One Night With My Ex …
In case you hadn’t guessed from the title, I’ve been watching One Night With My Ex. In fact, I’m watching it right now. I’m cringing and laughing and wondering … could I sit through one night with my ex? Which ex would I choose? And what would I really want to know?
Brown Eyes – I don’t really know if I have anything to say to that man. Or if he has anything to say to me that I would want to listen to? You can’t argue with stupid, for a start, and he has his head so far up his ass that nothing I could say would make the blindest bit of difference.
So, no, I wouldn’t want to spend one night with Brown Eyes.
I want to rule The Director out also, and Someone New too. Let’s add the Hubby to that list. And Big Love. I’m not bothered by their responses in their slightest. I barely think about them. They’re not important.
Jock. Hmmmm. I would love to spend ‘one night with my ex’ and ask Jock all the questions that always went unanswered, but I feel that it would be a dangerous decision. Would I really want to know those answers now? I’m over him. I don’t think about him. He’s not a big deal to me anymore. Would I really want to open that can of worms? Do I really need to know those answers??
I wouldn’t even know what questions I would want to ask these men, any of them. I wouldn’t want to spend five minutes with most of them, let alone one night, or even part of the night. There is nothing in my past that I would want to go back to now, and that’s a feeling I don’t think I’ve ever felt before. I’ve been so hung up on my past for so long, I don’t really know how NOT to live in it. I’m so battered and bruised, or I was, but I don’t think I am anymore. I don’t think I can “rely” on my past as excuses for my behaviour – my weird quirks and demands. I WAS battered and bruised, and I was almost re-battered and re-bruised, but I was also smarter than that. I am smarter than that. I’ve learned a lot of lessons. I’ve learned those lessons without ever needing to know the answers to those unanswered questions, so I think they’re best left where they are.
Pandora’s Box isn’t worth opening.
I always used to feel like I was missing out on something during a breakup. Breaking up from yet another [totally incompatible] man would mean that I was missing out on them, on what they had to offer me. My breakup from Big Love was devastating and I thought I’d never get over it, but then Jock came along and blew everything out of the water. He changed my mind about so many things that I thought were dead straight in my head, but it turns out he was entirely wrong for me also. I never thought I’d recover from that breakup. I wallowed in self-pity for the best part of two years. Technically, that man had four years of my life. I still can’t believe I gave him that much of me.
And then there’s Bear …
The way we are together, it’s like nothing I’ve ever had or felt before. We fit together so well, although we are a little out of sync sometimes, but we work so well together in so many ways, the little bits that don’t fit are just tiny in comparison. If we’re talking about a good versus bad ratio, for me, we’re looking at like 92% good and 8% bad. I don’t know about you, but I think that’s fucking impressive. I’ve never been so content just living with one man (and his son). It doesn’t feel like I’m missing out on something, anything. I don’t miss being single. I don’t miss my old drinking life. I don’t miss dating or first-time sex. I don’t miss the games of cat and mouse – the thrill of the chase. I’m happy with this one, the one man I’ve got right now.
Going back to the topic I started on, I think one night with my ex would just fuck shit up, regardless of how “over” those men I think I am. I don’t even have questions for those men now. What would I ask?
Jock, why did you leave me when I needed you the most?
What would he say? That he was scared? That he thought I would do to him what his ex did to him when she had cancer and then recovered? That he didn’t think he could cope?
Why would I care about those answers now? We don’t have unfinished business. I thought we did for the longest time but then again, I’ve also thought that about almost every breakup I’ve ever had. Did I try hard enough? For long enough? Did I change enough? Try to be accommodating enough? Was I smart enough? Did I learn from my mistakes? Am I making the same mistakes? Would I miss him if we broke up? Would it be the biggest mistake I ever made? Or the best thing I ever did? Would I look back over our time together and regret not giving it one last shot?
I’ve always wondered if I was making the right decisions, especially when it comes to men. Should I date him? Should I break up with him? Should I move in with him? Is it too soon? Are we waiting too long? What are we waiting for?
Questions, questions, questions.
Too many to ask, and there would never be enough answers.
One night with my ex? I’d rather gouge my own eyes out. Some stuff is most definitely best left in the past. Some of those questions probably are too.
Photo by Abdul Gani M on Unsplash
