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Out of the past | page 1, 2, 3
I broke up with my boyfriend last July after a dreary two-and-a-half year relationship. Every once in a while, he calls me up at 2 a.m., drunk, wanting to talk. He says things like "I love you, I miss you, don't you miss all the things we used to do together?" I've moved on. I don't exactly enjoy hearing from him in these circumstances. We have stopped conversing at all except for his random, drunken calls. I have tried telling him he needs to call at a more reasonable hour. Still I hear from him. Why does he do this, and how can I get him to stop it? Laura
Mr. Blue Garrison Keillor's column appears every Tuesday in Salon Books.
Feeling blue about your prose? In the doldrums over your last date? Ask Mr. Blue. Dear Laura, Get an answering machine, attach it to your phone and turn off the ringer. Let him talk to a tape. If you want to remonstrate with him, write him a letter and tell him to stop with the boozy reminiscences, they're boring and pitiful. If you stop picking up the phone at night, he'll stop calling. Dear Mr. Blue, For three years, my wife has been telling me that she never loved me and doesn't want to be married. I wanted to stay together for the sake of our two boys (5 and 9), but I moved out a month ago as she wished. I'm trying to get on with my life, and I may even go on a date soon, but whenever I'm in a social setting without my children I feel guilty -- as if I shouldn't be enjoying myself without them. I am a loving father, and I do see my boys every single day; they spend six nights out of 14 at my house. And yet. Any suggestions as to how I might teach myself to get beyond this guilt? Afraid to be Happy Dear Afraid, You're in pain over the thought of what these little guys are going through. Though you weren't the instigator of the split, you still suffer over it and the grief it causes your children. There isn't a way to dispel this quickly, though you tell yourself that you're doing all you can do and that this is enough. You are showing your children you love them and will care for them; but you can't get them out of your thoughts, and when you think of them, it's with remorse. This will change. Give it time. They do not need your constant presence in order to thrive, but they are sensitive to your well-being and it would hurt them to have a despondent dad. Go dance and have a good time and be happy and it'll be better for them. Dear Mr. Blue, Gay male, in early 30s here. Last May, I broke up with my partner of three years. I've had a couple of crushes and flings since, but now I find I am letting a lot of really nice guys go by. My heart feels muffled and still, and I don't think I like that. I have seen you tell others to embrace their loneliness, but I am not enjoying the experience. Where do I find the desire to tear this deadening rind away from my heart? Albuquerque Bill Dear A.B., A year is long enough to mourn the loss of such a brief love, and if your heart has not unmuffled, perhaps there's another problem. Not many people enjoy the experience of loneliness, but it's good discipline and it's also a fact of life that mature people need to cope with. Consider the sheer human misery caused by people fleeing from loneliness. One way to endure loneliness is to train yourself to be an observer, a passive witness to the world. This is not easy or simple. To occupy your bench in the park and to observe, really observe, the passing parade and read the faces and grasp the snatches of conversation. This is the great privilege of loneliness, a sort of selflessness to the point of invisibility, a keenness of eye and ear, an appreciation of the human comedy. And then it is the pleasures of observation that lead one back into the social mill. Dear Mr. Blue, I am a 33-year-old man involved in a long-distance relationship with a woman I first met when we were both in the seventh grade. Four years ago, we became reacquainted and fell in love. She is reluctant to leave her hometown and family, and I am bound to a contract that dictates where I live. I know I can overcome this, but what troubles me is that she has been cushioned by relative wealth most of her life, and doesn't understand what it means to earn a living. I've had to work damn hard for everything, and am concerned about committing to a woman who would be lost if her fortune faded. I need a partner, but I'm worried I might inherit a burden. What is your advice? Wary Dear Wary, Indeed one does inherit a burden in marriage, and more than one, and perhaps she is worried about taking you on. But your letter makes me feel as if I walked in at the end of an argument -- you thundering, "I've had to work damn hard for everything!" makes me wonder what she said that led to that? Did she suggest a big wedding with an orchestra and a honeymoon at the Crillon in Paris? Did you take her out to dinner and she ordered the lobster? This seems to be a class conflict, a working stiff and a bourgeois lady, and one can only guess at what triggers your irritation. Maybe a touch of self-pity? Of course you work damn hard and maybe she didn't, but work is a privilege and leisure can be its own punishment, and anyway it's not particularly relevant to this romance. If you cherish her, hold onto her, even at a distance, and if you are falling out of love, then let her go, but don't abuse the woman over this phantom issue.
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