Well, I'm on the road again. P will be gone when I return.
It's definitely easier to focus on me when she's not around. I mean, it's easier to be zen about her being away on a silent meditation retreat when she's actually away. When she's in the same house with me and acting like she's on a silent meditation retreat (okay, bit of an exaggeration) it's another matter.
On the one hand, here are great opportunities to observe our interactions, our habits, make changes, etc. On the other hand, what I'm NOT getting speaks so loudly that I have a hard time getting past "ouch, this hurts" and thinking more constructive, analytical thoughts.
We were working together on a house project. That's often a source of stress as we have different approaches, working styles, philosophies. We each made some changes in order to try to avoid getting into really frustrated spots.
My change was to slow down and put more effort into listening to P's ideas along the way. I made a major change of plans based on her input. P's changes were to a) tell herself that it's my house and my project and she doesn't have to agree with how I decide to proceed and b) instead of standing around and watching me do something and being bored and frustrated she would go read her book. She was particularly proud of the latter solution. I found it to be inefficient and immature (as she would silently wander off rather than either taking initiative or asking me what was next or asking if I needed help with the piece I was working on).
Sadly, my response wasn't much better. I was pretty angry by the third time she wandered off. I couldn't really concentrate on my calculations and I just wanted to wander off myself for a bike ride. I thought that would be too rude, so I asked if P wanted to go for a bike ride. No, she looks up from her book to say she wants to work on the project(?), and besides I probably want to go for the type of ride that would hurt her injured knee (WTF?). She figured she'd go for a ride by herself (on the trail that we'd been looking at together over the past few days) when I was unavailable (working for a few hours). Ouch.
All standard stuff, but I'd lost perspective. I expressed my frustrations and we did get some good work done. The next morning, I suggested bringing my bike along, too, as there was a possibility that my work gig would be really short. That was met with an emphatic, "I don't want to wait around!" More ouch. So, we pulled out without the bike, but I had to tell her how hurt I was and she denied anything but lack of imagination in seeing any possibilities for how a bike ride might happen. Then she miraculously thought of a possibility and insisted we get the bike.
Later in the day I was thinking more clearly and kicking myself for all the emotional drama. With a little processing time, I'm seeing how I was getting stuck in the painful parts that are completely predictable. I also was listening to Pia again. She talks about the pursuing partner being so uncomfortable with lack of feedback and "bombing" the distancing partner to get some connection (positive intensity is great, but negative intensity will do). Ugh. That's exactly what I did. I was so uncomfortable that I had to try to fix it. Couldn't just shut up and let it be.
I'm hoping that this awareness of the specifics for me will help me prepare and do better next time. May not be until September. P initially talked about coming back one week a month, but she's taking a part time job that will tie her up all summer. It's not for the money, it's to have an "anchor in her day" at her new location.
Overall, this visit felt much cooler than the last. I don't know if it was entirely P or if it was partly that I was hanging back and being careful to let P take the lead in any affection. It may be that she was doing the same thing.
