Saturday, Oct. 27, 2018 - 2:21 pm.
I've spent the whole week holed up at home due to a cold. I had planned to work from home on Monday, and I was healthy then until the afternoon, when my nose started to feel stuffed and achy. The rest of the week, I stayed home to try to get better. I kept writing my thesis, though, at times in bed.
Besides Andrew, who's also been a bit sick and moody (for reasons unrelated to me), I only saw one more person this week. He's my Mexican ex-crush's ex, S. He and A. (my ex-crush) arrived to this city together years ago, and broke up about six months ago. Break-ups are always hard, but luckily there was no particular nastiness involved in theirs. As far as A. told me, and as far as it seems, their relationship simply ran its course and they parted ways mostly in peace.
S. had invited Andrew and me to his birthday party last week, but we couldn't make it. We're both really fond of S. (I like him more than A.'s current flame, but no one's asking me), so we offered him to go for drinks to make up for it. Then he offered to prepare dinner for us instead.
We had a lovely evening at his single-guy flat. We have lots of viewpoints and interests in common, so the conversations can go and on. I felt that getting together sort of rekindled our friendship with him. A.'s in the department, so we see her far more often, but since there are no grounds for taking sides in this split, Andrew and I remain friends with both of them separately.
Then, this weekend, we have a guest. My friend JC's brother, who lives near Wales, is in town for a swimming competition and he's staying with us. JC is that friend from my late undergrad years, with whom I made out frequently and savagely at a time when neither of us was in their right mind, then had a fallout because of that, and now we're close friends, as we should have always been.
I used to be JC's cousins's therapist, so I also know (as in, she told me stuff in confidence) JC's mom, who was the cousin's legal guardian then. She is currently visiting JC's brother, so she made food from my home country and sent it to me with her son. This made me happy, both because of the food and because she remembers me fondly to the extent that she prepared something for me. I'm not proud of having involved myself with this family in a professional and a personal manner simultaneously, but I kept each sphere separate from the other, and ultimately, my presence did some good and no harm (except to JC's recent ex-girlfriend at the time. She was pissed. Rightfully so).
Since we're talking about the distant past, I should acknowledge that this past October 18th marked the 10th anniversary of Joseph breaking up with me (although I didn't realize he'd done that until four months later. Christ). By now, paraphrasing Don Draper, it amazes me how much all this didn't happen.
It took me so long (eight years, maybe?) to get over losing him, and to get over the hurt of such a messy break-up. It's all written in this diary in painful detail, but I can not tell that story again. I honestly don't remember it. I remember the devastating feelings, I don't remember much of what happened. It's like a past life.
However, I was reading Persepolis a while ago, and this panel came up in which the protagonist buys a snack for her boyfriend and plans to drop by his house to surprise him. I read that panel and I just *knew* what was coming (spoiler alert): five panels later, she finds him with another girl. I laughed and went GUUURRL, SAME! Then, this week, my university's research volunteers mailing list advertised a survey for a study about significant break-ups.
So, to my past self in this diary going through an excruciating emotional hell because of Joseph: You'll be fine. You won't believe the awesome things that await for you after he kicks you out of his house. This experience of loss will even allow you to participate in a study about break-ups and enter a prize draw to win a 30-pound gift card.
One of those things that await for me: Last night, when Andrew, the two cats, and I cuddled on the sofa, under a fluffy blanket, and watched David Bowie's 2000 Glastonbury concert on the BBC. This is the life.
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