I recently began a correspondence with a woman profiled in Salon's Personals. We live nowhere near each other, but romance was not the primary impetus for this meeting. I won't go into the details of how it happened, suffice it that it did and it is both a learning and a healing experience for me. I am gaining the benefit of a woman's perspective on men that I have not had in a long time. And hopefully, I am revealing perceptions and causalities of men in the beginnings of a relationship.
Part of the reason it is healing is that I have (IMO) had but a single good relationship in my 20 years of dating and I blew that with emotional impotence. I did not know how to communicate and I lost the most amazing woman I've ever met. (Ironically, she married a few years ago on my parents' wedding anniversary.)
Which leads to the second point. I am a terrible communicator. I learned that again this morning when I went off on my roommate (R). I approach him with anger rather than simply expressing the problem I had more rationally. I was pretty pissed, but in retrospect it was over something meaningless. I have never really been good with confrontation and I'm not entirely sure why. I have some notions of the beginnings and have spoken with my parents about it, but being 36 now, I think I am responsible for my own psychology and the resulting actions. R did not deserve my wrath and his angry words back at me sunk deep, as only a good friend's can. I have been making effort to approach more calm and/or without anger in my voice. I have been met on these occasions with a sneer, but open ears. It makes me not want to vocalize at all. And perhaps that is the impetus for my reticence. It is a silly fear that prevents me from confrontation. Usually, I have simply ate it, and there are many things in this world that are not worth confronting. They are small. This fear, though a small thing as most fears are, is quite an obstacle to face.
That is a reason I find my new correspondence easy. There is no fear. None. I have no idea whom she is. And here, in this wooly safety, I find myself being honest about myself and my history with women. I can communicate. I just type, I let the words flow, not stopping to think or revising at all. Emotional sorting, reliving, examining. Healing. It's good.
If you read this, C, I appreciate your perspectives. Thank you-
for anyone who believes in humor, poetry, romance, and sex read my poem.
ps. I did not have diverticulitis, thankfully. I just thought it was an interesting word. Apologies for the confusion....
10:58:25 PM 
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