How is it that some people will choose to be loved out of duty and humanity? And isn’t it a paradox when they cry because they don’t wish to be loved like so, because it’s painful not to be greatly desired by the object of your affections. I suppose some concern is better then none; I don’t think I could understand it. I live in love, and I live comfortably. I’ve never known any hardship, and I’ve never been alone. There has been no vast loss that has struck me all my life and I certainly do not wish to find out what my reaction would be like. But it is true that circumstances do not really matter in the long run. You know it as well as I do that what really matters is the intrinsic quality of a person’s character. If a person has a personality with a drive for life, then whatever the circumstances are, in a matter of months (and it’s been studied; at the most, 6) , that drive will come back, regardless of whatever misfortune had befallen the individual.
If women ‘know these things’ and therefore Liz knows your concern for her is out of consideration, and as you have said, you find no pleasure in it because it’s very hard work (and I believe it’s also problematic when you cannot love whoever else you wish to, freely. I live with my parents, I know what being beholden to someone else on a near daily basis feels like, and for me, it’s annoying. Not suffocating, because they know me and have accepted me for what I am. L knows you, I’m sure… but if you have to hide all your other affairs so stringently as how you are hiding me, then she mustn’t have come to accept it then). Oh no doubt, I believe in hiding all affairs from a significant other, simply because people like to believe other people have been faithful, even if they know otherwise. I do, anyway. And at least when something illicit is hidden, you can still behave as if she were the only one, even though there is some other one. Even if you half acting the affection, it doesn’t matter, because sometimes, if you act it enough, then maybe it’ll start to grow on you and you’ll love her anyway. Which I think you probably do. I don’t know, I would if I were you, just because I’ve gotten used to it. But then again, as you are always implying, women are so terribly creatures of habit. When they finding a relationship in someone, they’d keep on coming back (but I think men are the same).
I cannot understand though, if you’re not passionate for her, then how can she dare to live in this insane fantasy where she delights in an illusion of love? How can she know that she’s deluded, yet be torn apart when the day-dream is over? But then you can tell me that as long as this illusion of hers is real enough for her, then it’s as good as real to her, even though everyone else looking in will say that it isn’t.
Your relationships all sound straight out of some sort of epic romance, with so many, many women and over such long periods of time. Very époque! *laughs* ‘long’ here is of course clearly relative to how long I have lived, but since you are so often saying you are old, you must believe it has been a pretty long time too!
Oh well, I’m not writing all of this because I’m jealous of Liz, although being the self-righteous bitch that I can be sometimes, there is some resentment that she should have such power over your actions. But you are too wonderful, and too sweet. Being cruel, I’d sponsor her final year and leave it at that. It’s brutal, but it’s honest, and it wouldn’t infringe on the way you wish to live. But, I believe cheating on significant others holds some sort of pleasure. The way you do it… I swear, there’s a significant measure of artistry involved in it. If you keep doing it throughout your life, then you must like some part of it. Of course if you got married, then the stakes would be so much higher, and cheating on a spouse would be tragic, as opposed to romantic, as cheating on a significant other is. (But marriage is so flippant these days I don’t think there is any vast difference in the two any longer). I’d like to say we’re both very epicurean, but I wouldn’t dare to make presumptions, although I know I’ve made so many already by this point, and am certainly not liking myself for it.
There’s resentment also in me that she should infringe upon my desire for your time. I’m a very self-centered and self-loving person. You’ve always known this, I’m sure. After all, there’s only one person I love in this whole world, and that is me. Yeah, I told you this while sitting naked at your feet, looking at the curves on my body and thinking ‘god-damn I am hot’. And I think everyone’s like that, everyone’s full of themselves, but consideration is possible for the human race because it makes us feel good when we do something good for someone else. As I’ve said, I’m glad I’m hot, and I’m glad I have you to delight in it with me. (And therefore I’ve always presumed you found some sort of pleasure by helping and trying to love Liz. Give and you will receive, indeed, darling).
I’m just a little sad that I cannot spend the time with you, when and how I wish it. That I cannot just come by whenever, and that you chastise me when I’m already being as accepting of the whole situation as I am.
It almost feels as if you are taking advantage of me, which is why I questioned you about taking me home the first time we met the second time round. If you were afraid of L’s relationship with the manager of your apartments, then why would you even dare let them see us together. How about the first time we met, and I suggested taking a dip with you in the pool, to which you didn’t claim to see a problem with, would he/they not have seen us together and would that not have been unwelcomed? But since you hadn’t caught me then, since it was still fresh, and my company was not completely guaranteed –not that it is now, and neither is yours to me guaranteed; but I do not care for security of such anyway. I know how seeing a person for sometime can put an individual into that sort of pseudo comfort that they’ll be around forever (the sense of security more often springs from habit then from conviction, eh –George Elliot ;) But since you’d not known me then, you’d not know what I could tolerate and what I would not… And now that you know I’m generally very accepting of the whole situation. God damn you, I do feel like my malleability is being taken advantage of. But I am just now consoling myself all that paranoia is simply the result of the reason that L is coming down in a day. But don’t for a second think I think you’re a dick, I doubt you’d tolerate such a perception of yourself anyway. I’ve my feelings too, and this is just what they are, regardless of whether they are based on accurate perceptions or not.
I don’t resent the fact that you consider her more then you consider me (because I’m not a fool and I can see that she clearly needs it more, even though I honestly can’t say if she, or I, or another woman perhaps, would be more deserving of it). What I do resent is how that consideration imposes itself on the way in which I want to have this relationship. I wish that you could be free to do whatever you will, with me, and with some other girls –with me too, or without, it does not matter- I resent how my pleasure is being marginalized, despite the fact that you would rather it not (I wouldn’t, if I were you anyway) because you must consider L’s feelings. You must, I know that of course you do have to consider her heart. But the irony is annoying. You would like it, I would definitely like it, But…!
Ah, it doesn’t matter. Anyway, I’m bored in Sarawakian surburbia, I had the urge to write, and hence. I know this letter’s really full of myself, so please forgive me if some of it has made you upset. It was no intent of mine, I really wanted you to know how I felt (when sober). It’s all very stupid, and I almost have this feeling that you’d tell me to fuck off already if I didn’t like how things are. But the truth is, I do like how things aren’t so simple, and I do like being bossed around, and chastised, and maybe even taken advantage of.
I can stand all of that, find pleasure in it, feel that stupid sense of nobility that comes from my own damn delight in my own damned acceptance of everything as long as I continue to feel you think I’m more incredible then her. Maybe I’m not jealous after all because if she’d known it all when it was over, she’d be the one jealous of me. Because I think you like me for what I am intrinsically, while you love her out of duty, consideration, and that she deserves better then the hand life has given her.
I’m very selfish inside I think, and quite brutal. But I’m like that to myself too. I love living in disillusions, but I’ve no problem knowing that they are just that, and no problem coming to terms with things, if I have to.
I told you dear Martine, I’m really full of myself. Please don’t be angry, because I really am still yours (regardless of whether because it gives me pleasure to be so), and yours, for as long as you want it and as long as I keep wanting to be. So conditional, but so what.
*kiss* I’ll see you when you’re back. I’m returning on the 28th it would seem, and the weather here is terrible. But nothing compared to the pollution in Shanghai.
Sincerely Yours.
xoxox
No comments:
Post a Comment