Weekend Boyfriends and High School Crushes

W e e k e n d B o y f r i e n d s

Since the last update about my gentleman callers, I saw Paul, the U of I mohawk guy for lunch quickly last Tuesday before going to the orientation at State Farm. We shared the bus back on campus and hugged goodbye. I also hugged him hello. Since then, I sent him an email, a few txts, and he responded to one of them. According to the H.J.N.T.I.Y. philosophy no guy is too busy NOT to contact you if he is really interested and wants you to stick around. So he's out.

There have also been a few changes. I removed all my craigslist ads because I figure I don't need to add to the drama I find myself in (See "High School Crushes" Below) I am no longer actively looking for people to hang out with. And by people of course I mean men. Straight men. Straight available men. Straight available men within my age range (which happens to be my age up to 60 if he is persistent about being my sugar daddy and isn't senile or feeble).

Saturday, I met a guy from Rantoul visiting Champaign for the weekend. We met at Lincoln Square, he bought me a coffee, we walked around, visited an art gallery, I bought a sweater from Shnucks since it was so cold that day, and a candy bar for the boy scouts, and took him to lunch at a Chinese restaurant. We shared mixed vegetables and white rice. From there, we visited one of the friends he was staying with at work (Picadilly's) and went across the street to Strawberry Fields. I saw a woman there in a beautiful Sari and tried on cool frames. We then walked to the house he was staying at, watched Kill Bill Vol. 2 and I remembered I still had items to get for my CB uniform (I work part time now for Cracker Barrel Country Store and full time for State farm through a temp agency doing phone surveys in the evening) so we took the bus to WM and I ordered a pizza for everyone when we got back. A friend came by and we drank, I had two glasses of Bricco Riella, then we watched Donnie Darko. During the movie, we were sharing a couch and a knitted blanket on top of an electric heated blanket. We fooled around, but I had already told him on the bus that I didn't want to go too far and he asked if I was gonna stay the night. I only did because I thought I was gonna go right to CB the next morning since it was close but I didn't count on having left my apron at my apt so I ended up having to go back home the next morning anyway. People kept coming in and out of the living room or hanging out in the kitchen and I am glad because it kept things hovering around 2nd base and I was able to hold my resolve about keeping my undies on, well, below the waist anyway :P until...

I got the idea in my head that we could do the deed without quite doing the deed....you know...
• Bone smuggling
• Driving the Hershey highway
• Enter through the back door
• Plowing the back field
• Gardening uphill
• Goin' to brown town

And I had never done it before. I asked him if he had and he said yes but he didn't hear me say that I hadn't. So there I am on some rando couch with some rando guy I just met that morning and only talked to intermittently the past few weeks with my boyshorts pushed down in the back, my bra unclasped underneath the blanket watching this trippy movie Donnie Darko. I tried not to think about how much I would regret it in the morning, or how dangerous the situation was sexually, all those stupid ads and classes and pamphlets about safe sex running through my head, and I just closed my eyes and r.....e.....l......a.......x..........e.............d....................... :-O

He was gentle, patient, and very good at what he was doing. It took me a while to get used to it and once I did, I finally understood all those bits I had read about in Literotica. Random side note about me-TMI really but whatever-lately my libido has been fluctuating in terms of how easy or how long it takes for me to reach le petite morte and this particular time was a longer one. I also hadn't established with him my bed sign language or how I like things to go. I wouldn't dare post that list here, who knows who might google my name and come across the secret map to the crystal skull of my hidden temple?!?

(And of course 112's song "Anywhere" is playing right now. Even when it first came out and I was like in junior high I knew this song was Naw-T!! But I am at the library right now and I can't be thinking the things I am, I don't have time to go home and change my underwear...)

I will say this though:

(_._) (_._) the girls love attention ;-)



So after a while, I had to basically tell him what he could do to help me along since he had already finished. I am one of those girls who started on her own sharing a friend with my two sisters so I had to do things slow and quiet. When I finally did get around to being with a guy and was able to make some noise, I discovered very quickly that I was a barn door blower. This poor guy had to cover my mouth and I was hoping his friends didn't kick him out or something. The next morning, he woke up because of my snoring, hey I had some congestion!, and went to the other couch, but he ended up coming back after a while. After I left, he sent me an email basically saying even though we didn't have much in common he liked me and was thinking about me and all of this kind of stuff. Well, that Friday, he had done some kind of substance with his friends, swears he is off of that kind of stuff from here on out and he smokes (trying to quit like another few guys I know which really means they are telling ppl they are going to quit as they reach for a cig or continue to buy packs and haven't explored their options). I mean, he is a good looking guy, doesn't have a cell, but is moving to Champaign and looking for work and wants to go back to school. However, I don't like the fact that after I told him I didn't want to go that far, as nice as he was about it, he still tried to and ended up getting something out of me. I can only be so firm. I am way too nice, but I am getting better at being a bitch.


I told him that I didn't want to get serious w anyone in general until after my divorce is final and that if I have enough money by September I would be going back to Stanford so I didn't think it would be a good idea to start a relationship and instead be friends and hang out. The past few days he calls or emails and has made it clear that he does like me and wants to be with me. I am like, geez, where were you when I was in high school? Why couldn't' guys do that then? So cruel, fate.



So that's that guy, dubbed "Hippie Guy" for short, but his name is Brooks.

H i g h S c h o o l C r u s h e s

A few weeks ago one of the last responses from my craigslist ads responded with the following:

Hi Shamika

So I'm guessing the picture of you among the cherry blossoms is from when you were in Japan.

We've got some things in common: I don't have a television either, and I like films, museums, plays and walking around. I also live near the Champaign Public Library and spend a lot of time there.

I know what it's like to be new in town, and I'm always trying to expand my circle of friends.

It's good that you have an affinity for white guys, since that's what I am. I'm a lot older than you (38).

What else? I'm employed as a Nurse Assistant.

Let me know if you'd like to do something some time and welcome to Champaign. :)

Mark

After exchanging a few emails, and coordinating schedules, we decided changed dates a few times and were finally able to actually meet on Monday at the library. I showed up early but ended up getting a few knitting books. We sat near the cafe and talked for a few hours. The conversation flowed easily, he was funny, easy to talk to, good looking in a subtle way (I always had a thing for guys that seemed like they had more to them than just their looks so I never go for a stereotypical handsome guy, I prefer my guy to have his own kind of unique look), smart, interesting, and his age was older than me but not too much, and not too close. After my courtesy email, he responded saying the one thing I have wanted to hear from ALL THE OTHER GUYS I have met since I have been down here.

Thanks for getting back to me. I liked you too. :) I'll take all the nice things you said about me and send them right back at you. It's not every day that I meet someone I can gab with happily for two hours and have it seem like ten minutes.

I appreciate you letting me know about your husband. I think we should plan on - at least until you're divorce is finalized - just being pals (not that you're necessarily saying that you want to be anything more than that right now anyway). When your marriage is (legally) over, we can decide where to take things from there. Sound good?

Would you like to get together Sunday around 4:30 somewhere in downtown Champaign? I was thinking we could get coffee and knit, or we could grab dinner some place cheap.

Let me know,

Mark

This was the very next day that he responded and we are getting together Sunday afternoon after he gets off work at Merry Ann's where we will most likely eat, talk, and I know I will be knitting. We have been keeping in touch on the regular with fun emails, and all the drama I had to sift through with all the other guys and messiness of getting involved then having to try and scale back for one reason or another is totally behind us. We are moving forward, together, on the same page, no pressure, clear future, hope lingering in the wings. Its fantastic.


There is an update, an interesting turn of events, regarding Matt. So after V-day weekend, when he txtd me that he basically didn't want to go on with me bc I was still married, I figured I would never hear from him again. Well, that hasn't been the case. When I emailed an apology, he responded accepting my apology, then I emailed a response, and he emailed me a response and eventually I sent him a txt and he responded and for the most part we have found ourselves somewhat where we left off roughly before V-day weekend. He is only in town two weekends of the month as far as I know and after all we have done, he doesn't seem to want to commit, even when he didn't know I was dealing with divorce.

Before this week, all I could hope for was to work things out with Matt. But with him, it was a clear case of H.J.N.T.I.Y. because of how he couldn't admit that he liked me. Something that I thought was pretty basic and simple, junior high even with the boxes and checks. And I realize that as great a guy as I think Matt is, I shouldn't pour myself into his life as though I was pursuing him and tell myself that I am willing to wait him out until he comfortable enough with me to commit (all of this assuming of course that the divorce is behind me. I am looking ahead)

Instead, embracing the new phase of my life, I want to let go of the unhealthy habits I formed in high school in regards to my relationships with men. So instead of immediately treating a guy friend like I would a boyfriend, I have to develop genuine friendships with guys and allow them to naturally become relationships, and real ones, with titles and admissions and such.



P l a n o f A c t i o n

1. I am not going to pursue anymore guys. From here on out, if they want me, they gotta come to me because I am too busy trying to stay sane (literally) and work to go back to Stanford.

2. Once I am legally divorced, whatever guys from the past few weeks are still around, I am simply going to let them know where I am in my plan to go back to Stanford and unless they want to move forward onto a path of a committed relationship they will be relegated to purely friend status and I won't think two cents about it. The last thing I want to do is return to high school and have various crushes on various guys and not be really serious about any of them. After everything is said and done with Stephen, I want to embrace my adult single status, but not with a string of one night stands and halfway sub par relationships. I have always been a committed woman and wanted to be in such a relationship headed toward sharing a bathroom and looking at furniture. I may not get married for a number of years, but in the interim, my next husband deserves a whole woman as best as I can get there. I also don't want to use guys just to scratch an itch. I don't need it like that, usually anyway, and if I know that by waiting I am waiting for my next BOYFRIEND and not the next rando then that makes me feel better about it.

3. All the randos with epithets, if that, are getting filed away deep within my inbox to be forgotten. No need to keep in touch with them at all.

4. Brooks and I already talked and he knew about Matt and said he hopes the guy doesn't make any moves and its clear that he is willing to start a relationship now. However, he understands about me going through the divorce and has agreed to stay friends and see how things go. I know how hard it is from experience to be around someone that you want to be with but cannot so I am not sure how long he will hold out but I do hope that he finds someone steady and stable to be with since his last three relationships all ended within a season and most left him for another guy. At least, that's what he tells me.

5. Matt is going to be in town this weekend. He knows I like him and wanted to be with him, and on Friday he invited me to go pick up his truck from the shop. Armed with this new resolve, I am going to be able to let him know that I want to keep talking and hanging out, but as friends (which should only cut out the dirty deed and leave us with the friendship but we all know that just being friends with someone you have already been with decapitates the relationship most often) I want him to know that until the divorce is over, I am not meeting anybody new and I am not going to start anything more than friendships with the guys currently in my life. Most importantly, I will tell him that once I am on the other side of my current marital situation that several things are going to happen. I first don't want the first guy out of the gate to be some sort of rebound anything. Which is why this interim time is so important, building a relationship and a friendship even if it never goes past that, is going to be valuable to me during that phase. Next, and most pertinent, is that the next guy I get involved with is going to be for keeps. I would very much like to experience an adult intimate thoroughbred bona fide relationship long term. That is what I am going to be aiming toward with the next guy I am with. I don't need to add notches to my bedpost and I don't want to relive high school.

6. Mark and I are gonna hang out and knit and probably celebrate the end of the whole legal process with a trip to the museum or Japanese Tea Garden then assess where we are and where we wanna go from there. (Note how short, sweet, and to the point that one was!)




So! I am brushing my hands of the past, clearing my mind, and my heart, and after this month I will know where I am with the petition for divorce as well as who is still hanging around for the fall out.


And Boyz II Men is playing now, "I'll Make Love To You" which is less lust and more love. A great note to end this note on.