05/30/01 -- Page two of Tracy's craziness...

I wasn't always a COPBS, nope I'm more used to being the object of crazed obsessive stalking myself. In fact, just a few weeks ago this drummer guy named Joe followed me around my sister's apartment complex for days and days and kept asking me out on dates and writing me really crappy songs despite knowing that I already had a husband and a boyfriend. Hmmm — now that I think about it, perhaps I should have only told him about the husband or the boyfriend, not both. Maybe he got the idea I was easy or something.

Oops, there I go veering off subject again. Sorry, had an epiphany there — yeah, I could edit that little detour out, but I figure it's good advice and might come in handy to somebody, someday.

And it does sort of lead us to the object of my crazed obsessive stalking, my boyfriend P. Or, at least I think he's still my boyfriend. It's hard to say right now, because we're on a break. We're not supposed to talk to each other for a week, so I have no idea what he is doing right now or with whom. Or even if he's still alive. I always thought I'd just know if somebody I loved died, but I woke up certain he was dead last week and called him to check and he was very much alive, so perhaps my deathdar doesn't work so well. Boy was that embarrassing — I cried with relief when I heard his voice and everything. P. didn't seem to mind, though; he was very sweet about the whole thing. He did kind of disappoint me by giving me a rational explanation for me waking up all panicky and thinking he was dead — I dunno, I wasn't feeling very much like learning about how my brain works in sleep just then. I was hoping more for an "Oh my god, aren't you just the sweetest thing, worrying about my mortality that way" reaction, but that's just me. He probably gets a little annoyed when he tells me about what happened at work and I ask what everyone was wearing.

I should probably pause to mention here that I'm still technically married and P. is divorced — at least we hope so, there's some confusion over that — and that P. lives in Ireland and I'm in Tennessee right now and we are both under enormous strain for all sorts of reasons like work and money, and frankly, we've become snarly with frustration.

Up until last week we were lovey dovey and being all brave and spunky in a sitcom theme song kind of way about the whole situation. It was beautiful; he was Shirley to my Laverne, I was Balki to his Larry. We stood tall on the wings of our dreams — rain and thunder, wind and haze; we were bound for better days. We were going to make our dreams come true — and what's more we'd do it our way, yes, our way.

Somehow though, things changed and we began to grate on each other's nerves. We'd say the wrong thing and hurt the other's feelings — or be oversensitive and take things the wrong way. The stress was really getting to us, so I called him up and said those fateful words:

"You know, maybe we should just not talk for a week and see how we feel then."

As soon as I heard myself speak, I knew that wasn't what I wanted. I should have taken it back right then, but I was tired and stubborn and had too much pride to say "I didn't really mean that, I was just trying to get your attention so that you would know how miserable I am and maybe we could fix it because all this fighting scares me and if I lost you, the world would stop."

I was hoping maybe he'd understand that anyway, but all he said was "Okay, if that's what you want. Talk to you in a week. Bye." He has an accent you know, which made it all the more poignant.

And instead of saying "Sweetheart, no, that's not what I want, how could I want that?" I said, "okay then, bye." And hung up.

I was brave and optimistic about it, thinking yeah, that was a grown up thing to do. Give each other a little space, take time to work out our own personal problems — this could be good. We would come back to each other refreshed and eager to see things through.

General Foods International Coffee. Ask for it by name.

That lasted about five minutes — then I got this panicky feeling like my heart was falling out and I had to email my friend A. and tell her all about it. I thought perhaps we could discuss this over some International Foods Coffee and nurture each other's spirit or whatever it is that girl friends are supposed to do. So, even though I was panicked, it wasn't that bad; heck, on paper it all sounded great and it would give A. and me a chance to bond and maybe read Maya Angelou poems to each other. It would take our friendship to the next level, somewhere beyond "sisterly" but not quite to the "exploring our sexuality together" stage.

So, while I'm waiting for her to reply (took her ten minutes by the way. TEN! I love A. and all, but sometimes I think she's not as available to me as I'd like) I started feeling more and more panicked and less and less sure of myself, so I went ahead and wrote the entire Tracy emergency support team (including Omar) to let them know that I was suffering and in pain and they should all treat me like an idiot child for the next seven days. God bless them, they were happy to oblige. Could have done without the "And that's different from how we treat you now, how?" comments, but I'm sure they meant it in the nicest way possible.