Mercury Retrograde

So this is shaping up to be another delightful week. It's revoltingly hot and humid here in southern New England. The carpet in my apartment is sticky and stinks from the cat who belonged to the prior tenant. My toilet is still broken. The maintenance guy came today, looked at it, said "yep, the seal's broken. I'll get another one and some bolts and come back...how's early next week sound?" This even though I said "the seal is broken" when I called. But what do I know, I'm just a girl, right?

I came in to work today, and as I was entering the building, the fire alarm started. So instead of a frosty blast of welcoming a.c. that I had been dearly looking forward to, I sat outside in the heat with too many bodies around me. One of the office staffers told me mercury is going retrograde. Not keeping up on the astrology these days, but hey, with all the broken things around me (technological as well as personal) I could have guessed as much.

Speaking of broken things - T and I are officially broken up. I think he doesn't entirely realize this yet, but that is only because he is busy finishing his dissertation draft and won't wake up and smell the coffee until he has reached something of a stopping point. I could go out of my way to make it abundantly clear to him right now, but his obstinate ignorance and blindness seem to be protective mechanisms that he apparently needs. I don't know what is coming on that front, how the "talk" we will have when he's done with his draft will go, but I do know that our romantic relationship is over. Once he can be engaged enough to face it with understanding or even possibly relief, then I guess it's his turn in the tea room. He has spent most of his time and energy avoiding that place. While it is not always comfortable, it is necessary to be there sometimes. Otherwise, the challenges that life throws at us are simply miserable rough spots that do nothing except bring us down. If we are able to use them to gain insights into our attitudes about and relationships with people and aspects of our lives, then these times are not all and only bad.

I can't imagine opting for the all bad choice myself. Then it's just pointless sorrow, anger, insecurity, hardship, and pain that I am enduring. I've had a bit too much of that starting at a rather young age. (This is not a sympathy kick here, only background.) If I only ever looked at these periods as horrible, I think I'd have given up long ago. I do realize from my own and others' experiences that there are times when we can't reflect on the misery that the hard parts of life create because we're right in the thick of it and must plow on to survive. But those times are the genuinely horrible periods brought on by things like coming to terms with a chronic life-sucking illness, the death of a dearly loved one, disaster, and other truly catastrophic upheavals. Late 20s growing pains - dealing with the parental conflicts an adult identity uncovers, the personal shortcomings that are suddenly and undeniably illuminated, this is not one of those truly horrible events that gets in the way of living life. It's just life.

He had a solid and affectionate relationship with a very competent woman (me) to help him through the late 20s growing pains and other shit life's thrown his way. He had a family that at least has money and who don't all drive him nuts, and most importantly, he had friends. Through his hiding under the covers reactions to the growing up challenges that have come along in the last few years, he has jeopardized some of these things. I am one of them. All I needed was to know that we were in this together, not that I was going to be pushed into some quasi-parental role or pushed aside so he could stay firmy under his blanket.

It is pretty sad. I hope he's ok in the tea room, but I can't grow up for him and I refuse to enable what is essentially continued immaturity at the expense of my personal and professional development, my self respect, and my heart.