TKOG Who dishes all about The Ex

On Life As A Human, an open letter to my bus boyfriend, who doesn’t know we’re dating. Even though we’re totally, totally dating.

Part three in my Infrequently Asked Questions series. You guys asked about The Ex, so here it is. (Also, I know I promised to send out prizes today, but bear with me for a few days: I want to finish drafting answers to all the questions I’ve received before I choose a favorite, or else I’ll be biased to early responders. Winners by Wednesday-ish?)

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From The Ex:

Do you love me, now that I can dance?

Not to burst your bubble, darling, but your ability to dance was always tangential to my feelings about you. Which might be a good thing.

From Kathryn (which, ps, is one of my all-time favorite names):

Why did you and The Ex break up? You seem like you did, and still do, get along great, and he even vajazzled you post-break up. So I’m curious…why? What happened?

Okay. Let’s talk about The Ex.

He and I met in the spring of my freshman year of college, where we lived in the same dorm. (The actual story of how we met is a cute one that involves narcissism, Google searches and samurai swords. But I’m sure you can imagine it.) I’d spent the majority of my freshman year chasing after so many douchebags that I practically sweat straight vinegar; one day, not long after a hook-up so bad that it made me momentarily internet-famous, I decided I was done. I signed onto JDate and printed out a profile picture of a cute guy, taped it to my mirror, and declared to all and sundry that I wouldn’t even look at another dude until I met a brilliant Jewish engineer who knew how to respect a woman.

Three days later, I met The Ex.

Nine days after that, we were — er, involved. We spent the summer a-courtin’, all old-fashioned and epistolary, then met again and were wildly in love. We stayed together for four years, almost to the day, and as I remember it (but feel free to chime in, The Ex), we were very happy. In fact, during our whole four years together, I only remember one serious fight. Which was absolutely his fault. Obviously.

The year-long unraveling started shortly after I graduated. There were a couple of big problems.

Strike 1: The Ex, who is a brilliant and extremely talented man, ended up getting his dream job. I, on the other hand, had a mild break-down, realized I didn’t want to pursue a PhD in Russian literature, and decided to spend a year in part-time jobs so I could pursue writing. A good idea in theory, but I have no discipline. Over the course of an entire year, the only thing I ended up writing was one (very good) apple pie recipe.

Strike 2: Because we were both leaving the Ivory Tower for the first time, The Ex was concerned that if we lived alone together we would become too insular and he would lose touch with all of his friends. I was something of a social butterfly back home, so I wasn’t concerned for my own sake. Because of this, though, we ended up living in a converted 1920s mansion (swoon) with three of The Ex’s friends (decided un-swoon). Unfortunately, even living with the friends, he ended up spending most of his time with me, so living with his friends ironically detracted from his relationships with them.

Strike 3: In order to afford said mansion, The Ex (who was making about nine times as much money as me, not including benefits. I was below poverty level. No big deal.) offered to pay for a third of my rent. And, granted, were it not for him we would have been living in an apartment I could actually afford, it set up a weird money dynamic that we rarely talked about. I felt obligated to perform domestic tasks for him, and used that as an excuse to put off my writing even more; he bought me little presents all the time and bankrolled the elaborate cocktail parties I threw on a near-monthly basis. I felt, in short, like a kept woman.

So the basic swing of the situation: he worked extremely late hours all week; I worked mornings and weekends, during the parts of the day when he was actually home; I stayed at home with housewife’s depression to clean and angst, then, when he got home, was so worked up that I immediately started sniping; on the weekends, we would talk a lot about compromise, but the things we talked about were never put in effect.

And the whole time, I felt guilty and useless because I wasn’t writing. Actually, one night, I walked into the bedroom while he was on the phone with his mother, finishing a sentence. “Well,” he’d said, “she talks about writing a lot, but…” — I left before he finished it. It was the most hurtful thing I’d ever heard anyone say about me. But I opened Microsoft Word that night and saw that it had been six months since I’d modified a file.

We really loved each other — as far as I know — but it was a bad situation for a couple of months. Then, on Christmas Eve of the year we moved in, I had the insane idea to go to Boston and work for AmeriCorps (in a position that ended up not working out). I called and told him I wanted to leave, to pack up and shoot myself across the country. All the distractions of our life had been a cancer in me, and I wanted to cut them out in one shot.

We tabled the conversation for a few months, because our lease ended in July 2009. And once we did realize we were definitely breaking up, our relationship dramatically improved. We talked very openly about all of the little issues, and realized the places where we couldn’t compromise and just looked past them because they were temporary.

In the end, I really think we broke up because we loved each other. He was right about me: I wasn’t working hard enough, and I wasn’t pursuing my passions seriously. And because he was working such long hours, I think he really needed time away from a consuming relationship in order to bond with his boys, get more dating experience, enjoy being a 20-something.

And now he’s the social butterfly, I’m a workaholic, and we’re still very, very close friends. (Yes, vajazzling close. Although, for the record, I suspect our co-vajazzling days will be over soon because he, unlike me, is making a real effort to start dating, and I’d expect a girl to snap him up immediately. Years of girlfriend training have made him a real catch.)

From Michelle:

Going along with the Ex questions…how many times would you say you’ve been “in love”–if at all.

The Ex and I were definitely in love. We were a whole ice cream sundae bar of in-love with all-you-can-eat premium toppings. As for other relationships — I don’t know. I do know I’ve had exactly two relationships (I use the term with appalling looseness) that have hugely changed who I am as a person. But the other one was more of an Abiding Personal Tragedy, because I’m the kind of douchebag who just eats stuff like that up.

From Kara:

The Ex. I want to know about The Ex, and why you’re not together/will you ever be together again.

Will we ever be together again? If we are, it won’t be any time soon. When we first broke up, I’d hoped we’d get back together after a year or two — take some time to grow alone, then join back up as new, improved people. And I’d say we’re both new, improved people now. But. I guess I don’t feel the same way anymore? I want to be alone for a few years, and if the universe has other plans for me, it’ll have to scream ‘em in my friggin’ ear.

Tagged as: ask me anything, break-up, honestly our break-up was better than a lot of people's whole relationships, infrequently asked questions, the ex, the most civil break-up in history