Oh. (Dumped)

Oh.

Still no news from LEA. No text. No message. I hate myself for doing so, but I check her Facebook. She is definitely back, its full of loads of shit updates. Whats going on?

I email her at lunchtime, ‘Hey! Are you back?’

She replies, ‘Yeah’

Nothing else. One word. Not even a full stop.

Oh.

This is not good.

I don’t reply.

The afternoon passes.

I walk home, and decide to go up round the Hoe. I pass a bench looking out over the sea and sit down to think. I look to my right and see another bench. I suddenly get a memory. That bench, this location, has some history. It’s the bench I sat on about 9 years ago, under what feels like similar circumstances, when I had just split with my Uni girlfriend. At this moment (well, lets not lie, about 1 minute after id set off again) I get the text.

'Blah blah blah are you free for a chat blah blah blah blah I'm finding more than friends weird and holiday made me realise that. Don’t want to loose you as a friend thou blah blah blah blah'

Oh.

So that’s it.

My mind whirrs. I'm gutted, but it’s some sort of relief to know at least. My brain kicks out these thoughts, in this order, over the next 5 minutes:

1. Does that mean she’s shacked up with some cunt on her holiday?
2. What am I going to do with the tickets I bought for us to go and see Tim Minchin on Sunday?
3. I cringe at the thought of sending her a FaceBook message while she was on holiday saying that I missed her loads.
4. What / How has (this) gone wrong in such a short space of time?
5. I don’t think I want to be friends with her. Ive seen a different side and cant go back.

I get home. I decide to run away from the problem. I run for 2 hours. I did 1¾ hours yesterday, so I’ve just set a new record for the most running I’ve ever done in 2 days – about 30 miles.

I feel more angry than distraught.

But I still cry a little bit.

My thoughts sway between two schools. The ageing 3-belt champion idea is to call her up and launch into her; tell her she shouldn’t be so fickle, shouldn’t fuck about with peoples feelings, and should have told me before she went on holiday. But this is not me. The undefeated young challenger idea is to try and rise above it – we were good friends once - we've got lots of mutual friends. Maybe, probably, in a week or two ill be grateful for doing so if I bite my lip now. I decide to not reply and let things set in for a day or two.

Then I get home and change my mind. I think I should send her a text or else she might call me and I don’t really want to speak to her. At first I write:

‘WTF?! Youre so weird. You shouldnt fuck about with peoples feelings’

But during typing it the predictive text only found ‘duck’ instead of ‘fuck’ and as I was trying to solve it the screen suddenly said ‘Sending Message.’

Panic!

I press every button on the phone 34 times in one second and thank fuck it cancelled the sending. Phew. I’m not sure what LEA would have made of ‘you shouldn’t duck’ Maybe she would have taken it as a threat – ‘don’t you fucking duck bitch when I shoot at you!’ - Or maybe not. I think back to when I finished with the Twin and got a blank text through; I guess she wasn’t quite so lucky with the cancelling.

Having read the text back it sounded a bit jovial, a bit matter of fact. I want her to know she has hurt, but I don’t want to write an essay. I change it to;

‘Oh. Understood. I am gutted. You shouldnt be so fickle with peoples hearts’

No Reply.

Good.

Now I'm in my room listening to Damien Rice and Arcade Fire, typing this. I made some freezer bolognaise but cant eat it. I try to phone my mum (she doesn’t know about LEA) as it would be nice to have a chat about nothing in particular, but she is engaged for three tries.

Oh.

Without wanting to sound too fickle myself, I’m looking forward to ‘Amazon’ tonight more than ever. Ive heard that they go to Manaus in one episode, the city I stayed in for 6 weeks last year.

I hope AnnE and DPsyc are not downstairs as Ill have to tell them and it will be rubbish.

Dumped.

Oh.

Porno Pants: Episode 6

I’ve just set off on the swim and my left goggle is filling up with water. I swear at the goggle for leaking and at myself for risking changing the lens before the start. I do a length with my eye shut and wonder if I can carry on like this- its only 12 more lengths to go. Then the goggle becomes completely full and looses all semblance of suction with my eye socket. They come off my face but are held onto my head by the grey swimming hat im wearing. Soon the drag of the goggles pulls my hat off and I have to grab them both with my right hand. I try to swim with them in a clenched fist, but it doesnt work so I have to try and open open a few fingers to get some grip on the passing water.

It is not going to be a good day.

About 18 mins later and, ive made it out onto the bike leg. I’ve been cornering well and have overtaken a few guys just by not breaking so much on the bends. I go down a steep hill and see a yellow ‘Caution Cyclists! Bend’ sign some way before the bottom. I slow down and easily make it around a modest corner, and curse the organisers for warning me, slowing me down, for a nonexistent danger. A few more K’s past and I am hooning it downhill again. A ‘Caution Cyclists! Bend’ sign flashes past, and I half heartedly apply a little pressure to the brake. Then, all of a sudden, there is a very sharp bend. I force the break-pads onto the front rim, and begin to slow down, but with every turn of the wheel I am getting closer and closer to the verge. When I reach the apex of the corner my brain has made some complex calculations based around the rate at which im approaching the verge, the curve of the corner and the rate at which I’m decelerating. It has come up with the conclusion that im fucked. I get an unfamiliar sense of resignation to my fate, and I close my eyes and brace for what is about to happen.

I open my eyes and Im laying on my back, in a ditch, my head facing up the hill. I hear a groan while I wait for my senses to deliver a damage report. Nothing comes in. I stand up, see my bike lying in the road about 5 metres away, and suddenly panic that there will be other cyclists coming down the hill wanting to use the bit of road that my bike currently occupies. I walk out and get my bike, which seems, much like my legs, to be in good working order. I feel my left shoulder, which has a slight ache, and my hand returns with a few thin lines of blood on its palm, but nothing major. I decide to carry on, so clip into the pedals, wonder how they became unclipped in the crash, and pedal on up the road. Two cyclists overtake me, and I start removing bits of grass and mud from my brake levers, water bottle holder – my water bottle is missing – and front derailleur.


(My shoulder grazes this morning)

Another 10KM done now. I’m not hurt from the crash but my brain whirrs through the possibilities of what might have happened. The adrenaline in my system and gratefulness for another chance to race combine to give me extra momentum and I force the pedals round and round, zooming along the flat. The final hill looms large in front of me and I grit my teeth as I get out of the saddle to get it over and done with. Then disaster. A horrible "CRACK" and I look down to see my rear derailleur and chain having an untidy party where they shouldnt be in amongst my back wheel.

Fuck.

Fuck fucking fuck.

I get off and have a closer look. There is no hope - the rear mech has snapped in two.

(My rear mech this morning)

I try to push the bike, but it won’t even roll along because of the chain in the wheel. I can’t run in my cycling shoes, so take them off and clip them into the pedals. Then I put my bike on my shoulder and run up the hill. I get to the top and realise my bare feet are hurting from the tarmac, and I ask some spectators how far they think it is to the finish. The general consensus seems to be 5 miles, which I consider running with my bike, but my bare feet, and the state they’d be in for next weekend’s Half marathon make me realise my race is over. I swear again, not wanting to concede defeat and sit on a wall, deflated. A spectator offers me a lift back to the start and I gratefully accept – what a generous man – thank you. He drops me off at my car which I break into (my key is in the sports centre) and put the bike in.

That leaves a 200 m walk up the road to the race transition area. As I approach, the race stewards and two policemen come running over and ask me if im ok, and if ive been mugged for my bike. I explain that Im OK and have just crashed out. They ask me where I crashed and I say on a bend at the bottom of the hill with the Caution Cyclists – Bend sign, but they don’t really catch on to my irony. I walk back through the crowds in the race village and see people tapping their friends shoulders and point at me. I look down and see im bare footed, bleeding from my back and have red scratches and grazes on my left leg and arm. I go to the organising tent and tell them what happened, then get my stuff out of transition and buy some lunch.

‘Chalk it up to experience’ my dad says later that night. And I have.

Leaves on the line

Its not quite gone off the rails, but progress in my new life down south has been frustratingly slow for the past month or so.

I wont blame the weather, and will try not to dwell on the wettest June for 95 years, or the severe flooding that has followed it in July. Things have just slowed to a near stop after a frantic first six weeks of meeting people, drinking, and then meeting people I would struggle to remember the next day.

I guess that things run in cycles, and there can't be solid back to back great times, if for no other reason than their regularity would, by definition, stop them being unusually great.

I'm amazed at how close I've got to my French housemate T. I'd had an irrational loathing of the stereotypical french ever since 'they' stole my football while I was inter-railing with friends as a carefree 21 year old. Both the already departed J, and the soon to depart T have been wonderful to live with, and I feel lucky to have met such a friendly and funny pair. Ive had great fun spending a whole evening getting drunk with T, saying 'un bon muff' and laughing whenever an attractive looking girl has come onto the TV. Sad, I know, but somehow it was brilliant. I'm not sure what I'm going to do when T leaves on Weds. Not in the mopping a tear with my hanky type way, but because his room is the first in a series of three that will quickly be emptied and refilled by a girl. A few years ago this would have filled me with excitement at the prospect of rolling round the lounge floor with a new arrived single housemate (happened once in 8 years!), but today I'm genuinely more worried about being in the middle of the winging / bitching / tension that is bound to happen when 5 twenty somethings with no Y chromosomes start interacting.

Still, the cycle will turn around again I'm sure, and it is interesting to imagine what the future holds down here. I hope I can get a neat circle of friends together and start doing some things on the weekends when the weddings and watching le tour de France have run their course.

This might well start next weekend, as camping and then a night fishing trip are all booked in.