You’re probably going to want to kick my ass for being so dumb after you read what a lousy predicament I’m in, but a bit of advice would be appreciated nonetheless. I feel like I’ve overthought this situation so much that I can’t even get a straight answer out of my head, so a fresh perspective would be nice.

Around December of last year, I met a great guy through a mutual friend. I’d just broken up with my casual boyfriend and wasn’t looking for a relationship of any kind. Same goes for this fella — not only was he in town temporarily, waiting to hear on a job in the East (about ten hours away from where I live), but was also dealing with a dissolving two-year relationship (and even now he’s only just starting to admit that it’s been over for a while…Old Girlfriend has a new love interest and hasn’t shown interest in him for some time, fer chrissakes).

So the guy, who I’ll call “Steve,” and I weren’t what you’d call “on the make” when we met. Alas, rather stupidly, I began to find myself attracted to him in a pretty serious way; I could go into all the details, but suffice to say that we match very well, and when I began to realize how seriously I felt for him (over a metter of a couple of weeks of hanging out), I really began to felt as though I’d run smack into a soulmate. I was, and still am, pretty crazy about this guy. We’re just…I don’t know how to explain it all without going on and on, but suffice it to say I’ve dated plenty of guys in my time, and I’ve never felt this way about any of them. AND I tend to consider myself a realist, so it’s not like I was looking for someone to do the proverbial “sweep me off my feet” thing. Stuff happens, I guess.

So…at the time I decided not to fill him in on how I REALLY felt about him, because of the girl thing and the potential move. But one night after hanging out on-one-one, he confessed that he felt the same way and, essentially, he wanted to pursue things with me seriously if he didn’t get the job and could stay in town for a little while. Much longing, sexual tension and joined-at-the-hip activity ensues. He talks about the future, tells me he doesn’t think he’s going to get the job and that he’s crazy about me.

So, naturally, he got the job. And because Old Girlfriend was now going to be only about three hours away from his new location, he didn’t want to cut things off with her quite yet. I’m upset but remain supportive, tell him I understand that he needs to take the job (he couldn’t work here doing the stuff he wants to do — he career is too specialized) and that I want to spend time with him while we still have the opportunity. I attempt to keep things platonic and fail miserably; we don’t have sex, but we do fool around regularly. Usually this means he’ll tell me he doesn’t want to be physical, because he doesn’t want to make the separation harder, but then will turn around and say he can’t resist me. We pretty much pretend like this move isn’t really happening, and when he finally does leave the state, it’s open-ended. I ask him what he wants me to do, and he tells me that he doesn’t want to give up on the potential between us.

So, fast-forward several weeks later, and I decide to go visit him while on break from school. I fly up and tell my friends that I’m going to visit him platonically. Truth is, I think I was just in pretty big denial about it; if I’d left at the end of the week without him touching me, I think I would’ve been pretty disappointed. So, yes, sex happens. Very gratifying, but things seem awkward afterward. I address it with him the next day and try to tell him that it’s okay, but he seems torn between being very attracted to me and wanting to make a go of it with me (which I would be okay with; I’m almost out of school and have the potential to move for the right reasons…if I had reason to believe it would work out, I’d give it a shot) and still having this unresolved bullshit with Old Girlfriend. Basically, he’s not receiving the the strong “it’s over” signals she keeps throwing his way, and I’m sick of seeing him act like such a jackass over her. Even just as his friend, I’m starting to find it exasperating to witness.

For the rest of the week, we continue to have sex and discuss what’s going on, without him once telling me straight-up what he wants from his relationship with me (and stupid me, I was too timid at the time to demand it). When he drove me to the airport, he was by turns affectionate and distant; “mixed signals” doesn’t even begin to apply. I tried to keep it casual so he wouldn’t feel further stressed about it, and told him, “I guess I’ll give you a call on your birthday, then” (which is in a few days). His response: “You guess?” He seemed really concerned that I might not call him.

So, to wrap things up (I KNOW!), I really do care very much for this guy. I can’t explain it well in such a relatively short space, but we really do have a great time when we’re not putting each other through buckets of angst. We talk for hours, love the same music, same taste, blah dee blah…all the good stuff. Part of me even still feels like if he could get his shit together and realize that we’re worth taking a chance on, I would want to go for it. But, simply put, I can’t do that without him placing the smallest amount of faith in me/us, and part of me is wondering if he clings to Old Girlfriend at least partially because it keeps him from having to make a final decision about me. But beyond that, I know I need to make a decision soon to get past this; it’s eating me up, and I can’t get any peace until I know for sure what’s going on. I don’t even know if he even still feels the same way about me anymore since my visit (we haven’t talked; I feel like I ought to wait until the birthday call, like I promised).

So, the two-part question is: Should I ask him, point-blank, what’s up, or let things ride a while and see what happens when we don’t force it? And whether I do this, should I continue to keep being Steve’s friend, even when I know there’s a good chance nothing romantic will work out between us? Part of me just wants to get rejected and get it over with, but part of me is scared of losing a good person and a friend whom I care very much about. Help — his birthday’s in a few days, so that phone call is coming quick!

Kicked in the pants

I have
this problem with my husband’s friend who is staying with us (I’ll call him
“M”). M and my husband (I’ll call him “A”) met six years ago in a hostel in
London and have been good, although not necessarily close, friends. They are
both in IT and have done contracting, so they have quite a few things in
common.

M came to stay with us after 18 months in Bangkok. The job market
was bad there, so he returned to London in the hopes of landing the big
contract and being able to bring his Thai girlfriend here. M will be moving
out after he finds a job, but the market is not good here so it’s just a
matter of time until he finds one. That’s not the problem.

The problem is, M is the most socially retarded individual I have ever met.
He repeats nearly every single sentence that he utters, and not just once.
He’ll say it two or three times. He doesn’t pay any attention to what anyone is
doing, such as me saying, “I’m going to change now” and walking into my
bedroom to change clothes. No, he just follows me and keeps on talking
while I’m changing (I spent a few months in a hostel so that didn’t freak me
out as much as the fact that he just didn’t get it! To me, “I’m going to
change now” means “you stay there, I’ll change and be right back,” not “follow
me and keep blabbing”).

I’m sitting on the couch reading a book, but M
doesn’t care. He talks and talks and talks. Nonstop. All day, all night.
We’ll be watching a TV program for the same amount of time, but does he
watch the show? No. He asks me what’s happening instead! One night I just
lost it and told him that if he would just shut the fuck up and maybe
actually watch the show instead of talking to me about it, he might know
what’s happening. but I can’t both watch the show and tell him what’s
happening. At first I thought it might be because he’s just spent 18 months
in Thailand and ended up teaching kids to speak English. and that he was just
missing conversational English. But now all it takes is two minutes in his
company and I want to choke the living shit out of him.

A also is suffering with this need to choke. He mentioned that he didn’t
realise that M hadn’t changed, and I immediately asked him why he’d offered
to let M stay with us if he knew that M was the way he is; A’s reply was
that he thought 18 months in Thailand would have changed M, but apparently
not. M also knows how every single company in the world works — they are
all dodgy, of course, and if you have an interview then it’s best to make
them come out to meet you for coffee to be on equal footing rather than go
into their office where you would be at a disavantage. In fact, he knows so
much about how everything works that I’m amazed I’ve made it this far in
life without that essential knowledge (insert sarcasm where necessary). A
had told M one day to shut up, as it was non-stop verbal diarrhea while A
was trying to look for work from home, and M became very offended and
replied he didn’t feel it was fair that he was told to shut up.

My question is this — is there a way to make M understand just why we are so
irritated all the time with him? How do I explain that it is not necessary
to repeat every word one utters? How can I get across to someone like
this that I do not feel my request for peace and quiet is unfair, and that
when I am watching that all-important, everything-coming-together moment in
a TV show, I do not want him to ask me what is going on? If it carries
on for much longer, I’m going to have to make a game out of it, to stop
myself from going mad.

I’m sorry this seems so muddled. I usually love having people stay with us,
but this time we’re both ready to kill the houseguest.

Sign me,
Shut The Fuck Up Or I’ll Kill You

Excuse me if this is too petty, or too New York, but yesterday my
wife and I were having brunch at City Bakery, up in the balcony, and it
was sort of a splurge because it’s going to be $30 and we basically
stumbled in because it was raining, it was cold, et cetera. Anyway, we’re
sitting at our tiny table and the empty table next to us is then occupied
by two women, one of whom begins chatting away really insistently, and at
length (about dysfunctional friends, mainly this guy Robert, and how he
brings out the worst in everyone she knows, he even brings out the worst
in her, and when he’s with Stacy they don’t pay attention to anyone
else, and they never invite her over either, not even to with them on
Fridays to the Met, you get the idea…).

This woman’s conversation
wasn’t excruciating, but it was insistently in our ears the entire time,
and it felt like we could barely but a sentence together. Now, I
understand that we could have tried to nicely say, “Excuse me, I know your
conversation is very important to you, but it’s a little loud and if
perhaps you could just speak a but more quietly we’d really appreciate
it.” But can you ever really say that, or something like that, without
leaving a residue of resentment and irritation that stays in the air
through the rest of the meal (which is even more invasive than the loud
conversation)? And as we’ve both just been served, we’re going to be
sitting next to each other for another half an hour (and moving to another
table isn’t an option, the place is packed).

Further, part of the reason
her voice is loud is that merely we’re so close (because it’s New York),
and it’s a loud bustling place. So it’s that middle ground where, on one
hand, she’s speaking too loud for the proximity of others, and it’s really
cramping our enjoyment, but at the same time we’re convinced, partially
just from her self-aggrieved tone, that if we say anything to her it will
come across like we just said, “Hey, shut up!” which isn’t really what we
want to say, because who hasn’t needed to bitch about dysfunctional
friends, or dysfunctional selves. But still, $30, spent learning far too
much about Robert. So can I ask what you do in this kind of situation?

G