Tagged: breakups
Don’t Look At Me, She Started It
And now another challenge to myself.
With one singular purpose in mind I created a second blog. You can view it here: petewooscammie.wordpress.com
I am not going to mention it here ever again (unless to announce wedding bells), but today, and today only, I’m posting writing from that blog. The About page comes first. Then my first post. If you enjoy what you read, please help a fella out and like and follow that blog too. While I’m making requests, ladies, if you could add comments that include the idea that you wish it was you receiving the attention, and gents, if you could likewise promote the general mood that Cammie would be silly to pass me by, I’ll owe you one big time. Thanks. You’re the best.
ABOUT
Cammie wants to meet a man and live happily ever after. To do this, Cammie is dating men in Denver. Besides many, many, many free dinners Cammie has not had much luck. Read about her experiences on her blog:
Pete heard about Cammie’s plight on a radio show that featured her heavily read, though young, blog. Pete has his own blog, Captain’s Log, and decided to see if he has what it takes to capture Cammie’s attention.
Unlike other suitors, he has two conditions. First, split the tabs and second, no matter what, no making out.
Her response: “Pete, I haven’t paid for a dinner in months, you’d have to be pretty special for me to start now!”
Believing that he is pretty special and hoping that she proves worth the effort and wait, Pete has decided to woo Cammie.
WOO:
verb (used with object)
1. to seek the favor, affection, or love of, especially with a view to marriage.
2. to seek to win
IT STARTS
Me: How do I get on the list? I’ve only ever met maybe two women worth competing for. You think you’re that high of quality? I like that. And I write too. Check out Captain’s Log. Might be good material for both of us. Oh, conditions include splitting the tab, and no matter what, no making out.
My Queen: Pete, I haven’t paid for a dinner in months, you’d have to be pretty special for me to start now!
Me: I wouldn’t let a woman pay for our first date no matter who she was. The thing about free is that you don’t know what you really paid until it’s gone. Most of the time free takes a portion of your soul, at least that’s been my experience. Your posted experiences seem to concur.
A quick survey of my brother and brother-in-law resulted in an opinion that you wouldn’t be worth the time it would take to pursue you. But they haven’t heard your voice.
WordPress Stats indicate that you likely clicked on my blog today and despite this, still replied. (Google+ referrer.) Were you bored or curious? You’ll find every reason to not encourage my pursuit if you read much of it, but this post will tip the scales one way or another for sure: On Breeding.
The Object of My Desire: Pete, do you have any idea what I look like or just hopeful? Also, I enjoyed your writing. Good stuff. But why did your family suggest I wouldn’t be worth the chase?
Me: Can we agree to only be honest on here? I’ll lead the way. On the radio you described yourself as tall and blonde, and you made it seem like a burden. So, while on the whole I prefer brunettes, I didn’t quite imagine you being repulsive. Plus, you have written that you’re going on four dates a week. That’s generally not a feat homely women pull off in the world of online dating, no matter how reasonable their cleavage makes them sound. Then, there’s you using your real name (why?) and a blonde woman working in Denver possessing a LinkedIn profile with the same name. However, I would like to add that I recently watched Beauty and the Beast for the billionth time. And it occurred to me that peers of ours would have to be pretty effing dense to not be aware of the “…warned him not to be deceived by appearances, for beauty is found within” concept. I, for one, breathe the concept. The point is hair can be dyed.
I wonder if you know how rewarding you complimenting my writing will be for you.
Why you wouldn’t be worth the chase? Two things. First, every vibe that your massive and complicated dating life sends out includes a resonance to “high maintenance.” Second, I think they were thinking about me being a divorced dad and because of, not despite, their high opinions of me and hopes that I find a good woman, I imagine they were nervous about you eventually hurting me.
In any case, I’m a big boy. And everyone knows that winners don’t focus on the bad things that might happen. They focus on Cammie. At least I do.
My Online Dating Profile
Sometimes I like to dare myself. Recently my hopes of actually finding a like-minded soul online were dashed again. Shortly thereafter it seemed fun and yet inconceivable to share something as intimate as how I sold myself. I could preamble this for forever but will stop here. You will never know how much pleasure writing this and imagining womens’ reactions to it brought me.
ABOUT PETE
Can you handle truth? Here goes. I am a divorced father who works a goofy two-weeks on/off schedule on an oil rig. Before that, I was an Air Force pilot. I usually have my daughter when I’m home, but her mom gets her for a few nights. I’m looking for a pump and dump. Well, at least the pump part. The dump part is up to you.
What are you looking for? Are you looking for spontaneous? Are you looking to laugh? Are you hoping to find a guy who isn’t interested in breaking your heart? Perhaps you’d like to finally meet a guy who makes you feel special? That’s me. Promise!
Ladies: No matter how nice you think I am or if I ask you the most interesting question you’ve ever been asked on here, please don’t message me if you’re not interested in meeting in person. A pen pal has no appeal to me. A woman, though, a real woman? Now that is the most appealing thing I can imagine. If you read at all, to give you a flavor of what she looks like read this post I wrote: A Jaw Dropping Woman.
Also, you should know that people probably don’t use the word “kind” to describe me. That’s good, because I’ve never even wanted to be kind. Instead, I’ve always aimed for things like a huge heart, a great sense of humor, edgyness–sometimes crossing the line–and pretty sharp. Other things that I wouldn’t think to say out loud (but am learning I need to) include great father, hard worker, and uncommon integrity. Though it seems most people can’t even discern those qualities’ value until it’s too late.
As a final note, if you have “finally ready to settle down” on your profile…well, I think Danny Kaye in White Christmas says it best, “My dear partner, when what’s left of you gets around to what’s left to be gotten, what’s left to be gotten won’t be worth getting whatever it is you’ve got left.” The point is “finally ready” sounds depressing as shyat to me. A “thanks for giving everyone else in your life the good stuff. I guess I just get leftovers.” No thank you.
Lastly, I’m not fat; I went to college after high-school and graduated in four years, and I am not all tatted up. Couples look like each other. Have you ever noticed that? Then again, I don’t put stock in checking boxes, so maybe you think you have what it takes and have sleeves. I doubt it, but would love to be wrong here.
FIRST DATE
I pick up the tabs, you put out.
(I’m laughing so hard. If you’re not, allow me to welcome you to earth.)
The end.
Sleepless
“So how’s working nights these last three months been going?” George asked.
“It’s okay. The night shift is slightly less stressful and as you know I worked nights nearly my entire time in the Air Force,” Pete answered.
“That’s right. So no big thing? No problems sleeping?”
“Nope, no problems sleeping,” Pete said. “Well, that’s not entirely true. Sometimes, if I discover something undesirable is happening that is out of my control right before bed then I lie awake thinking about how to regain control. And then I just watch the clock. That’s no fun.”
“Like what?”
“The home loan thing did it to me last time. I have no idea why I answered the phone, but I did and it proceeded to limit my sleep to about three hours out of eight that afternoon. Want to know what I thought about most of that time?”
“Sure. What?” George asked.
“Her.”
“Of course you thought about her. H- is your daughter and you miss her. Everyone knows that. That’s nothing to be worried about,” George conceded.
“Not her. Well, of course her, but her. H-‘s mother.”
“Oh.”
“Yep. It seemed as rational and logical as anything as I laid there. I was trying to solve the problem of not seeing H- as much as I think I should. And then it hit me. If we re-married, then I’d be able to see H- all the time. And you know that I hate that she has another male adult figure in her life besides me. So I started developing this whole scenario of what life would be like if I approached her mom and tried to make an argument for trying again. She’d have to lose the dogs of course. And quit her job. And do what I say. But man, it could be perfect.”
“Jesus Pete.”
“I know!” Pete retorted. “I know. That’s what I’m saying George. It was eight acres all over again.”
“Eight acres?”
“Yeah. You remember? The book I’m writing. It’s about how some of us seem to be fine living with unpleasantness in the present by simply imagining and dreaming about some ideal future that is only a few strokes of luck away.”
“Oh, yeah. I remember. You didn’t mention this to her while you were gone did you?”
“Of course I did. Ha. It’s a lot of alone time George.”
“Oh shit. What’d she say?”
“Not interested.”
“Well, considering her actions during the marriage and the divorce I’d say she just did you a favor Pete. It would’ve never worked. H- would’ve been the worse for it.”
“You’re right. You’re right. Even when I did bring it up, the fantasy had worn off a little and reality set in,” Pete conceded with an expression of sadness that was quickly erased by sincerity. “I just want to see H-.”
“Yep. We all do. Don’t worry so much. You’ll figure it out.”
“I hope so.”
Vulnerable and Mature, A Counterpoint Review of Michael Jackson’s “Dirty Diana”
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I get it. People generally wouldn’t say MJ was a mature man. But then again, no one really knew him, did they? Just like no one knows Sam Smith. So, taking their respective singles as simply stand alone art, I see no reason that the man who built Neverland for real shouldn’t get a fair shake.
Have you ever read the lyrics to the number one single “Dirty Diana”? I feel like I have memories of watching the video from childhood, though I can’t place from when or where. I know I certainly didn’t know what the song was about until about a decade ago. Then I was shocked. Who knew he ever sang about such things?
Contrary to Smith, MJ’s masterpiece lacks introspection or self-reflection. It starts slow, builds, and then reaches a climax all the while admitting a terrific weakness of character. For my money, it is perfect art for the precise reason Tolstoy was leery of music’s power. Tolstoy once wrote, “Music transports me immediately into the condition of soul in which he who wrote the music found himself at that time.”* (Since reading that, I haven’t been able to get that concept out of my head. Good art makes the listener/viewer feel the way the creator felt. Nice. Simple.)
And just like Smith, there is something in MJ’s voice that sounds personal. These are two clearly torn artists. But unlike young Smith, not-quite-as-young Jackson didn’t feign insecurity or doubt about his station in life. He knew the score. And that was in 1988, which was a few years before Smith was born. Point being, when will we ever learn? Jackson didn’t want to do it, but did. Smith did it and now questions his decision. Me? I’m with MJ on this. At twenty-two, Smith is too old to waffle. Ignorance is not bliss. You knew what would happen. Grow up. Everyone has to.
I guess I’m just bothered because I liked the song. And I wasn’t alone in liking it. But then I saw that it wasn’t what I thought. And I don’t like being taken. Argh!
*Tolstoy, Leo. Master and Man ; The Kreutzer Sonata ; Dramas. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1904. Print.
Correction to Friday’s Post
A mellow friend of mine informed me that Sam Smith is gay. The interwebs confirm this is true. So, in my last post about his song, I’ve gone back and edited three words. In the third paragraph, the word “girl” is now “guy” and “her” is now “him”, and then in the fourth paragraph “her” is now “him.”
Please accept my apologies for this error.
Vulnerable or Immature? A Review of Sam Smith’s Hit Single “Stay With Me”
We all know the feeling we get when we find out a singer isn’t black. It’s really quite humorous that we think we can tell people’s skin tone by the sound of their voice. And Sam Smith is the newest artist to shock the masses and sell a few more records along the way. I bet most of you didn’t know that I’m black. Just kidding.
Smith’s new single “Stay With Me” has been hogging air time for at least the last month. It’s catchy. It’s all heart. Men I’ve never heard sing have sung it. And that’s because it’s edgy. A simple three verse song, “Stay With Me” is a request for a groupie to not leave in the morning. I imagine most male listeners claim to identify with the feeling because they think women find Smith’s vulnerability appealing, and yet these guys still get to maintain their man-card because they could only identify with the song because they’ve had one-night stands themselves. If I’m right, everyone is mixed up. Here’s an attempt at order.
First, as a friend of mine’s dad once told him, “Be grateful for the sex you’re getting. It’s more than you deserve.” Second, while the brutal honesty the song portends is no small feat, I can’t help but wonder if it’s a valuable confession. It only works if it’s in response to the idea that guys who have one-night stands are supposed to kick the ol’ belt-notch to the curb at first light. Right? Smith is basically winning his version of a rap battle Eminem-style. Some real-large-type arse-hole picked on Sam for calling the guy back the next day. Instead of defending his action (which would be weak) he goes one further and admits that he never wanted him to leave in the first place (which is a fatal blow in these contests it seems). Good for him. But we can’t let uncommon vulnerability distract us from the truth. His actions which trigger the song demonstrate that he is not a man. He is a boy. And boys shouldn’t be listened to.
Men–real men–do not have one night stands. They don’t. How do I know? The same reason you know. Because it’s the way it is. Smith wonders why he’s so emotional the morning after, and then advises himself to gain self-control. Another good friend of mine would tell Smith he’s emotional because “the inner man isn’t one with the outer man.” You want to stop crying over him, Sam? Too late buddy. You’re crying because you just caused the two of you pain. And pain hurts. The good thing is that the pain wasn’t lethal. You can learn from it. We can learn from it. But learning is defined as a change in behavior caused by experience. A change. And no fellas that doesn’t mean that you learned if you don’t get weepy next time.
In the end, the world could use a whole lot more and a whole lot less Sam Smiths.
The Morning That She Didn’t Put Up A Fight
They had finished bathing the baby. She was asleep in the pack-n-play. The dog’s constant pacing made the temporary apartment feel smaller than it was. Not that it mattered now. The seller had accepted their latest offer on the house, so only a month remained until they closed and would be reunited with their own stuff.
“I care about you,” she began to answer. He couldn’t remember what question he had asked. “But I don’t like you,” she concluded.
She wore the same resigned look he had grown tired of seeing for the past two years. Ever since the stripper.
“I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do with this information,” he said. “Why would I want to live with someone who doesn’t like me? I’m glad you care about me, but to me that’s not as noble as you just made it sound. I’m taking the dog to pee. Is the trash full?”
Without their separate beds he let her have the covers and slept in his sleeping bag. Sleeping bags added a level of fun to any night so he didn’t mind. He was all out of fight himself as well, especially over something as trivial as sheets.
The closing was uneventful. He tried to stay positive about the new job that didn’t pay as much as they hoped. She tried to not stress about shift work on the weekends. With each passing day his walk to the bar seemed shorter; her options, fewer.
She went out with a co-worker after he returned from happy hour with a friend. Waking by himself at two-thirty he figured she was on her way. At three his worry hardened into a decision. He was never going to feel knots like those in his stomach again. Never. Four am will forever sound to him like a door handle, the bathroom fan, and the plop of vomit into toilet water.
After the baby went to sleep the next night they were finally alone. He raged. She sat as he lectured. With each non-response he raised his volume.
The following morning she behaved as if the fight was over. For her, the cycle was complete. For him, the marriage was. Some cycles should never be repeated.
She followed him out of the house for a few steps after he said divorce. He answered the phone thirty minutes later. She told him her parents had two attorneys ready to schedule a consultation.
He now lies to himself that the hurt has decreased since that morning–the morning that she didn’t even put up a fight.
Why $30 Per Day Is Not A Deal
As most of you know I am divorced and don’t see my daughter for half of her life. The same goes for her mom. That can’t be changed. But expectations between her mom and I can be changed.
I bet you’d be surprised to learn that her mom reads these posts. I was. I think she hopes she’ll be able to use them against me someday in some melodramatic legal battle. It’s a great feeling, hammering in your own nails.
Most recently, we were in a mediation which had a moment where the mediator gave a look that was accompanied by a primal utterance that betrayed that he thought that paying her boyfriend’s mom $30 per day to watch H- was a deal in today’s “not my responsibility” childcare market. Here’s why it isn’t a deal.
I took H- camping last week and while we were in the bathroom she volunteered, “I saw a man lick a woman’s face on TV.” H- is four. I think at least a few of you can imagine the expression I nearly successfully held back upon hearing this.
I asked if this was at her mom’s house or “Grammy’s” house (not her grandparent on any level, to be clear). Another parenthetical–(now I know you’re not supposed to play detective as a co-parent, but I’m human.) She answered, “Grammy’s.”
“So you watch TV at Grammy’s house, eh?” I continued.
“Yep.”
“Was it while she was flipping channels?”
Even at her tender age H- has a way of seeing through any attempt of mine to pretend that I’m really not interested in the answer, so she simply resorted to, “Nevermind!”
What the fuck? Television is a poison beyond measure. Does anyone doubt this? And yet a wonderful feature of my choice in ex-wives is that now my child is being raised by it when I’m not around. And I’m supposed to be happy about the financial savings. Whatever happened to the phrase, “There is more to life than money”?
What am I supposed to do? The other option is to track down some fantastical daycare which allows her to attend only half of every month. My experience in this realm is that this is not likely. And daycares that don’t cost a fortune usually are religiously affiliated. Keep in mind that as the father, I’m paying for childcare not for when I’m at work, but for when her mother’s at work. I’m paying other people than her mother to raise her. So my options are face licking or bible stories. At this point I think I’d take bible stories, but I have a difficult time understanding why a television is ever on. I know I’m not alone on this. I spoke with a stay-at-home dad (still married) a while ago, and he said he was at some function where they were discussing how many hours of television they let their kids watch a week. He said, “An hour.”
The others said, “Wow. An hour a day. That’s great.”
And he said, “No, an hour a week. Maybe.”
They said, “How do you fill the time?”
He said, “How do you have the time?”
How do you have the time to watch television with a kid? Why would you put a kid in front of the “boob tube?” Or the “brain drain?” I know why. You do it because you’re lazy. You do it because you rush to help people that behave in a way that seems like they need help when they are really just lazy. I’ve said it so many times I’m sick of hearing myself say it, but I’ll say it again. I grew up thinking the opposite of love was hate. Then I heard the notion that the opposite of love is not hate, but selfishness–and I preached that. These days, however, I’m with M. Scott Peck who wrote that the opposite of love is laziness.
Do you love your child? What’s it like finding out that she’ll admit these things to me?
It should be Miss P-, by the way. P- is not her grandmother. Words have meanings. Why your mom doesn’t care is beyond me.
Anna vs. Emma, A Joint Review of Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy and Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
Nothing motivates me to write better more than sentences like these.
“As if tears were the necessary lubricant without which the machine of mutual communication could not work successfully, the two sisters, after these tears, started talking, not about what preoccupied them, but about unrelated things, and yet they understood each other (Tolstoy 125).”
“It showed him the eternal error people make in imagining that happiness is the realization of desires (Tolstoy 465).”
“In order to undertake anything in family life, it is necessary that there be either complete discord between the spouses or loving harmony. But when the relations between spouses are uncertain and there is neither the one nor the other, nothing can be undertaken. Many families stay for years in the same old places, hateful to both spouses, only because there is neither full discord nor harmony (Tolstoy 739).”
“As it was almost empty she bent back to drink, her head thrown back, her lips pouting, her neck on the strain. She laughed at getting none of it, while with the tip of her tongue passing between her small teeth she licked drop by drop the bottom of the glass (Flaubert 24).”
“And he at once took down from the shelf Emma’s boots, all coated with mud, the mud of the rendezvous, that crumbled into powder beneath his fingers, and that he watched as it gently rose in a ray of sunlight (Flaubert 174).”
“Emma was like all his mistresses; and the charm of novelty, gradually falling away like a garment, laid bare the eternal monotony of passion, that has always the same forms and the same language (Flaubert 177).”
“We don’t speak on the first floor as on the fourth; and the wealthy woman seems to have, about her, to guard her virtue, all her bank-notes, like a cuirass, in the lining of her corset (Flaubert 215).”
“They knew one another too well for any of those surprises of possession that increase its joys a hundred-fold. She was as sick of him as he was weary of her. Emma found again in adultery all the platitudes of marriage (Flaubert 268).”
So here’s the scoop. Anna and Emma commit adultery. And when they discover this act didn’t end their unhappiness, they kill themselves. These novels are often classified under “realism”, which seeks to be just what you’d expect–realistic. (This, of course, comes in response to the unrealistic stories which rued the day up until writers like Tolstoy and Flaubert (can’t not mention Twain) couldn’t stomach any more of it.) And right up until the ending, I can’t find novels which more accurately describe the human scene. But the suicides struck me as unrealistic. Was I being too literal?
Maybe the suicide is a metaphor? Maybe women who commit adultery long to commit suicide, but lack the courage to do it? Is that what these guys were arguing?
Or are the stories warnings to women? Are they a kind of “cheat on me and you’ll probably want to kill yourself” thing? They are written by men after all.
Or maybe there is something more going on?
Always returning to Tolstoy’s wisdom, I’ve decided that these books’ adultery-leads-to-suicide motif is a warning to everyone. Tolstoy, especially, tips his hand in the quote about about happiness not being the realization of desires. That these books sit on so many shelves across the planet proves we recognize the truth they contain, whether we can verbalize it or not.
If Tolstoy and Flaubert were alive today they might have chosen to write about men ignoring their family in favor of email, or mothers working while strangers raise their children so that they can live in a house that would make the Jones’s proud. Or maybe they’d write about women who wear make-up and men who have hair plugs. But then, I wouldn’t believe men and women would kill themselves after finding their cosmetic choices didn’t bring them happiness. But a spouse watching his or her selfish action destroy a family? Yep, I could see how that might make someone want out of this life. And since it is Tolstoy’s Anna who chooses her lover even when her husband is ready to reunite with her, Anna Karenina wins the better lesson presentation battle. The lesson being happiness is. No fill in the blank, no requisite. Happiness just is.
****
Flaubert, Gustave, Chris Kraus, and Eleanor Marx Aveling. Madame Bovary. New York: Barnes & Noble Classics, 2005. Print.
Tolstoy, Leo. Anna Karenina. Toronto: Penguin, 2000. Print.
Hoping She Was Asleep
A pair of pink sandals, a pink stuffed penguin named Pingu, and a pink, doll-sized tutu (which H- had used on her polka-dotted stuffed puppy as a bathing suit all day) made it clear that the two men were not alone in the house. This particular Friday night’s late hour ensured the girl-child was deep asleep in her room. It also ensured that any interested onlookers, the likes of which James Fenimore Cooper’s noble Chingachgook would label “blackguards in the grain”, would not be surprised to see George and Pete staring at two respective laptop screens as they intermittently stated their latest life observations. Those screens, naturally, were filled with images of women supposedly interested in dating. Well, at least George was viewing a proper dating site. Pete found himself fighting the good fight, that is, deciding how inappropriate it would be if he friend-ed a woman on LinkedIn because she was a smoke-show.
“Pete, just do it. It’s not a crime,” said George.
“I know that it’s not a crime,” Pete said with a touch of exasperation, “I just think that it’d be tasteless. Plus, this chick has 500+ connections. Apparently it stops counting at 500. I can already tell that there’s no promise there.”
“What does the number of her connections have to do with anything?”
“Look, I really want to believe Rudi’s advice and just try to find a woman with whom I enjoy spending time. But I’m just saying let’s look at reality for a second. She is gorgeous, posts videos on youtube of her singing with her sister, and has over 500 connections on LinkedIn. Whereas I don’t really like people, am pretty sure that I don’t even know 500 people, and I certainly don’t want to be dragged to events where everyone spends all their energy pretending that they’re not pretending, blah, blah, blah,” he said, running out of air. “Plus, it appears that she enjoys her job. And that means she’s not interested in kids, raising a family, etc.”
“Fine. You’re right,” George conceded facetiously, “don’t click connect.”
“You know what guys in the Air Force used to say?” Pete asked, his tone somewhere between frustrated and bitter. “Poverty is the greatest aphrodisiac.”
Opening his eyes wide, as was often the case when he liked what he heard, George nodded and said, “I’ve been trying to find a poor woman for forever. Or at least one who grew up without much. That type of woman would know how to budget, not be comfortable spending a lot of money, be happy just to have a steak every once in a while-”
Laughing, Pete asked, “Ha. You’re serious? I thought you were joking at first when you agreed.”
“-I’m totally serious. Especially since reading Anna Karenina and all those scenes of the simple life of farming.”
“I told you man. That’s what Tolstoy did at the end of his life. He practically gave up his nobility to work out in the fields,” Pete added, “and he had 13 kids.” He then paused just long enough to form a point. “The trouble is, I have no idea where or how to even start to look for a woman like that.”
“All I know is that a big step in problem solving is voicing the problem.”
“My mom asked if I’ve ever considered a deaf woman.”
Captain’s Log 