held

"Why do you have a post-it with be accountable on it?"
I hesitate. "Let me finish drying my hair."

How did I forget to take that down? I run my hands through my hair, heat delaying my response, thinking through how I'll explain it.

I switch off the hairdryer. "Well?"
"Well. I put on a few pounds since Christmas" I have, hardly anything but I don't want it to be the start of an upward trend "and I know you don't notice, but it's just there to remind me. Don't sit at your desk and eat rubbish."
His eyes on me I go to him.

Later we're eating an amazing lunch and sharing a bottle of white. They clear the main course and I lean close to him and say I don't know if you meant to make me feel lovely, earlier, but you did.

Oh, and how.

preparation

We're on the telephone talking about the plans we have for the week. I have an interview the next day; he has a position to run for in the sailing team elections. I am tired but positive about the impending trip to another firm for another hour's tentative chat.

"I hope you get it." I say, after we've discussed what answers he'll give some silly questions they're going to ask.
"So do I. But I'd happily not take it if it meant you got the job."
And then my heart exploded.

nye

We're all pretending to be grown up and having a dinner party. As EQ points out, student food (shepherds pie and peas) slopped onto plates is only a dinner party by virtue of the fact that we're all in black tie. I've even got my hair up, braids pinned at the nape of my neck.

He looks so good, stubble and a dinner jacket. After Big Ben chimes we're on the sofa, talking. We talk more when we get home, in bed, my head on his shoulder. I am not good at this, this talking, but fuelled by cheap fizz I do my best.

He looks impossibly better the next morning, dress shirt with sleeves rolled to the elbows and pyjama bottoms. We make breakfast for welcome guests and spend the day asleep.

Happy New Year. Thank you for reading.

landing

"You're the worst kind of high maintenance. You think you're low maintenance but you're not." EA has told me this more times than I care to remember. It's whip-smart true, a rising welt of character assassination.

I repeat this to my boyfriend (perhaps we should name him) as I follow him up the stairs in a book shop, searching for a long-ordered vegetarian cookbook. I fall over my own feet and a step and as he rolls his eyes I stumble upright and regret the truth of the statement.

He replies You're not high maintenance.
"She meant emotionally."
...Well, yes.

But, I would be fascinated to meet the person who is unguarded from the first instant, always. Who doesn't measure themselves out, dose by dose, seemingly relaxed but judging every movement minute message.

And now we are here, and giving of yourself is comfortable, in a manner.
And it is good, despite the gift.

chill

There's a bit in the second Bridget Jones book (er, or the movie) where she's discussing how horrible Mark Darcy is. She's in the Thai jail with all those women singing Madonna and they tell her about boyfriends who beat them. And then she feels silly.

I feel silly.

The course I have to do this year I am finding more interesting than last year's. It is just that there is not enough of it to fill my working week. Three hours of college four days a week is hardly full time, and this is the "busy" part of the year. From February I only have to be in three days a week. The homework they give us is mostly asinine (apart from this thing about shares that I haven't got a fucking clue about) and besides, who wants to be doing homework when you're 23?

I'm bored out of my mind. I'm getting all control freak-y about things like washing and going to the gym and keeping my room tidy. This isn't good for me, and it isn't good for my relationship. Here it manifests in jealousy that my boyfriend having a good time, and irritation that my long evenings of nothing can't be filled with him.

One of the things I love most about him is that he's brilliant at keeping in touch. There is no reason at all to be needy. Fortunately I think I've got a grip on myself in time.

But I still feel silly.

maverick

http://beatonna.livejournal.com/74943.html

Pimms and an early night to doze in front of Maverick and Goose. He nudges me awake during 'select homoerotic scenes' (his words, not mine).

The movie finishes and he turns the laptop off. I look up from the bed and he is wearing aviators. I laugh until my stomach aches and he kisses me to shut me up.

sharp

A favourite blogger has been describing her break up. Her experience wrenches horrible familiarity in me.

I am too scared to write about him, despite eighteen months distance.

I am exhausted today. I have been short with my flatmates all week. I cannot concentrate.

I wrote more than this, originally. I cannot post it. Perhaps this will be catharsis enough.

things I wish I'd said to the man harrassing me as I browsed in Ann Summers

Man "Natural is better." [bonus: guess what I was looking at].

What I Didn't Say:
"Not with you."
"I'm not sure your wife would agree."
"Liar."
"My girlfriend and I don't think so."

Feel free to contribute.

PS: apologies for surfeit of sex posts.

calling

I went to buy lined paper today, for revision season is upon us.

As I left the shop, a man came up to me; tall, black, hot.
He wanted to tell me I was the prettiest girl he'd seen in two weeks.

Precision aside (bizarre), I smile and say thank you, because, well, he isn't a weird Hispanic bloke.
"I'm moving to America tomorrow" he continues; "I work in the adult film industry."
...
I got propositioned for a porn job in WH Smiths.

allusions

Despite the fact I do not currently own a camera, I want to add 'take more photographs' to my resolutions for this year. A few years ago (where has that gone) I remember saying the same words to my ex, leafy streets in Bristol, sunlit.

Sat beside the pond in Hyde Park this weekend we watch the swans: I would not get that close says my West Country past as a tourist creeps up. Feathered neck will break yours.

(more) mock exams next week but again I keep typing cryptic nonsense.

Restless; shortly to the gym to run it out.

v day

you are very hard to read
there is a frown on my lower lip (in my mind) am I?
pensive... is the same as content. is the same as sad.

no frown then ...I practice ...
... I have been called an emotional retard...
laugh you are not
I am just bad at talking...
... I am trying

ignoring my tightening chest, head on his elbow as he reads the poem I had been reluctant to reveal

I am glad I gave you those words
(I wonder if you know there are more here for you)

total non-post

Was halfway through writing a post about my favourite tramp but it got a bit too twee; woeful charity. I saw a man stop to hold a conversation with the back bumper of a car today, prompting the bout of condescension.

Am pretty happy and balanced at the moment. This has been the best start to a new year that I can remember; there are recent photographs of me where my smile has eaten my top lip. They also indicate that I badly need a haircut.

Oh dear. What disconnected, pointless paragraphs. It was that, or tell you about how indescribably hot I found watching my boyfriend do something (I have fuck all idea what but it involved looking purposeful and clever) in the lab last Friday. I've dabbled in some weird fetishes but never thought science would be one.

snow day

College is cancelled. I have a reasonable excuse not to leave the house today; we do, though, to play in the snow. The strange man next door stands beside his recycling bag full of Kronenburg cans and throws snowballs at us. One slides down my neck.

Snowfall. Remembering the late sweet daze of Friday night, I could say so much, did I dream it? All of it?

Confident I reached to you.
(I did not dream it).

On the train, I write the line from the ee cummings poem that makes me cry.

Snowfall; no sound. Bleak, content weather.

london love

"Hey, baby."
I roll my eyes and walk past him.
"You think you're too good for me, ah? You think you're too hot for me!"
The man; short, shorter than me in my heels, Hispanic, slick hair.

He turns to his friend. "She thinks she's too hot for me!"
I walk through the barrier.
"You're nada! Nada!" He yells, at my back.

I think briefly on what I will do if they appear on the platform. My train arrives, I abandon my grimace of distaste and start to snigger into the high collar of my coat.

homecoming

Tuesday is the new Sunday. Oh yes.

I spent the weekend in Bristol. Meeting AM in a bar after far too long an absence, we gossip and exclaim disbelief at how strange it is, how alien to be drinking in our university city. The attack of his warm, delighted hug is just as I remember.

As I stumbled from the train earlier in the afternoon, bleary from afternoon drinks in London, I text a friend; Just arrived. Feels like coming home.

Beautiful moments; emo kids perched like crows against the rounded wall of the building by the river; carrot cake and a stolen crossword; that extra hour on Sunday, and shy amazement at quite how wonderful some people can be.

getting the message

Dear ex-boyfriend who found me on Facebook,

Given that I did not reply to your Myspace message, did you really think I'd react favourably to a Facebook friend request? If I wanted you in my life, I'd have kept you in it. Leave me alone.

Sincerely,
me.

PS: Facebook need to make their blocking process simpler. Your name, ex-boyfriend, is so common that it took me ten minutes of clicking through search results to find your photo and remove your electronic presence. Ugh.

...

In better and unrelated news, I am going away tomorrow; ten days of sailing in the BVIs. I am taking my notebook. All I have been able to think about for the past month is Leaving. I will be writing. Hopefully I'll blog about travel when I get back. It was the primary purpose of this, I know.

Until then.