Baby, All I Really Need Is a Little Bit..

Damn, I hate to sound like a complainer. It makes me feel like a spoiled brat. I do not like it Sam- I -Am!

BUT...

I just need a little bit...Call it what ever you want:

• lovin'
• strange
• shameless fun
• cut
• some

I just need a little bit but I aint gettin' any. Why? Because he "hadn't planned on it."

WTF?

What guy doesn't plan on gettin' some? I feel like smacking a bitch! Now I would be wrong if I called in the reserves. Some would say that isn't right, but damn, a girl has gotta have a plan B, doesn't she?

Didn't I say I needed the pipes cleaned at least twice a week?

Men don't listen.. or maybe it's just this guy!

Regrets and "I Told You So" Part 4

Knowing what a big mistake Swiss made and hearing him say things were not what they should be validated my feelings of being right all along. The question I keep asking is...

Why? Why? Why?

2005... at the Villa

Swiss calls my house to get the scoop on the new digs and I tell him to stop by and see the place. He ofers to hang the art on the walls. (I love that I can count on him for things like that). He arrives giving me a great bear hug and indicating his pleasure at seeing me again. I return the hug and notice the fine cut of his clothes and the manly scent of his cologne. It feels good to be enveloped in his embrace.

I give him a tour of the Villa, he loves the airy spacious feel of the place and gives me the thumbs up. We sit down to chat and catch up, it's been a while since we've seen each other ( Swiss's birthday was the last time we hung out). I ask about new hobbies and interests that he is involved in and we get into a lengthy discussion about his passion... "timepieces." He goes on to tell me about the $1000 timepieces he owns and the $4000 timepiece he's eying currently.

$4000 for a fricking watch? You gotta be kidding me!

After a while I see what the timepieces have come to mean. They are his passion... a passion that replaced the one missing from the marriage. He uses them to fill the void that is ever present in his life. I guess if he surrounds himself with things...he can't concentrate on the parts that are missing. The parts that mean the most. It is so sad.

In the course of our conversation, he makes mention of waiting. THEN, he drops a BOMB.
"I REGRET GETTING MARRIED! I SHOULD HAVE WAITED, IF I HAD WAITED, I WOULD NOT HAVE MARRIED THE PERSON I MARRIED." When I asked about, who and what he thought would be diferent, he looked at me and said, " YOU, IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN YOU."

The defense rests!

He then tells me that I should have tried to stop him, tried to talk him out of it. I reminded him tha he was very determined back then, and that anything I said would have seemed self-serving and selfish. I then reminded him of the conversation we had when I asked him "if he was sure this was what he wanted to do."

He's right, it should have been me, but this is what happens when people are afraid of what they feel, afraid to take a risk. Life becomes all about...

Regrets and "I told you so."

Reckless

We decided to meet for happy hour. We hadn't seen each other in a while. We needed to catch up, see one another, reconnect. I meet him at his parent's house. We drove to Virginia to Chevy's for margaritas. We had several, talking, catching up, shots of tequila (him, not me). We stare at each other across the table, eyes saying things are mouths aren't. The tension is there, thick, like smoke, waiting to be cut like hot apple pie.

We leave the Chevy's, we get into his Jeep, he has seat warmers. Thank God! It's winter and his seats are leather. We glance at each other, I smile at him, feeling the warmth of the margaritas. He leans over while driving and kisses me like its the last time. We're driving on 395, on the highway. He is kissing me and steering the Jeep. We could crash any minute, but we don't because he trying to keep his eye on the road and his lips on mine. It's reckless, but it feels so good. I break the kiss, I don't want to end up down a ravine. He keeps his hands on me, it's like he can't live without my touch. I revel in the feeling of it.

We get back to his parents house, we turn on the TV. I plop into a nearby chair. He comes over to lean over me and gives another mind-blowing kiss. I can't get enough of them. Soon he's lifting me from the chair, he's reaching under my shirt unclasping my bra. We make our way to the bedroom, lips and hands are everywhere. Mindless, we both try to connect skin on skin. Whispering words of heated passion we touch every inch of each other. No spot is left neglected. He stops and caresses my face, as if trying to rememer this moment forever. He then kisses me ever so tenderly and says, " I love you (insert last name here).

Our coming together is the perfect storm. We bond as if we have come across oceans of time to find one another. It is dizzying and frightening at the same time. It is not just a coupling, but a mating.

author's note: the above mentioned interlude took place prior to 1999.

I've Arrived

I DID IT!

I've finally finished my degree. 2.5 years of graduate school has ended with a Master's degree in education. I feel amazingley light today, knowing school is finished and there are no more papers to write. I feel amazingly free as I now have no after work obligations. It feels foreign, but damn good!

"What are you going to do now?" This was the question asked repeatedly.

Enjoy life and have some fun. Party with friends, see old friends, hang out, plan happy hours, play flip cup. You name it, I'll be doing it.

I love having nothing to look forward to, no obligations.

Life is good... Damn good!

Holla!

Regrets and "I Told You So" Part 3

So now there is this kiss between us and I'm trying to act like I'm not affected by it but I am. The kiss was...incredible, like our kisses usually were. So much passion, it boggles the mind.

Anyway, a few weeks later, I'm throwing a small get together and have invited he and the wife. Suprisingly, they both attend and have a chance to meet some of my friends from the workplace. Cool! I'm playing hostess upstairs, where Swiss wanders to get a drink. He mentions everything is nice. I tell him I'm glad he came and brought the wife. I asked if she was having a good time. He said he "didn't care!"

Huh? what do you mean? "I'm here to support you." Oh, thanks. Friends are great, aren't they? As I walked be to open the fridge, he proceeds to grab me and give me another of those brief but incredible kisses! Again! You gotta be kidding me!

I look at him ( after I have recovered my composure, and surprise) and say, "You can't keep doing that, Swiss! What are you trying to prove?"
His reply, "I can't stop. I can't seem to help myself."
By this point I'm tittilated and alarmed at the same time.

We return downstairs with the other guests. A short time later I'm in the middle of a conversation with some of the old college crew and his wife does the unthinkable...
She completely embarrasses him by talking to him like he's a not a man, like a child. I was shocked, and embarrassed for him and I was not the only one who noted and commented on it later after they left. Yes, several people stated they would never understand why he married her. I kept my mouth shut!

Whoa! The wife completely disrepsected him, and he didn't say anything, but I know he was pissed. I also get the feeling that she was condescending like this frequently. It was almost as if she had no respect for him as a person, like she thought she was better.
Nice eye-opener into their relationship! How sad for him.

Swiss knows I love 50Cent, Jay-Z etc. When I told him I was going to the Rock Da Mic Tour concert at Nissan he shook his head but could tell I was really excited about this concert. 2 weeks before the concert he met me and best friend at a local club (in the parking lot) and whisked me off to another club. On the way there he told me he had a present for me.
"I have something for you, you're going to love it!" I am totally surprised and flattered... a gift.
Swiss gifted me with a big, black t-shirt with 50Cent on the front! I absolutely loved the shirt and still have it to this day. In the parking lot of another club, I give him a great big hug and thank him for thinking about me. "I knew you would love it." "I do, I really love it, thanks." In my pure excitement, I give him another hug and a kiss on his cheek. He stares at me intently for several seconds, caresses my cheek, and calls me a big "kid." Hey, 50Cent is HOT! everytime I see a picture I think, hot damn... but I digress.

Flash...2004

Starts off sour, I hate my job and have decided to leave at the end of June. But there's some drama there and I end up leaving in March anyway (thank G-d! cause someone would have found me in the bathroom with my wrist slit!) I get offered a job in Korea., among others. The money is great, it's for a year or two. I tell Swiss about the different job offers and especially about the job in Korea. I'm really considering this job because it involves travel and a different culture. I discuss all of this with him and he tells me, "you can't go to Korea for 2 years, I want you here. I want you here, where I can put my hands on you."
Insert smug grin here! I know he was telling me in his own (albeit machismo) way that he didn't want me to leave because he would miss me.

What was interesting about this conversation was that when I mentioned that a year or two wasn't that long, that I would be back, and that we could still communicate via e-mail... nothing would really change except my location, Swiss seemed sad. I hit him on the shoulder and teased, "besides you won't miss me at all, you'll probably have a couple of kids while I'm gone, you won't even notice that I'm not here!"
Swiss then informed me that the wifey had just entered a Ph D. program, there would be no children for at least 5 years. WTF? 5 years? You must be joking, they've already been married 5 years at this point. I ask if he's serious and was told yes. So, so sad!

Premonitions of the mistake of this marriage were confirmed when he said," Yeah, at least 5 years before any kids, and that's if I'm even still around in 5 years."

FUCKING-A!

I had never heard this type of talk before! I had to mentally check myself to make sure that I heard him right. When I called him on his comment, he stated that he didn't know if he'd still be married to her in 5 years. The reasons he gave were all the ones he had given previously and that they shared no passion (one I hadn't heard before). He said they were more like roommates than married. He said the issue wasn't their inability to get along because they did, but there was NO SPARK between them. He said there was nothing.

It must have taken everything he had to admit that to himself much less to me! At that point, I realized just how sad his existence was and it made me sad because....

it could have all been avoided.

Regrets and "I Told You So" Part 2

Ahem... where was I? Oh, Ok!

So Swiss is now an old married guy. He is settling into the new house, having dinner with the in-laws... you know married people stuff. I give him some time to adjust to it all because, hell, it's an adjustment! I don't call etc. I figure he needs his space.

I send him a grad announcement for my BS and he calls me one day to say congrats. The air on the phone was quite charged, tense even. I think he felt unsure about whether I still counted him as friend even though he "punked out". But what could I do as his friend other than be there to support his decision? So I decided then and there to always keep things light.
So our friendship renews, all the while with an undercurrent of something...was it things left unsaid, I dunno, but all I knew now was that all we had left was our friendship so we needed to work on that. Being friends... married man, single woman. Nothing is ever easy though is it?

Skip to year 2001....

By now you would think things have settled down by now. Swiss, at this point is doing the exact same thing as a married guy that a single guy is... clubs, late nights. He is acting like a singe man! I ask one day about this and the reply I got was,"I'm a grown ass man, I do what I wanna do." Ok but what does the wifey say? His story was she didn't seem to mind. Whoa... Red flag! ( I know you're thinking at this point that this is just his male bullshit, but read on) Well the reason she didn't seem to mind was that she was in grad school, tutored etc. She was never home either. Well come to find out, they only really hung out on the weekends. This is not the normal habits of married couples is it?

He began to share details about their marriage and life together. Unsolicited details. I did NOT open up that can of worms! Maybe this was his way of getting it out without fear of what others might say. He could've easily shared these things with the best friend. He mentioned how marriage was not what he thought is was going to be. He never had sex. At this point I reminded him that he wasn't having oodles of sex BEFORE he got married! He stated he knew this but now it was nonexistent. At this point I'm feeling pretty smug ( OK, only a little) and I ask why did he get married if he knew what was it was going to be. His reply "I thought it would be different. I thought I'd having more sex."( With someone who doesn't like having sex all that much?) Amidst feeling smug, he goes on to tell me that he often tells her that she needs to "handle her bsusiness" i.e. have sex with him. I'm totally intrigued at this point. I hesitated and reluctantly asked how often he was having sex as a married guy. I did not want to seem like I was prying into a very personal part of his life. He told me maybe once every 2 weeks.

HOLY SHITBALLS, BATMAN!

At this point I'm feeling WAY SMUG but try not to show it. Instead, I offer some friendly encouragement. I tell him that things will pick up, they're still newlyweds and that he needed to tell her that he wanted more sex. He seemed to think the latter idea would do no good based on her actions prior to getting married. I let him know that he could make it work and I dropped the subject.

Beam to 2003...

I'm over at their house, just passing through on my way to a hair appointment, to stop by and say hey. He's there alone and shows me around the place to see the improvements made since my last visit. I see the big screen tv, the paintings on the wall etc. I listen to the plan he has etc. The house is coming together slowly. I would expect nothing less especially in the bourgeois neighborhood in which he resides. Checking the time and making leaving noises, I make my way to the front entrance to leave and the completely UNEXPECTED happens. As I turn to say goodbye, he calls me by my last name (a long-ime habit) and gives me the quickest but sweetest kiss I've ever had.

Whoa, hey, uh, umm, OK??????

I look at him and say bye while practically running to my car. WTF? What just happened is what I'm thinking to myself. So much for boundaries. What is going on, here? I try to think back on the past couple years... have I done something to make him think this is OK? Am I to blame, was it me? Was my shirt too tight or something? These are all the questions I'm throwing at myself as I drive to my stylist. 5 minutes later, my cell phone rings. It's Swiss on the end asking if he was "out of bounds". Damn right you are! I couldn't talk, I was so shocked by it all. I stammered a lot. The only thing I could manage to get out coherently was " It was just unexpected. I wasn't expecting it." I repeated this a few more times and he wanted to know if we were OK.... I guess ... wait a minute... hold on. He then proceeds to tell me he couldn't help himself, and rings off.

You can't kiss me like that (this is the tirade that's going of in my head)! Things are spinning out of control ( or at least they feel that way). It took me a few days to get over this incident. Prior to this, there had been nothing, nothing to indicate that our relationship was anything other than friends. He seemed to be fine with our reationship; it had slipped into a comfortable familiarity that made me believe that married and single people of the opposite sex could actually be friends.

Eventually time passed and the incident was not forgotten but was forgiven. Swiss and I were friends, surely we could get passed it.

Couldn't we???