i know i haven't posted in a while, i just have been processing too many things in my head to make them public. however, i'm gonna go over the gist of these things. first of all, let me introduce gavin. i really should do the magazine thing and change names to preserve privacy, but whatever. so gavin is a guy from church, and new to the area, that i know through the tutoring program i help run. One friday, it would have been the weekend jason and shannan came up, so that was the 14th, he called me up (the tutoring had been ended for the summer) and we ended up talking for like 4 hours. we had spoken at tutoring before, and i thought he was nice because he really watched out for the kids and thier behavior and helped out. but that was a good conversation. so now you know who gavin is, basically, i don't want to post all his personal info, but he has shared quite a bit. and he made reference to the fact that not everyone knows these things about him, so he must not have conversations like ours all the time.


so this past weekend my old friend mike came up. i know him and his wife from college...they were married and he went back to school to get another degree. two months ago his wife left him, it is all very messy, really messy and i was basically a pit stop on his way to taking a short vacation (she's not talking to him anyway right now). it's really very sad, but i won't get into that. so he finally arrived on saturday afternoon, around 4. this was actually really good for me, since i needed some alone time and some downtime from constantly coming and going. so. but bear in mind that while i am friends with both mike and peg, i haven't kept in very close contact with them over the past few years, and i have not even seen either of 2 years. so we get re-aquainted (sp?) and go downtown and go out to dinner and have a good conversation. it is a bit difficult, just because mike has his opinions, but if you dont' share them, you are wrong. he's very nice, but not as easy going and laid back as many of my other friends, or myself. he's a bit high-maintainence that way and understandably needy right now. but we go back home and talk and it's all good.


sunday i take him to church with me and he really enjoyed that. there was one particular talk about how to help the youth and basically minister to them, and since mike had been a youth minister, he found it very interesting. of course, on the way in to church, jorge drives by as we are getting out of the car and honks to say hello, so that obliages me to wave hello. more on the repercussions of that later. we leave after the main service and basically hang out. we go by where i work, and tool around. we go out to dinner again, not something i normally do on a sunday. anyway. and again, conversation can be difficult. for example, he doens't think that cardinal law bears any responsability or blame for the problems in the catholic church, or at least the particular ones in boston. let's just not get into that. mike actually managed to upset me twice in a period less than 48 hours. so, that should give you an idea. not all bad mind you, and there were good conversations. so sunday night we are hanging out in my apartment. i get tired and wind down early on sundays, because i have to get up early for work. the phone rings a few times, and it's jorge...apparently waving hello means 'hello, i do actually want you, so keep calling me without leaving messages even though i made it rather clear that i am not interested'. but then gavin called, on his way home from the weekend. he says he is bored and so i invited him over. he is literally in his car... he tried my cell twice, then called information to get by home number and had them patch him through. all in the car, before he even gets home . so he came over, i guess around 10, a little before then. and we all talk and hang out. and gavin is making a lot of eye contact and being rather flirty. he and mike actually have a bit in common, so they got along well. and it was fun to think that some guy wanted to get to know me and liked me. mike is convinced that gavin really likes me and that i should date him. i'm not so sure about the dating, but i am very open to hanging out with him. we had a good time, good conversations, and he left around midnight. and then of course mike and i had to talk, and so i got to bed very late on sunday. oh. a funny thing. jorge called again while gavin was there. and this is a bit shameful and mean. but i looked at the caller id, and said that i wasn't going to get it. gavin offers to pick up the phone and pretend to be a wrong number, and i tell him to go ahead. and to be honest, it was funny. gavin wasn't mean or anything, just repeatedly said hello until jorge said he must have the wrong number. of course, both gavin and jorge were tutors and gavin figures out who it was. gavin has no idea that i've already given jorge his due and gone out on a date, to see if there was any interest, and so encouraged me to go out with him because he is a nice guy. so that was that on sunday. no need to give details of the conversations, but there was a lot of joking and laughing, as well as more serious topics talked about.

monday. i left home for work and mike was leaving later on in the afternoon. work was good, mondays always go by quickly. however, lois and craig had a softball game (the play in a league) so we met up with craig and i drove thier second car home. however, while lois and i are waiting for craig to get there, my cell phone rings and it is gavin, wondering what i am up to. honestly, i had to do laundrey because of guests coming into town today. but i tell him that's all i have to do, so i'll call him when i am done. it was very flattering, really, and i appreciate all the effort to get to know me (my issues with gavin will be spoken of a bit later). so i called him and the conversation was one of those 'well what do YOU want to do' conversations,but he bucked up and suggested we rent a movie. we had been talking a bit about what movies we had seen and liked and he liked 'kate and leopold' which i had not seen. he offered to come over and pick it up on the way, all very nice of him. he gets to my place around 7. we talk, put in the movie...and i really like it. he does too, although i'm not sure if he knows i actually did like it, since i said meg ryan reminded me of her character in ' sleepless in seattle' (mainly because she has a few of the same lines). and we end up talking and he doesn't leave until midnight, again. and again, some serious topics and some just joking around. and of course we are on opposite side of the couch, but i think he was leaning. or making himself comfortable, which is much more likely:) and i can't sit in the same position for more than twenty minutes. anyway.

tuesday. i am driving to meet with my pastor, however, i hit traffic on the way in on a 2-lane road. i have my windows up and the air conditioning on because i am listening to the mix tape that sam and i made and i want to sing along. singing along with the windows down in stop and go traffic is not good:) this one car passes me, and i get an almost-glimpse of like a quarter of this guy's face and he was clearly looking over into my lane and i can see that the guy is laughing. i think it is gavin, but i've just been singing in my car, which can be kinda silly-looking and embarassing, so when i pass what i think might be him, i don't look over. and we don't pass again. when i get home, there is a message on my machine from him saying he has actual valid questions for me and so to please call him or he'll call me. so basically , we talk later and while he doesn't say that he saw me, it comes up that he was also at the church at the same time i was for a bible study class. so, it is conceivable that we were on that road at the same time, just not saying anything. he was definately laughing at me though, or himself for not being able to get away from me. and can i just say that his 'questions' were perhaps a bit, shall we say, contrived? he had honest questions, but i don't think he needed me to answer them. one, was for a defination of a disease that he said was not in his medical dictionary so he wanted to know if i knew what it was. i didn't, but i was able to find it in my medical dictionary. and then he had a question about the different hospitals in boston, which he thought i'd know because of my job. not that he has a clear idea of what it is that i do. but basically, my knowledge from my job had no bearing on his question anyway, but we ended up chatting. so that's that.

and here are my issues with gavin. well, first...this isn't really an issue...but i am just not attracted to him, as in , i don't find him attracted. for some strange reason i feel drawn towards him and while he is a good-looking guy, i just don't find him attractive. also, there are certain qualities in guys that i refuse to put up with. mainly because they are ones that my father possessed and it was pretty not good living with them and really were very detrimental to me, my siblings, etc and i decided long ago not to date or marry someone with those qualities b/c i was not going to go through that again, or put my future children through that. now, it is kind of hard to explain with this little background, and just because i sometimes find it hard to put into words without it sounding either melodramatic, or just not a big deal. but i will not marry someone who is controlling, or feels that thier opinion must be obeyed or that other people are just wrong for not sharing that opinion. someone who is judgemental, sees themselves as better than others, is critical/condeming of others who may not share thier beliefs or point of view...i guess that all boils down to respecting other people, even when they are different from you and believe differently, and not judging them and realizing that you don't know everything, and that it is not your place to judge them. someone who 'makes' people do things. and i understand that you have to set rules (as in a parent, like when i was growing up) but the rules and thier enforcement should be done from a place of deep love and understanding and not from wanting to MAKE others do what you feel is right, even if it really is right. i won't be with someone who is belittling or demeaning...i won't choose that for the rest of my life.

so how this applies to gavin (and i hope i got the gist across, but that isn't the whole thing). he laughs and to me, trivializes what i do (job). and okay, its not the most improtant thing in the world, or the most important thing about me, but still...it's rude (he does it joking, but serious, i think) and it's just...be supportive and encouraging and not judgemental and negative, you know?i don't want to be belittled. and i shouldn't be. i have worked to make myself someone who is positive towards others and supportive, even if what they do is not something that i would choose. because i respect them and because they don't need to be like me and because maybe there are things about them that i should be more like.

he is controlling and very strict and other people can set rules and be strict without the same sense i get from him about the need to be controlling. he also makes fun of my efforts with the tutoring program because there are a few of the kids that he was able to get under control that i was not. that really really bugs me. he expects me to explain to him what i do there that is so important, i guess b/c he thinks that i am trivial. and you know, i often came away from there feeling incompetent and inadequate and then to have it thrown in my face. and not even that, to have that thought shared by someone else who should understand and be supportive and see the efforts that you made. i had always thought that him helping out was him being nice and thoughtful, not him doing it because he thought others were not as good as him and inadeqaute. that does actually hurt my feelings. he seriously wanted me to list for him what i do to justify myslef. it was belittling and showed a lack of respect . for all i know, maybe he was joking and just giving me a hard time, since he often does, but putting people down like that should really be avoided. i do tease him and give him a hard time, but not about things that seem at all important to him. i actually try to be sensitive. and i will not put up wiht that kind of stuff...it's kinda hard to describe...but i think you get what i mean. it's an attitude thing and other people can say simliar things or have similar reactions/feelingsas him, but have a different attitude when relating to you, etc...so that's my thing with him. and i think we want some of the same things, but also differnet lives, you know? it's like he really needs to loosen up and let go of himself and his controlling-ness in order to be someone that i'd want a relationship with. he simply reminds me too much of my father sometimes and i will not repeat that.

that all being said, he is not all bad. you can see that there is a sensitive side. that he knows some of the mistakes he's made and would like to have a second chance to not make them. you can see the points that would make him a good husband. it's the controlling-nes and belittling/putting down that really disturbs and scares me off.