Saturday, Nov. 07, 2020 - 11:45 am.
Another relatively relaxed week at work, which does not take away from the peace I feel when I wake up on Saturday morning. I have no obligations this weekend, which feels odd but also liberating. I should structure my time a bit, though, so I won't end up feeling regretful on Sunday night.
Halfway through this week I got majorly pissed at my girlfriend. Over a minor and easily fixable mistake, I know, but these things are too important to me and I trusted her knowledge. It's a silly thing, I was writing a column for the online newspaper, and I sent her the draft because she said she'd love to see it first, like having VIP access or something. Which, hey, cool, thanks for enjoying my work. So I sent it to her after I'd sent it to my editor.
She then replies pointing out at a line and asks to be walked through my thoughts behind it. This alone pisses me off, she can sometimes get so fixed on "elaborating" and it's exhausting. No, I did not care to elaborate further, that whole column was a solid elaboration over 24 hours (thinking about it when I wasn't writing it), rushing through it and yet taking my time to make every argument no less than perfect because it was a sensible subject. I told her no, I will not walk you through it, just please point out if something is wrong.
She sent me a voicenote saying I got one of the Constitution articles wrong. And that fucked me up. I felt so arrogant for mentioning the article without double-checking, for being 100% sure about it. I quickly deleted the line off my column and emailed my editor, all ashamed and apologetic, saying to please revise this second version.
A few minutes later, my girlfriend writes back and says she was wrong. I got it right the first time. And I got just downright pissed because she fucking studied law, and I trusted her because she knows this shit. I'd already second-guessed myself so much with this column, until I documented myself and ended proud of it, but then I grant her "VIP access" and her feedback makes me feel like an arrogant ignorant who shouldn't write about these things. I wrote to my editor again, apologizing for the spam and saying the first version was still the right one. She's really nice to me.
I've overblown this, but that's how I feel. There's a lot of mental energy involved in me writing these columns, and I say the arguments cannot be less than perfect because there's a possibility of backlash and harrasment from people with differing political views. Usually my columns don't get that much attention, at least not enough for nasty comments to reach me, but there's always the possibility. They may not say anything if I'm right, but if I'm wrong, I won't hear the end ot it. I was terrified of getting the constitutional side of my column wrong. Someone I trusted said it was wrong. But then it was right.
It did not help that earlier that day I'd had sheepishly reached out to her to ask her to pay for $70 USD in taxes for a package she'd sent me. Even before the column, I was already in emotional turmoil over this, first because I was going to pay out of my pocket for a gift for me, then because it was out of my monthly budget, and then because I had to tell her, so she'd either pay for it or risk having the package returned to her.
Listen, there's a lot of love in the package. It was black hoodie with Aladdin Sane's lightning bolt on the back, and it checks all the boxes regarding what I like in a hoodie. It's very me, it's something I'd wear while I'm staying at Brother #1's house in Houston and God, it even makes me wish I was there. And there's more: she added a scent, a beautiful print of two mermaids kissing, LGBTI pride stickers and a hand-written letter explaining the idea of having her scent on my hoodie. All very thoughtful, all for our 6-month anniversary, which is today.
(Andrew said he thought I was the sugar mama in my relationship with her, and congratulated me because those weekend phone calls "are paying off". He's awesome).
But I'm still not entirely over the blow. Yes, well, a blow to my ego and not more than that. Maybe to my trust in her too. I still trust her, she objectively knows more than me, but that trifecta of me feeling proud - arrogant - stupid because of a mistake she made hit very deep. So I told her it'll be best if she just reads my columns when they're published. I know, it's my fault for sending her the column. If there were any factual mistakes in it, my editor would catch them.
I didn't speak to her for a day, although she apologized and said she was embarrassed and understood if I needed to take my time to talk to her again. The next day I summoned the maturity to text her that I wasn't mad *at* her (not anymore at the time of writing this message) and hers was an easily fixable mistake. Which is true, I made it worse by panicking and writing to my editor in shame. I could've tried to defend my point, but I trusted her she was correct.
She wrote back saying she was relieved, and thank you for clarifying that I wasn't mad at her, and she wondered why it took me so long to say that. At this point I just replied in my mind "fuck you". Fuck you for expecting that I work on your emotional regulation when I've had a day of nearly getting in red numbers because of a gift you sent me, then having to ask you to pay for it, then having you read something that's a source of stress and pride for me and you tell me I'm wrong, and I feel arrogant and dumb because I trust your feedback, but then tell me I'm actually correct.
Fucking hell, I didn't expect to dedicate more than two paragraphs to this drama. Rationally, I understand it's not a big deal and nothing was lost. The column has been published and it didn't make a fuzz, as usual; the topic is yesterday's news (last week's, really) and there's a tropical storm wiping out the region. But I'm sorry, I'm still pissed. It's a small thing but the length of this entry shows how I sincerely feel.
Other topics: I'm getting an author website to promote myself and the book, haha (that's ANOTHER person I'm dealing with at the moment, making stuff more complicated than it should be, but let's give him a week). I'm actually on Goodreads, someone had the good heart of adding two of my books so I claimed the profile and added the other two. Now I'm terrified of checking the ratings.
Andrew and I remain uncertain on a couple of things. First, about my uni contract next year, and about the apartment. The landlord is not answering our emails about the lease which is up next month (yes, we will phone him, but we needed to send him some paperwork from the building administration). On the latter matter, around 30% of the apartments in these buildings are for rent due to the crisis, so at least for us it means there's some leverage if the landlord wants to increase the rent or if he just decides not to renew our lease.
It was Brother #2's birthday yesterday and I videocalled him. Though we text here and there, I don't call my siblings often. I know I should, it gives me a nice warm feeling all over my chest.