Mr. GAG and I played TT last evening. …….If you want to find out what made XH take his pants off, you’ll have to read at least the first few paragraphs.
XH seemed very calm and receptive with me all evening. I was surprised. His e-mails had sounded so short and curt I thought he was in an irritable mood. I have noticed that since I pulled back on the many friendly e-mails and texts we exchanged (April to November of last year) and changed gears from working toward friendship to flirting in our personal interactions (I changed my approach beginning in December last year), that overall Mr. GAG has been warmer and less standoffish when we are together but his communications have been much less frequent and shorter. Don’t know whether this was prompted by the change?????????
After spending 3 ½ hours with Mr. GAG I think he is currently struggling with depression about his mother’s physical and mental decline. Last night I sensed an openess from him that I don’t remember sensing before. It was even different than when we were a couple. It wasn’t romantic, but XH wasn’t defensive at all. That’s a BIG change from last 5 months ago.
This week I was friendly but more reserved. I didn’t run up to hug XH when he arrived at TT and when we hugged goodnight, I didn’t kiss XH on the cheek like I have for the past several weeks. I thought that XH looked kind of surprised when I DIDN’T kiss him on the cheek. Go figure………
No flirting during the game. I was pretty serious and on task, trying to improve my topspin and underspin volleys. XH was very patient with me even though I kept hitting the balls long. Toward the end of the evening we had some very good volleys. During those volleys I felt like we were working as a team. It felt challenging and interesting. I guess this was a glimpse of what our TT could be like in the future……
We played right up to closing time. The community center was empty except for Mr. GAG, me, and one male staff person. The changing rooms were already locked, so Mr. GAG decided to change from his TT shorts into his blue jeans in the TT room in front of me. He said “I guess I can change in here” (funny……..there are big windows on two sides of the room) and seemed more nervous about the young man who works at the community center walking in while he was changing than he was about changing in front of me. I got to see XH’s tighty-whities and manly bare legs again. Caught just a glimpse of bare chest and belly too………. and I have to say that I found it a bit titillating (he's in good shape for a guy in his late 50s). That surprised the heck out of me since I have been feeling “spent” and irritated with what an emotional idiot XH has been for the past 3 years.
We went to the Cuban restaurant. XH immediately started chatting away. He told me that his return flight from the national conference was delayed 3 hours and he didn’t get home until 3 AM Sunday morning. XH showed me lots of photos of his business partner and employees and caught me up on what’s going on with his business and the lives of these people. He showed me some photos of a former business partner (FBP) and said that FBP and his W of 20 years have been having marital difficulties. FBP’s W is unhappy because her children are growing and she gave up her career to support FBP’s career and take care of their family. They are in therapy. I said to XH “R’s go through cycles just like everything in life. People say that when they work through these kinds of problems their M’s are much stronger and better than before”. XH said “Hmmm” in a receptive kind of way. This response was notable because I sensed no defensiveness at all from him on this topic. He did not disagree in word or attitude. He seemed very receptive. This is a HUGE change in XH’s attitude when compared to the months following the bomb and before the D (D was 12/2009). ……….In fact, last July, when XH told me that one of his other friends had recently D’ed his W and when he has referred to his sister’s M difficuties over the past year, he spoke of these things in a defiant tone of voice, as if to justify his actions. Not so last evening. His tone was softer and receptive.
XH raised the topic of the TV star who has been having a meltdown on US TV this week (CS) and we talked a bit about how addiction changes people. XH thinks CS is not in full command of his faculties.
Last summer I borrowed XH’s stepladder to paint my kitchen and hadn’t returned it (my bad…….I was trying to find time to paint the back hallway). Earlier in the day XH had texted me to ask if I had the ladder. He’d been looking for it. I told him I would bring it for him yesterday evening. At the restaurant I told XH that I felt badly that I’d kept his ladder for so long and apologized for not returning it earlier. He said “That’s OK”. He wasn’t irritated at all. I said that to thank him for letting me borrow the ladder for so long I would like to treat him to the King Tut exhibit. He said “When does it come to town” and “You don’t have to do that”. I told him how badly I felt for keeping the ladder so long and thought the exhibit might be really interesting. We ended up changing the topic after that, but I at least planted the idea. I will follow up on that in the future. This is the same approach I used to get XH to play TT with me the first time. I couched my invitation as a “barter” of goods/services……and look at us now.
I pulled a book of “adult” Mad Libs out of my purse and told XH we were doing them earlier at work because one of the gals at work is getting M’ed in 2 weeks. Then I showed XH a sexy Mad Lib in the book that he and I did together 3 months before our D one evening when I served him dinner on my patio. I said “Do you remember that?” and he responded “Yes, I do”………so THAT was INTERESTING. XH DID remember that evening. We really had a nice time that evening. We giggled and laughed ourselves silly that evening and I flirted relentlessly (let's just say the nouns, verbs, and adjectives used in those Mad Libs would probably be edited by J3B ) ………..I am finding over the past few months that XH HAS actually remembered and noticed a LOT more detail than I ever thought he did, just like DB 101 says! Go figure.
After we finished eating, XH just kept chatting away. It was obvious he didn’t want to leave. He told me that while he was driving to the community center this evening he had been crying because he was thinking about his mother’s declining health. She's lost ~20 pounds in the last 1-2 months and has no appetite now. He had been spoon-feeding her dinner before TT. His eyes started watering a bit while he talked and he said that this experience with his mother is bringing back memories of his twin sister’s death 30 years ago. I let him talk and he continued for about 10 minutes. I put my hand gently on his and validated his feelings. He didn’t pull his hand away, but he didn’t take my hand either. ……This exchange was VERY significant because I have only seen H/XH cry two other times in the last 7 ½ years that I’ve known him. The first was when he gave me the news that my mother had passed away, and the second was as he was leaving “our” house one afternoon after we worked on the terms of our D settlement. That day I had lost my composure and screamed at him “You didn’t even try! You didn’t even try (to work on our M)!”……………So XH allowing himself to cry in front of me was an intimate moment……………A few minutes later XH looked at his watch (it was almost 10pm), looked surprised at what time it was, and said “I’ve got to go”.
I drove behind XH’s car to his house to drop off the step ladder. We stood inside his garage and chatted a bit (it was cold). He told me that he doesn’t really want his sister to come visit him (she comes from another state) because it just makes more work for him. He thinks she just comes to take a mini-vacation and said that X-SIL visits so that she can have lunches and dinners with their family friends, including XH’s first W (that was news to me -------- didn’t know X-SIL was visiting the 1st XW (last I heard she was M’ed) so frequently). XH said that he had told his sister what time he was expecting her to return from our lunch (referring to XH's tantrum 1 1/2 weeks ago) and that was why he was so irritated with her (so you were right Mila! Sibling rivalry at work.). XH said that his sister said she’d forgotten what time she was supposed to be back at his house. I’m guessing she “accidentally on purpose” forgot because she wasn’t looking forward to going to their mother’s place and maybe because I was sharing info about what happened between her brother and me that I had never shared before. I told XH very gently, “This is the second time something like this has happened. Why don’t you just tell me what time I should have her back next time? I’ll get her there on time.”……….It was interesting that XH felt the need to bring up his tantrum. Maybe he felt the need to offer an explanation for his bad behavior?
It was cold, so we hugged and said good night. I'm thinking that I should visit X-MIL sometime this weekend to try to get her to eat something.
Thanks for hanging in if you've made it this far. As always, I appreciate being able to journal these things. It helps me put the pieces together.
