Day 3-- I will be the pitiless censor of my own mixed intentions

I ran a quarter marathon today. Lifted some fog from my mind.

With clarity comes both forgiveness and treachery.

By 5 km I had convinced myself to call Patte. By 10km I had decided to call him today. Today. Right now.

I wanted to apologize, because I didn't consult him about the decision to go no contact, and he hasn't done anything wrong to me besides be confused.

I wish now I had talked to him more before I came to this. But I didn't. And I'm sitting here now realizing how much I love him, and that if I love him, I should let him go. It hurts me to see the sad and angry songs he's posting on Spotify. I've given up telling myself not to look.

I can't call him. I have nothing to offer. I know he's hurting. I know he's lonely. I know he misses me. The only way I can reach out is musically. I've put together a list of loving but firm goodbye songs. I can't do any more than that. If he finds it, he does. But if I love him, if I really love him, I'll leave him strictly alone.

During the early days of my divorce, he listened patiently to hours of ranting when I had nothing to say. I don't even remember what I said.

He flew in for my birthday. He has hairy earlobes. He looks into the distance when he things, his eyes moving  back and forth to his thoughts. He's rude to his boss and kind to the receptionist. I've never seen him be anything but lovely to anyone with less power than he has. He puts his arm around me when I ask. He lets me spoon with him at night even though he prefers his own cover. He always looks at me like a dog looks at a starving bone. Once, I passed him in the office, and he turned on a dime because I said his name. He does everything too much. He loved me without reserve. He knew how much I needed to hear he loved me and kept telling me even though he hated saying it.

I'd been making him increasingly miserable because he couldn't reconcile my need for a real relationship with his marriage. He loves me. But I'm not the one.

He's married. His wife's the one. And she should be. And if I pretend to love this man at all, then I will not contact him. I will not.

Day 2-- Some kinds of backsliding are not as obvious as a pie in the face.

I cut Patte off on Facebook. I cut him off on blackberry messenger. I unsubscribed from all of his spotify lists, except one.

There was one very old list of songs in his original language which he made for me. I didn't unsubscribe from that list.

Last night, for the first time in a long time he added several songs to the list. And made a new list, which had enough of "our" songs for me to conclude the list was for me.

So naturally I drank lots of whiskey and made my own list in the hope he would see it too.

And I went to bed drunk. A drunk middle aged woman posting love songs to a married man is such an attractive thing, isn't it?

I unpublished it this morning, although I'll keep it to remind myself of my own foolishness.

Letter to my stupid self:

Listen, if he really loved you and wanted to be with you, he would not be posting playlists in the middle of the night while his wife sleeps in the other room. If he really loved you and wanted to be with you, he would first try to work things out with his wife while being honest with her about their problems. He would come to you when he was free.

You want to read smoke signals into his music choices. You want to hope he's going to choose you. Isn't that selfish? Isn't that stupid? It was one thing to want that when his wife was resolutely pushing him away. But if she isn't doing that anymore, isn't it better for him, his children, his wife if he can work it out? Leave it the fuck alone.

 Besides, it should be blindingly obvious that even these smoke signals are ambivalent. He's *not* about to choose you. Grow up.

Things to do:

• Look at the picture of them together from Christmas on her Facebook
• Imagine how I'm going to feel when he puts his wedding ring back on, because that gesture will come shortly.
• Rinse/Repeat
• Stop drinking whiskey.

(If I was really clever I would cut off the one remaining playlist. But I'm not ready to do that yet.)