30 June 2002: A Plague of Exes

A plague of exes was visited upon me this weekend. When I went out dancing with Wolf Gal last night, Tutu was there. First time I’d seen her since the day of our very amicable breakup, which was only about three months ago but feels like at least six. She came up and hugged me and we both said that it was really good to see each other, and we both meant it, because we’re like that. Then we went off and did our own separate dancey types of things in different parts of the room, and didn’t interact again. But she mentioned that she was planning to come to Contact Improv class again soon, so I guess I’ll see her there and dance with her, assuming that I actually follow through on my plan to go to Contact Improv class again soon.

Then, as I mentioned in the previous entry, Moonspice showed up at Aleph’s late that night, with Titan and Opsimath. It’s always nice seeing Moonspice. She’s one of my two favorite ex-wives. One of my favorite things about being married to her was the quality of conversation. Just our casual conversation had such an enjoyable flow to it. Whenever I see her, it’s still there. When we met to fill out the divorce paperwork, we chatted for a couple of hours; at the end, we agreed that it had been so nice that we really ought to divorce one another again sometime soon.

My marriage to Moonspice was a turning point in my relationship to romance, because of what it did for my confidence. Moonspice is a woman of such a high caliber that after being married to her, I will never again regard any woman as being out of my league. Before Moonspice, I thought I was unbelievably lucky every time I landed a girlfriend or even a date. Since our divorce, though, I’ve only been single when I wanted to be single.

Now I enjoy watching the effect she’s having on Titan. Titan is a great guy. No. Titan is a Great Guy. Capital letters for him. A Mensch. Titan is a Mensch. He’s also the sort of sweet-natured geek who’s got no confidence with women at all. And he’s recently been through a Genuinely Horrible Marriage to a Genuinely Horrible Person. He deserves so much better... and now he’s got it. I catch him looking at her sometimes with a look that says, "My God, I can’t believe I’m with someone this great." Believe it, friend. You’re with someone that great. And you’re entirely worthy of her, in my opinion.

This morning, after about three hours of sleep, I strolled back over to Aleph’s house to meet up with Aleph, Geminica, and Lexicat for dim sum, and there was yet another ex there. This was not as warm an encounter, because it was Broken Wind, the only ex with whom I’m not on at least amicable terms. (Argus once showed me an email she wrote him, soon after I broke off contact with her, in which she theorized that I was constitutionally incapable of being friends with a former lover. I guess my two ex-wives, and every one of my other ex-lovers, are all Isolated Freakish Anomalies.) About a year-and-a-half ago, after recognizing that everything that went down between us was just karma, just part of the dance our souls had arranged with one another to play out for our mutual edification, I emailed Broken Wind a very gracious offer of truce, for the sake of Pack cohesiveness and the feelings of our mutual friends. That was the last interaction I had with her, until this morning. The extent of our interaction this morning was saying hi to one another. She stuck around for another forty-five minutes or so, but we ignored each other (it wasn’t a hostile or uncomfortable kind of ignoring, or at least it didn’t seem that way to me – we just both chose not to initiate any further interaction).

My initial decision to start an online journal came over a year-and-a-half ago, when I still bore Broken Wind a good bit of ill-will for the damage done to my life and friendships by the petty melodramas she’d been staging. My original plan, back then, was that the journal would be a place where I could tell the truth behind her web of delusions, lies, and slanders. But by the time I actually got the journal up and running, I’d reached my own peace with the situation, and, after talking the matter over with Geminica, reached enough understanding of the nature of Broken Wind’s personal damage that my ill-will was replaced by compassion. To understand is to forgive, as they say. And in the end I never talked about her in my journal, and soon stopped mentioning her at all... at first for the sake of Pack cohesion and the feelings of our mutual friends, and eventually because, well, life goes on, and I didn’t really have any reason to think about her anymore. So it’s mighty strange to be writing about her now.

Eventually Broken Wind left to go to work, and shortly thereafter, Aleph, Geminica, Lexicat, and I went and ate delicious vegan dim sum. Then I went and taught my Sunday aikido class.

After aikido, I hung out for a bit with Aleph, Geminica, Lexicat, and Da Rong Jo. I love those people. Geminica and I went back to Aleph’s house and talked of many things, but mostly of relationships. Encountering Tutu, Moonspice, and Broken Wind in such rapid succession (plus talking with Aleph about relationships the day before) had got me thinking about that sort of thing, and where I stand on it, and Geminica’s got her own relationship drama going on right now, which you can read about in her journal. You can also probably read about the actual content of my conversation with her in her journal soon, since, much to our mutual amusement, she took notes on Aleph’s computer as we talked, to make sure she remembered certain points for later journalization.

Later, Geminica and I visited Taarna and Galahad, so that Geminica could meet Grace, who wasn’t born yet last time Geminica was here. As I watched, Grace taught herself, for the first time, how to grab an object and place it in her mouth. The object in question was my finger. At first, she got the grab-then-bring-hand-to-mouth sequence down, but kept ending up with her own fingers in her mouth instead of mine. Then she figured out that if she grabbed further down my finger, instead of at the tip, she could retain hold of the finger and put the tip in her mouth. Then she experimented for a while, grabbing the finger in different ways to expose more or less of the tip. Then she tried it with the other hand. This whole process was highly systematic, and her skill visibly improved with each attempt. It absorbed her complete attention for about fifteen minutes.