Jay Elias | You can take it with you

"I have wasted Time, and now doth
Time waste me"
- Richard II

2002-08-17- 6:40 p.m.

Not A Moment Of Peace

8.12.02 – 5:15 p.m.
What am I doing here? The quick answer is easy: I’m trying to have a vacation, a well-deserved good time, a time to spend with friends and a girl I like. I’m trying to prove I’m capable of enjoying myself like regular people do. I’m struggling to uncover evidence that I’m not some sort of prospective hermit, destined to hole up with nothing but a vial of methadone and an internet connection. I want to gather some proof that will show me that I will be able to live a semi-normal life. After two days on vacation, what I’ve found is that the jury would like time for further deliberations.
If you asked me to try and explain what it is that feels wrong, I’m not sure I could. Dogs, they say, can smell fear. Perhaps I’m developing an ability to smell my own impending failure.
I’m sitting on a beach that can’t be reached by land. We rented a powerboat to bring us all out here, at about $300 for the afternoon. We have the whole spot to ourselves for fifty feet at least in each direction. The water looks lovely, the sun is shining, and it isn’t too hot. But the beach is rocky and covered in dying seaweed. I wore my gym shoes out, because I’ve a long-standing prejudice against flip-flops and sandals on guys. But the boat can’t beach herself fully; I have to jump off and wade the last ten feet or so in. My shoes soak and fill with small rocks, and when I reach the beach, I’m forced to take them off and expose my city feet to the sharp rocks and shells, until I can reach a sandier spot and contend with the acidic heat.
Nothing is going quite how we planned, and Rachel and her friends Montana and Eddie are forming a little troika to decide how to deal with it. I’m ambivalent; I’m not really being included by either group, so I can’t much feel that I have any stake in the resolution of their disputes about room arrangements and plans. I just want to keep it all from getting ugly as much as possible. Well, truth be told, I want to feel like I’ve been invited on this vacation. Right now I feel like even Rachel considers me as having only come along because I’m sleeping with her, and that if we’re not going to be doing that right now, I had better find a way of having my own good time instead of tagging along with hers. But I’ll settle for the possible: I’ll work at trying to keep it from getting ugly.
That is about as involved as I can get in whatever is happening to me.
8.14.02 – 7:35 p.m.
I find myself without a clue as to how any of this happened. How did I end up here, watching this sunset, on this beach, with this girlfriend? I’d almost feel it was a sort of blackout, only despite all the competing substances in my system, I remember every single step along the way. I just don’t remember any of the decisions that I was supposed to be a part of. All of this feels like fate or destiny; implacable and unmoved by my feelings and desires.
Things are devolving between Rachel and I, too. We’ve fallen back into an old pattern, where all of our feelings have to be communicated through looks and touch. We can’t speak to each other about things, not right now; she invariably says too little and I too much for either of us to find solace. No one else wants particularly to hear my feelings of doubt either. The conclusion among everyone else is that Rachel and I are working things out, and we’ll just keep doing so until we’re good and fine and ready for what they consider an inevitable walk down the aisle. I don’t think Rachel is of quite the same mind; in fact, she doesn’t show a particular interest in ever marrying anyone, but she clearly sees this as something that will last for some time.
When I was with Sivan, she always used to say that she couldn’t see either of us breaking up with the other. This used to bother me; it felt like an excuse to not try very hard. I wanted to try to explain that I’m the leaving kind, I’m the sort of guy who will dump you over almost nothing. I’m fickle, at least I think I am, ready to give up part of my heart for a little, and ready to withdraw it over infractions only I really understand. I want to rail against Rachel’s assumptions. I want to tell her that my feelings are already counting the steps to the door. But I don’t know what the words to communicate that are, and I’m not sure I’d see the point to telling her anyways. Perhaps it isn’t the worst thing that everyone always sees me as a little less strong than I really am.
When I was younger, I think it was easier to be with someone and see it just as a means of marking time. Everything is far more complicated now. But I’m beginning to think that perhaps my ideas of how I want things to be are what is holding me back. It is so much harder to reconcile yourself to the way things are when you have a picture in your head of how things should be.

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If you want to make me
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Older

Doesn't Take Much and That's Messed Up - 2004-03-15
Like Water Under Bridges - 2003-09-08
Jesus On The Dashboard - 2003-08-13
An Administrative Announcement - 2003-08-11
Don't Worry, It's Coming - 2003-08-02

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