I felt the need to open them because I haven't been sleeping well. A combination of still being a little sick, and breakup stress, I think. I'm becoming more and more convinced that this is the right decision; it's starting to feel right. I only occasionally have the impulse to send Kev e-mail saying I've changed my mind... But my brain is still pretty unhappy about breaking up with him, and persists in sending me nightmares. I woke up around 3 a.m. from one in which Kev was telling me about the new woman in his life, the one who was requiring that he never talk to me ever again (actually, it was your friend Ellie from Seattle, Jed). Woke up completely panicked. Took a while to get back to sleep. That scenario actually happening is so unlikely that I would bet a year's pay against it -- but part of my brain still worries. It did happen, with someone I dated casually -- when he got married, his wife made him cut off all ties with everyone he'd ever dated. This made me furious for months -- after all, he and I had been friends for years -- we'd only dated for three months. It was a lot of friendship to give up. Though I was angry at him, not at her. Guess I still am, in a quieter way.
Eh. Not worth the energy. There's too many good things in this world for me to waste my time on that kind of nonsense. Monday I went up to Berkeley for the afternoon; did a little birthday present shopping, and then hung out with Karen at Au Coquelet, drinking cider and catching up. I do like cities that have cafes with hard cider! That evening, Susan came over and had curry with me and David (and more cider, which left me a little hung over -- ah well). Nice evening. Tuesday, I went up to Berkeley early, supposedly to work. Instead, I read Kathleen Goonan's Queen City Jazz, one of the most fun hard sf novels I've read in a while. I also ran into Debbie Notkin and her friend Guy -- apparently, Debbie has also adopted Cafe Elodie in Berkeley as a good hangout. I recommend it -- right next to the BART station, decent food, chai (a bit sweet), tons of outlets, comfy couches.
Came back home, leftovers with David, then we went over to Susan's for a little birthday cake and coffee with Heather, Karen and Jed. That was just delightful. Surrounded by people I love, and having the kind of relaxed fun discussion that you can only have with people you're really comfortable with. We actually ended up talking about sex a fair bit; stripping and strip clubs and such were a big part of the conversation. Also sex post-baby. :-) I really miss this kind of conversation -- I had them some when I was in Oakland before, and lots in college. In Salt Lake, I have friends that I could theoretically have this kind of conversation with -- except that they're colleagues too, and there's a level of frankness that just doesn't seem to happen. Kind of a bummer. It's hard to drop the awareness of our professional relationship...and I'm not even sure I ought to. So even though I like some of them very much, the friendships feel limited. Maybe that'll change as time goes on, or once we graduate. Dunno.
Today, I work some in the morning, and then take David computer shopping. He desperately needs one. I'm going to try to talk him into a titanium powerbook -- if I can't afford one, then *someone* I know should get one. :-) We're also planning to swing by Lake Merritt and make sure there's no problems with sailing on Saturday -- also find out if it'll be okay to have helium balloons at the lake. We'd be very careful not to let any of them fly off and hurt the birds.... Then tonight, he's going to go over to Heather's, so theoretically, I'll be getting more work done. Heh. We'll see...
It's my birthday tomorrow! (in case you forgot...)