreds of pictures 20S posted for a while and confirmed when meeting him was "greasy". I do worry a bit out 20S with him. She was over the moon, moved half way across the province to move in with him, posted hundreds of pictures to Instagram about how much in love she was and then sometime in the summer if I recall, she messaged me that she was spending the day drinking and crying. I didn't ask why, told her that if she needed a temporary place to crash that we had room which she appreciated but didn't take me up on. Ever since then - while they are still together and are presumably a couple, there is no "love of my life" or any other sorts of stuff and they were acting more like room-mates when they were here. I'm presuming that he was cheating on her and that she like many looks at sunk costs and is making the best of things.
One thing that threw me though was as they were leaving I got my big hug as usual and 20S whispered an ILY in to my ear. I'm presuming she meant in an "uncle" sort of way but it did startle me - she's never said that before. And yes - keeping my distance. Despite the fact that I like her and she is very cute and curvy, she's also my son's best friend and more trouble than 9 miles of bad road.
Speaking of the Uncle things there was a funny bit in a Huffington Post article "Facebook Dating Is Now Active In Canada". In it is the quote "The company wants to avoid accidentally suggesting people date their uncle" - which gave me serious giggles. I'd thought of sharing that with CL where by some counts I am her uncle but didn't. I think all here who know my story would find that funny too though.
Nothing new from CL. As far as I know she and her kids are still at Disney or probably are on their way back this weekend. She did actually do a social media post on Friday - a blurry picture of her and her daughter tagged as at Disney. So - if she doesn't have the right forms to take her kids out of the country some things may hit the fan for her or perhaps not. If anything does hit the fan it won't until long after she's back.
No clue if she'll try to contact me when she gets back. She knows my schedule. I'm going to work on not reaching out to her. There are a bunch of warning flags that I'm trying to pay attention to. She did have a huge amount on her plate personally, at church and at work leading up to this trip. I believe she was intending on clearing out her schedule in the new year. I do like her and consider her a friend. I'm really uncertain on if I want anything more from her.
In other lady type news, I'd sent a couple of messages to the Gift Shop Lady to help her with her ask about her business Facebook page. It was still "broken" when I checked on Friday and so I sent her info on an alternate work-around. No response. But when I got home last night, there was a message on her business page that there was a death in her family. Perhaps one of her parents. Her mother has MS and her dad dementia and she's been helping care for them. Like all my neighbours I expressed condolences. As a one-person business she did post that she's going to be open today if she can manage it but close at the start of next week. I was already planning on making a pot of butternut squash soup so I may take a dish of that and some fresh biscuits over to her this afternoon. The thing that any neighbour would do. Since it's vegetarian I don't have to worry about dietary restrictions.
I've gotten progressively more worried about my health lately. Being unsupervised makes it easy to just ignore things. On bomb-day I was about 270lbs although most people would have thought around 220. I have very dense bones and carried it well. Dressing well helps too. After, I dropped down briefly to an actual 220 where my SIL2 - a personal trainer - took me aside and told me bluntly to stop losing weight. I went back up to 235 where I hovered for a couple of years until this fall when it started to increase. The scale on New Years day told me 250 - up 5 lbs from pre-holiday. The new pants I bought a couple of months ago don't fit comfortably so I'm down to a couple of larger pairs.
Even though I have a home machine, I stopped checking my blood pressure about a year or so ago. My meds were changed this past summer to even the dosage out through the day and I checked a few times then and it was a bit high. I take my meds in the evening as my ex had the opinion that most heart attacks happen in the morning and that gave me the best protection. There was significant variance between morning and evening readings.
When I was in to the dentist they take my blood pressure as part of a general wellness check. Last year's appointment, the number was high but not too bad. This time it was scary high. Systolic in the 190s. Part of that was undoubtedly stress but most of that is just plain bad news. On my home machine that evening, under ideal conditions it was 163/89. This morning 161/74
Not being a doctor I think that I can reasonably posit that much of the issue is the extra weight that I'm carrying around. That I can do something about. One good thing about the LBS diet is that I know exactly how I can eat to lose weight but also stay healthy. So I'm doing my best to shift back to how I was eating in late 2016. Cutting back on the booze (which there was way too much of over Christmas and leading up to it) is a big part of the plan. I need to add some more regular exercise. The house cleaning and my regular walk should do for this weekend but I need to get on the exercise bike or out for more walks mid-week.
I've been "good" all year thus far and am down a couple of pounds but that may well be just past accumulations working their way through. I was feeling quite bloated previously. In part because the cats are waking me up I've not been sleeping all that well so need to work on that.
Not that this is a medical forum (those medical people put away your stethoscopes and pads) but in the summer and again now I have had a weird left arm pain that worried me. "Of course" Dr. Google tells me that I'm deathly ill. It starts out as a joint pain making me think first that I had a rotator cuff issue. Over time it works it's way down my arm as weakness / muscle pain combined with some numbness. And no - I have angina and this isn't combined with any of those symptoms. This time I've found that aspirin gets the pain to move down my arm and fade so that helps with sleep.
That is "of course" a symptom of a heart attack and I've been told I had one in my early 40s. I was also worried when I was at the dentist as I seemed to have trouble putting words together - yes a stroke sign - but that may also have been me being out of practice.
The plan is to closely monitor my blood pressure again (I have a spreadsheet), work on losing weight and see how it goes. I'm confident I can get back down to 235 within the month as I was there this past summer and if my blood pressure is still high then go back to the doctor to see about getting the meds adusted.
As a side note - I had my colonoscopy done this past summer which would have involved some very serious monitoring of my vitals and there was no issue mentioned then. So if I can get back to that weight - very achievable - I may well be fine.
This is one of the parts of being single that I don't like. My ex usually wasn't all that sympathetic when I was ill but she was "there" at least and I felt that I was accountable to her. Now it's just me. S24 and I have actually talked about what to do if something happens to me and he'd be fine - ending up with a free house to live in as his part of the insurance would pay everything off and then some.
A minor bit of news from ex-wife land. On Friday nights I pick up (now less) beer on the way home and that route takes me by her apartment more or less. Unusually for a Friday night she was there and while I didn't look carefully it may well have been her guy's pickup there as well. I think we can assume it was. It is a fairly nice apartment but he's got a reasonably nice house which I'm sure she would prefer to move in to. On the other hand they may have settled in to the "together but apart" life that many mature people seem to like. I can't see it being her preference but then again I'm not an expert on her any more.
Well - undoubtedly there is more I can ramble on about - I miss someone to talk to - but time for me to shower and get my day moving.
Have a great weekend all.
On BD H52, W50 T27, M26 S21, D23 BD-9-Mar-16 D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18 I am a storyteller. The story may do you no good. But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
You're going to turn my head with that purty talk.