Phooey

Whatever happened to primal scream therapy anyhow?

So I wrote an entire entry yesterday about honesty in writing without ever mentioning what in the hell was really bothering me.

What happened was, this past weekend, the very same weekend CJ and I spent cruising up and down Santa Monica Boulevard, I also got together a couple of times with some friends of mine. I didn't mention that in the entries because it seemed more personal than the public looking-for-an-apartment stuff. CJ and I went to a party and to a brunch with these friends. I know I was hyper, I know I talked a lot about moving down to Los Angeles--

--but yesterday one of my friends called and said that I had behaved badly. That I'd been completely narcissistic and not at all interested in what was going on with anyone else. And, if I were going to continue to behave like that, things were going to change between us.

And I had no idea what to say. The right thing never occurs to me at the time. I go blank and it's only later I come up with the proper thing to say.

The proper thing to say, by the way, did occur to me: "I'm feeling very defensive right now and I don't feel I can discuss this." And then wait until I'm not feeling defensive and more like an adult.

I asked CJ if I had been so boorish. She said she didn't think so (at least, ha ha, not more than usual), but she doesn't know what my usual interaction with those friends is like.

My first impulse is to run around and scream and stomp my feet. And then I want either to say, "No, it's all untrue!" or "God, I'm a terrible person, I'll go hide in a cave forever." I tend to do this when I have to deal with confrontation. I can't handle difficult, unpleasant situations--at least, not easily.

I'll do something about this, I promise. And I'll get back to being silly tomorrow. Or whenever.

I forgot to mention anything else I did today. The main activity of the day (other than running around doing errands that were not, ahem, done in my absence [Yes, Darin, I mean you]) was having lunch with my friend Judy. We discussed, in no particular order: sex, Silicon Valley, Hollywood, my looking for an apartment, and Apple Computer. We met in the Tech Pubs department at Apple but didn't really become friends until after I left.

She brought me up to date on who's leaving Apple these days. I loved Apple for so many years, for 10 years before I started working there even -- it hurts to watch it implode. To see it fall apart because of stupidity and greed, not because the other guy has a better product (which they don't, not even close).

Since we're both married we had to content ourselves by discussing other people's sex lives. Luckily, there was enough gossip to go around.