2004-07-01 - 12:45 p.m.

You know, the days where you wake up and just want to get dead trashed and stay that way?

I haven't had one of these days in a long time. I've had a few of these nights since I've been in Chicago- probably even this calendar year. But I don't recall having had one of these DAYS in a good long time.

So here's the deal.

And no, I don't want to talk about it. So don't email me with questions or advice. I just need to get this out because it is fucking driving me crazy to hold it in.

Okay. Deep breath. I'm just going to say it. Really. I'm going to say it.

Married life is not always wonderful. And my married life is not perfect by any means. I"m especially resentful of that today because I spent at least an hour crying this morning over nothing in particular, and the thing is-- I'm living my dreams. I'm off saving the world, and things are going really well with my job. And Michael's having a great time at 8th day and doing all sorts of wonderful things. So, by all right, we should both just be unbearably happy about everything right now.

But we're not.

We're not fighting. We're not being mean to each other. We haven't fallen out of love. We're just... indifferent sometimes. I bury myself in my writing, and he buries himself in computer games, and we don't spend much time together except for the occassional (really good) shag and for the random conversation about how we should spend more time together.

And when I'm sick he'll make me dinner or bring me orange juice in bed, but he won't just go out of his way to make time to spend with me. And I guess I don't either. I just feel really far away from him sometimes, and I don't for the life of me know what to do about it.

Because it's also like this. I can't talk to Michael about my religious beliefs anymore. I am far too scared to do that. When we first started going out, he bashed on Christianity so that I can't talk to him about it because anything I say I believe having to do with that, he makes me feel stupid for. And then, when I really started exploring paganism, it was the wrong kind of paganism for him, so he bashed on that too! I tell him about my magic and he breaks it and I feel like I'm floundering as it is in that department because sometimes I just don't know what the hell I believe anymore. I'm finding this mixture of Wicca and Catholicism but I don't have any support present to me here and I'm scared to death to tell my husband about it. And I did finally come clean and tell him all of this and he laughed at first because he thought I was being silly and then I screamed at him and cried and he said, "Oh shit. I"m a bully," and spent the rest of the night cooing and stroking my hair and apologizing and trying to wrap his mind around the fact that he has made his wife afraid to talk to him about something so incredibly important to her.

But we don't talk about it. That night ended, and it was vaguely brought up once again, but nothing's really changed. I can't bring myself to not be scared about it because I'm so insecure with my spirituality right now, and I don't want it to be broken again.

In fact, if I had to sum up my relationship with Michael right now, it would be like this:

I am extremely fucking insecure.

Because here's another thing. I feel like I'm caught between feminism and stereotype. Feminism keeps telling me that my life is great-- that I'm living my dreams and all sorts of wonderful things are going on and taht my happiness should not be contingent on what Michael thinks about my body. But then that stereotype says, "Oh God, I"m so fat." And I obsess over how I look lately, and I've started wearing make-up again, and I dyed my hair black, and I hate my body and I'm researching ways to de-hair my legs without actually using razors, and I keep thinking that if I just change ONE MORE THING then he'll find me attractive. I haven't had any net weight gain since I've known him. But I"m not sleek and firm and skinny like he is, and I know he thinks he's fat so god only knows what he sees when he looks at me. And I'm all out of shape since the marathon. Whatever muscle I had built up has turned straight to jelly and all I can see when I look in the mirror are a million reasons why Michael doesn't admire me when he looks at me. I'll be naked in our rooms and he walks past without a first glance, much less a second. It makes me want to spend hours sculpting my figure, and I can't help but be reminded of the time John-MIchael dumped me and I bordered on anorexia just trying to be perfect so he would want me back. And so I say, "Screw it. I'm happy how I am," but it's a lie and I look in the mirror and hate myself again.

And he runs hot and cold on my with sex. It is almost always mind-blowing. But it's happening less and less. And he tells me he doesn't like it when I'm pushy and he wants me to play harder to get. So I'm scared to initiate anything, and I'm getting so fucking sexually frustrated. I've had an altogether alarming number of dreams of having sex with people who are not Michael. And granted, it was really only a few, but that's way more than normal and it's freaking me out. Michael and I had a fight the other night and then I dreamed about sleeping with some guy just to get back at him. And when I woke up I almost laughed at the way my subconcious had retaliated in a way that I never would. The ultimate in passive aggressive revenge.

The thing is that I would be happy with even less sex if we... I don't know. I he acted like he was in love with me. And he does-- he brings me orange juice in bed. But what about when we're standing in a room full of people, and he's perfectly content to not stand right next to me. This is an entirely new occurrence. And I"m talking, in the last couple of months this has started. It's a big fucking deal when three months ago we had our arms all around each other but now he doesn't want to hold my hand-- doesn't even feel compelled to be on the same side of the room with me.

Oh god, now that I'm talking about all of this, it seems so much worse than what I was thinking. I have my sunglasses on because I'm at work and I'm afraid someone's going to come in and realize how upset I am.

I had a good religious experience the other night. Fabian designed chapel so that we had a labyrinth to go through our house, and each station was this different interactive prayer sort of thing. And it was all such blatant elemental magic that I was on cloud nine, floating from station to station and moving into my altered state of conscious, and I prayed for Michael every step of the way, and in the end, I left him a message in the sand (he was behind me- we went through the stations one by one)

I wrote: I love you beyond reason.

That has been the line in my head since I've known MIchael to describe how much I love him, how I love him. What it means to me. I'm so crazy in love with him I can't even make sense of it.

I went into the chapel and waited for everyone else. Michael comes in, and quite honestly, I did expect him to come sit next to me on the couch and wrap his arms around me and tell me he loves me and kiss me and cuddle me.

And you know?

If he had done even ONE of those things, I would have been happy.

But he sat in the chair diagonal to me and started making fun of that line- how it sounded like a bad thing. And, stunned, I said, "No more than 'hopelessly in love'" And he shrugged and said he saw my point. And I said, "I really expected you to react differently, actually." And THEN, after disparaging the best way I've ever been able to put my love for him for about five minutes, THEN, he caught himself, and leaned over and kissed me and said he loved me too and sat next to me and cuddled me.

And I let it slide.

But then later, when we were talking, I tried to kiss him and he didn't want to. We were playing. This has happened before. I should have learned. When he doesn't want to kiss me, I shouldn't keep playing and keep trying to kiss him, because he won't. He'd rather fight me off. He'd rather physically push me away, pin me down, to the point of forceful, than kiss me. And he's playing too. But by the time it gets to that point, I can never understand why he would rather fight me than kiss me. He said, "You're being pushy" and I remembered how he wants me to play hard to get. And I left. Because I was so hurt and angry.

He broke the magic in my line about how I love him. I love you beyond reason. I don't feel all romantic and wistful when I think that line like I have for the past four and a half years. I think about him telling me how bad it sounds.

And, fucking hell.

There are good things too. There are always good things too. But today I'm having one of those days, and I can't think of any of them.

I don't feel like, "Oh, I want to make this work." To me, it's not an option of it not working, because I can't imagine not being with Michael. He's the other part of me. And it's fucking awful when we sweep past each other with indifferent attitudes. It's fucking awful when we're even just not madly in love. I have no idea what to do about this. I have no idea what to do about this. I have no idea what to do about this. I have no idea what to do about this.

But I can't just wait it out again. Because it always comes back to this. And this time it is as bad as I ever want it to be.

I don't know. Maybe I should talk to someone about this. Maybe you should write and give me some advice.

Because I'm lost here.

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