I really have to thank The Ex.
About a month ago, he watched Isobel all day and that evening, while I went out and got hammered and started kissing random people slightly inebriated. I came home later than I said I would, but I was quickly forgiven. Definitely, the drunkenness helped in that department, since I become quite a cuddler a copulatious she-devil apologetic when I’ve been liquored up.
Where was I?
Telling you about how he was the awesome and watched Isobel while I was at the conference a month ago, and then was so gracious as to allow me an evening out with friends, too. All for the small, completely unacknowledged as such, white-elephant-in-the-room barter that he be allowed to miss his visit with her this past (long, if you’re Canadian, eh?) weekend. To go camping.
aka drink for three days straight.
And I was good. I didn’t give him shit or mock him about it, even when he mentioned how much he was planning on dropping on booze, or that there’d likely be some hallucinogens at the wooded party. Not even when he showed up pretty much uninvited on Friday morning, therefore fucking up our entire routine, did I audibly tsk in his direction.
Oh, but I judged, using my inside voice. Also, the wondrous power of Instant Messaging – the best place to berate someone (to someone else), really.
Annnnnyway.
Point is, I sent him on his merry way, hard up and in for a weekend of binge-drinking, with nary a comment. And he had fun. And Isobel and I – who’ve not gotten a weekend to ourselves in positive circumstances in oh, over a year – had a blast.
Without this teenaged boy in the body of a 29 year old man, I wouldn’t have woken up on Sunday morning, itching to do something different. With a bank account balance to support it, as long as I didn’t go to crazy. I wouldn’t have lay there in bed, as Isobel tried to coach me on the proper getting out of it techniques, and considered spontaneously hoping on a ferry to the Island or the Sunshine Coast, finding lodging once we got there, as just walking and being with each other in a different place.
Without thinking about what we could do that could be an adventure, I wouldn’t have wasted some time, throwing on makeup and making myself feel relatively attractive while I figured out what direction our day should take us. And I wouldn’t have walked out of the door with confidence and inner-peace, wondering if we should head to the ferry on a quest for outer peace.
Instead, yet (around here) oddly similar, we went to Ikea. Were it not for the itch, I wouldn’t have walked around every single section of that two-floor warehouse, noting everything that I’d petted and she’d sat on, on not one, not two, but three of those pamphlets they provide with a tiny wooden pencil. It was like we’d both taken the Swedish shopping equivalent of Viagra, since there we were, four hours after arriving, still hard and questing for cheap kitsch. And finding a lot of possibilities, but nothing that screamed “Do me, now, you dirty bird.” “Buy me, now!”
Without Ikea blue balls, I wouldn’t have chanced walking into the as-is section with my to-be-purchases thus far (measuring cups and spoons, a rolling pin, candles, a few plates and some cutting boards) and I definitely wouldn’t have seen the loveseat/futon combo that I’ve been wanting for, oh, only about six months. On sale. Like, 30% of the regular price, sale. Already assembled.
Without seeing that futon marked down so drastically, as low as what I would have spent on a room for the night if we had gotten on the ferry, then I wouldn’t have found out that delivery from their store to my home is less than fifty bones and can include, like, 10 items.
Without that knowledge, I wouldn’t have dragged the futon/loveseat up to a cashier, gleefully beaming like a mentally-deficient sociopath, struggling to keep it on the two dollies it spanned, an eye on Isobel and pay by Interac. Then I wouldn’t have pushed it down the longest hallway of my life to the delivery section, where Isobel proceeded to knock over someone’s framed artwork – that was not from Ikea.
I also wouldn’t have witnessed her automatically acknowledge her mistake and apologize to the stranger without me admonishing her first, using two complete, clear sentences that showed a level of understanding I didn’t know she had. And shame. It was awing.
Without happily strolling out of the bathroom after arranging the delivery, I wouldn’t have had to wait for a bus for nearly two hours, meeting and befriending another mom and her two kids, who Isobel latched right on to. A mom and two kids who were going in the same direction as us, who became our travel companions.
Without waiting for that so long, the mom and I chatting, the girls digging for ants on a grassy knoll by the bus stop, I wouldn’t have arrived at the skytrain in time to meet a single dad and his son, also coming back from Ikea, who had taken a different bus than us. Who was also going in the same direction, but unfortunately, did not partake in the most excellent delivery deal and was laden with not only an over-tired four year old, but three bursting-at-the-seams bags.
Without the folly of a 35-year old single dad, with his overtired kid, my overtired kid, the other mom and her two overtired kids, all of us going in the same direction, we wouldn’t have bonded. And we wouldn’t have parted company with the mom and her two kids at the skytrain’s end, them wanting to hug Isobel goodbye. Which was almost cavity-creating, it was so sweet.
I wouldn’t have ended up deciding that the dad with no hands and an overtired kid on his second wind required Isobel and I to walk them to their bus stop, since I could easily stop a wayward youth from jumping into one-way downtown traffic.
And without me chasing two preschoolers down a sidewalk on a Saturday night, after their bedtimes, I wouldn’t have ended up laughing, having fun, and having this little boy, who’d just met me, hold my hand. And I wouldn’t have known that that could feel right.
Without that jaunt down the street from the skytrain, his dad struggling behind us and us three getting breathless with giggles, I wouldn’t have looked back a few extra times, accidentally. I wouldn’t have flourished toward the bus stop when we’d arrived there, because I’d accidentally reverted from my usual polished heart-made-of-ice exterior, into a giggling girl with a sense of humour. I wouldn’t have seen a look, right as I realized that I felt a feeling inside myself.
Without that feeling, I wouldn’t have smiled and merely said goodbye and that it was nice to have met them after the little boy hugged Isobel (verging on syrupy sweet, here, people), even though everything society’s taught me was screaming in my head ‘give him your phone number’. I wouldn’t have walked away with Isobel, half skipping and occasionally spinning her, waltz style, as we moved a block further from the dad and son duo. Who, it appeared, had watched our whole 110 yards journey.
Without feeling that there was something in the air between us, this mom and that dad, I would have likely never walked them to the bus stop with Isobel, and I wouldn’t have left them with a practically intuition-like feeling that I will be meeting them again, and when it happens, something will happen.
So, I guess what I’m trying to say is, if The Ex wasn’t an immature drunk, I never would be sitting in a newly decluttered apartment (because new furniture requires moving the old stuff around, which means that everything gets cleaned and reorganized, including the filing cabinet) on my new loveseat/futon, having recently met my potential future boy/best friend, wondering when I’ll meet him again.
So, I guess I should thank him.
