Not YOU, for goodness sakes!
This is another one of those posts that will convince you that it's a whole mess o' crazy inside my head. Here's what I'm thinking -two completely unrelated things that have linked themselves as possibly being about the same underlying thing.
I've thought for a while that my pretty bed might look better with two pillows on it instead of one. I had an extra pillow -with no pillowcase on it- on the floor next to the bed for at least a week. (Because we all know how hard it is to put a pillowcase on a pillow -insert eyeroll here!) Yesterday morning I finished the project and instantly felt uneasy. Last night, I went to bed with the other pillow on the bed and felt downright crowded. I threw the pillow back on the floor and this morning put it away in the linen closet.
Apparently, that bed is MY space. I don't want it to even look like I'm waiting for someone else to be there -not just in my bed, obviously. In my life, I mean. The second thing is weirder. Don't laugh.
I think I might have had a date. Now, wouldn't you think I would KNOW???? I went out with this guy I've known for a while. This one definitely wasn't a date. It was one of those "let's meet at the restaurant after work" deals addressed to anyone and everyone; we were just the only two who showed up. We had a lovely time and decided to meet up again a few weeks later. Now is that a date or not? Who the hell knows.
It turns out that it was remarkably date-like. And I felt EXACTLY as I had felt with the other pillow on my bed. This guy is a lovely friend. I told him I wanted to stop the other thing because I didn't want to not be friends. I know this guy -and think he's great. He wants a simple dating arrangement with absolutely no strings attached anywhere. God knows I don't want permanent attachment right now. But apparently I don't want ANY of that kind of attachment. He was about to walk into a whole pile of "complicated". And I was about to have to share my psychic space, and I'm absolutely not ready.
I'm me, after all. If I ever date again, I'm going to have thought about it, decided I'm ready, fretted about it for a while, freaked out... and then we'll see what happens. Over-analysis-R-us. It's all kind of the opposite of simple, in my head.
Now I get a little stuck. Thriving and sharing can't be opposites. In fact, thinking they are is pretty much the definition of narcissism, and I don't want to go there. Connection and loss of autonomy can't be the same thing. And the fact that I worry about those things teaches me more than a little about my marriage. Maybe until I figure out how to thrive and share, connect and fly, I really do need to keep that extra pillow off the bed.
6 comments:
Hm. That's interesting - when I was single I had 2 pillows on the bed. Not because the second pillow was for anyone else, but because it allowed me to sprawl across the entire bed without waking up with a crick in my neck, realizing I was on the empty side of the bed, and scrabbling for my pillow.
That second pillow was for ME, dammit.
Connection and loss of autonomy are most definitely NOT the same thing. But there are also times when you just can't have a thing in your life. Let me posit a possibly dumb example: jogging is a good thing for me. It gets me out of my house, out of my head, burns calories, makes me stronger, etc...
But when I'm injured, it's NOT a good thing for me. It will only make me more injured to push it. So I wait until I am healed, and then head out - and not at the speed or distance I did before I injured myself: I have to be gentle with myself.
Hm. Maybe that's not such a bad analogy after all.
Be gentle with yourself, dearest.
Hmm. I wonder what it says about me that I (a single woman) have three pillows on my bed?
I don't see a single thing wrong with either of the two decisions you made, either about the pillow or the date. If it's not the right time for you to add these things to your life, it's not the right time.
And I think Jill's jogging analogy is brilliant.
Molly, it means you want a threesome! ;)
I think a bed with one pillow looks lonely. We have 5 pillows on our bed and dh and I both sleep with 2. The 5th pillow could mean lots of things but it's mostly there so my head doesn't fall with a clunk onto the mattress. And we can meet in the middle when the mood strikes.
Or it could be for the dog who also sleeps with us.
O crap... If 3 pillows means Molly wants a threesome what do my five pillows say about single me? Orgy??!!
Anyways sweets, you will the things you need to do in your own time and own way. One pillow or two or maybe date or not.
Funny, I'm wracking my brain trying to remember what my pillow arrangement was when I was single. Was it one, was it two? I don't remember. I can see me throwing an extra off the bed because it was crowding me. "Hey you get offa my cloud."
I don't think I remember how to date either.
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