STILL?!

I wasn’t always single. My longest relationship lasted seven years and ended five and a half years ago. There’s a clichéd response I’ve heard from some: Seven years, eh? So who got the seven-year itch? No one. Had I been stronger, it would have ended after nine months. I know the moment when the relationship jumped the shark.

While I don’t live with regret, I’m not proud of prolonging that partnership. At the time, I didn’t want to be the flake. There was that phrase, “for better or for worse”, that kept nagging at me—not that we were married or even could have been married back then. (At any rate, I should have distinguished that language from “for better or for worst”, but didn’t.) More than anything, I didn’t want to be single again.

It came with tremendous relief when I finally and firmly announced I’d had enough. No need for specifics here. We’ve moved on. Any belatedly bashing would be tacky.

So a couple of text messages I received last night baffled and frustrated me. Both from The Ex, of course. I’d just picked up the dogs after he’d looked after them for the weekend and I was shorter and colder with him than usual. I could blame it on standing out in the rain waiting for the doggy changeover or a lack of sleep after spending two nights on my best friend’s too-short sofa or the fact that my ex tried yet again to pass off the dogs early yet again despite the fact I was at a conference. Who am I kidding? The faint sound of a siren twenty blocks away can make me cranky in front of The Ex.

When I realized I had a couple of messages—I’d shut off my cell as it was running out of power—I knew whom they were from and didn’t bother to read them until this afternoon. First message, sent right after the drop off: “I still love you!” Okay that could be read any number of ways—as an in-your-face way to rile me, as an apology for throwing off my schedule, as, um, well okay, I’m searching here.

The second message came an hour and a half later, after opportunity for reflection, clearly not an impulsive statement: “You need to know that I still miss being with you, you have to know that.”

What?! Five and a half years later?! Got me an Urban Cowboy, looking for love in all the wrong places. What am I supposed to do with that? I’ve always hoped he’d find someone new sooner than I. Why hasn’t that happened? Okay, I can think of lots of reasons, but he’s supposed to be A Catch to all those window shopping single gay men. Damn.

I’m tired of things being awry in my life. Where’s the kismet?

I really have to stop watching romantic comedies.