BATTLE OF THE SEXES

I ran into the person who is primarily responsible for introducing me to blogging.  Because of her, I leapt into cyberspace and began blogging and learning web design.  When I first met her she was single and vivacious.  10 years later, she no longer resembles that curious young girl that I watched evolve into womanhood.

The only major change in her life has been a full time man.

She lived with this man for a while then about 2 years ago they got married.  Immediately after they married, she began complaining to me about him and his conduct.  As soon as she took his last name, he became very controlling.  He started regulating the time she could spend on the internet and the time she spent with her family.  About 6 months ago, she asked me to stop sending emails to her personal account, citing her husband's dislike of our communication.  When I saw her today, she hardly spoke to me.  We rode the elevator together in silence.

Before her association with this man,  I was always greeted by a big smile and some engaging conversation.

Since her marriage, we have moved from confidants to distant cohabiters of the same work space.  I suspect this transition is a direct result of her openness about her relationship with me and her husband's insecurity about her relationships with men in general.

I had an epiphany, as I walked away from her causing me to write this piece.

I went through a very similar transition with all the women in my life, after I hooked up with Dracula. I now believe that this form of gender isolation occurs with many people in "committed" relationships.  I would like to explore that devolution with my readers.

Cease And Desist

Men and women engage in a battle of wills over the course of a long term relationship.  The conflict is very subtle at the beginning but gains steady momentum.  As time moves forward one finds oneself confronted by the prospect of fighting with one's spouse over issues that revolve around that other person's comfort level.  Individuals are faced with the choice of acceding to your significant others badgering or finding a new partner.  Most people give in.

As I was, in my relationship with Dracula, Baby Girl is "in it to win it".  She is not ready to concede and might not fully understand that she is embroiled in a battle of wills.  I certainly did not get it when I was smack dab in the middle of my power struggle.  It took me several years removed from my situation to understand how thoroughly I had been manipulated by my insecure lover.

Like A Snowball Rolling Down The Side Of A Snow Covered Hill

With Dracula, it started with a frown, one night at dinner, in an upscale soul food restaurant.  We were seated in a section of the eatery that had a particularly attractive waitress.  After the cute lightskinded waitress made her 3rd stop at the table, I asked Dracula what the problem was.  It turns out that Dracula thought the waitress was being a little too attentive to her Daddee.  I knew that Dracula was trippin.  There was NO merit to her suspicion.  As time went on, whenever we encountered any attractive waitress that was as light as or thinner than she, a temper tantrum would follow.  After a point, I stopped being the chronically attentive person that I am to people that are waiting on me.  If the waitress was real pretty or real pretty and real yella, I would try and avoid looking at her to ensure that I would not have a big fight in the car on the way home or after we got home!

Over time, I became so hen pecked that I severed all ties with everyone outside of work.  I was home by 7 o'clock every evening.  The only women I had contact with were her family members.

There was one member of her family that could not come to our house.  After the initial visit, Dracula would not allow her own younger, finer sister to come to our home alone.  I must admit that Baby Sis and I had a very natural attraction to one another (see "Doing The Dance") but it was rather innocent.  We could not help that we liked one another a lot but we had NO plan to do anything about it.  We were victims of our innate chemistry.

My transition from social animal to virtual shut-in was gradual.  It took Dracula about 2 years of whining and tantruming to get me to stop going to strip clubs with my partners.  All of my free time became hers.  Even as she gallivanted around town, I was sitting at home watching television. Being secure to the point of stupidity kept me from demanding to know her whereabouts at all times. She would stay in the street as late as 11pm, while I enjoyed my own company in front of my best friend la television.

Abuse Of Discretion

I went along in blissful hermitage for almost 6 years.  In the battle of wills, when one of the parties gives in the other will relax and wallow in their victory.  That relaxed state often causes the "victor" to reveal themselves in very unappealing ways.

Once Dracula had me where she wanted me, her extraordinary triflinness reared it's ugly head. Though she dressed impeccably and got her hair did at the 90th Floor in Birmingham, Dracula did not believe in a tidy living environment.  It took me a while to discover that her fung shui was based on chaos theory.

Dracula's clothing that needed to go to the cleaners sat in piles in our bedroom and her clothing that required laundering sat in larger piles on the floor of the laundry room.  She had forced me to fire my cleaning lady when she moved in with me declaring that "There's only going to be ONE WOMAN in this house!"  She made up for it by washing dishes and making the bed for about the first year.

I looked around one day and my house was 'tore up from the floor up'.  In fact, it looked exactly as her house had when we went over there to get some of her clothes, after she moved in with me!

One day while she was at work I bounced.

The previous December, Dracula asked me what I wanted for my birthday.  I replied: "A CLEAN HOUSE!"  I did not get what I wanted for my birthday.  That fateful December my nihilism and my self centered preservationism reawakened.

Kindness For Weakness

The sublimated ego, if managed properly, can be a powerful tool in the social dynamic.  It keeps you centered and not subject to acting irrationally or too emotionally.  In a long term dyadic relationship, the hubristic person tends to misunderstand that they are being "allowed" to have their way with their significant other.  They are often lulled into a false feeling of control.

Dracula was not the first person to come home to an "empty" house and shall not be the last.  She took her bed warmer for granted.  Her beautiful baby sister told me years later that I had make a "mistake" by assuring Dracula that I planned to always "Be there for her".  That belief was her own twisted interpretation and her narcissistic folly of the concept of reciprocity.

Homo sapiens are naturally aggressive.  As we course through the social diaspora we learn to be passive or overt in our aggression.  Passive aggressive individuals have a broader agenda than those of us who care not to camouflage our modus operandus.  Passive aggressive people will lay in wait and seduce then brow beat the unsuspecting into a complacent state.  That worked well for Dracula until I became discontent.

After I bounced, it did not take me long to get back into the swing of things only something changed.  I had become inexorably co-dependent.

For 8 years, I was involved in a partnership. Although many partners abuse the trust that develops, it still creates a co-dependency none the less.  Without that partnership, many individuals that thought they were captains find themselves cruising aimlessly without a rudder. Dracula found that out.  She called me crying more than once. "You tried to tell me" became her mantra.  To no avail.

Scorched Earth Policy

In the Battle of the Sexes, there can be no winner. The best one might be able to obtain is a truce that allows both parties to cohabit the same space.  I learned from watching my Mother and Father that brute force is no match for cunning.  My Father was no dummy, he was a caveman that had discovered fire, then pissed all over the blaze when it got too hot! He later found himself unable to rekindle the flame!

I vowed to never resort to brutism in deference to my Mother, whom I adored.  Experience taught that brutism never got my Father any measurable results.  He died alone and lonely.  All that he had at the end was pictures of his former wife and children in his wallet.  His cruelty to my dear Mother inexorably divided our family.  He in effect won the battle but lost the war!

Dracula sent a very suggestive email to me a few months ago.  When I told her to drop dead, she accused me of being "bitter".  I have no time for bitterness.  It does not occur to her, at this point in time, that she betrayed me and our relationship in lieu of her own narcissistic considerations.  She only remembers what was important to her own selfish interest.  In the Battle of the Sexes, most people loose site of the synergy created by the partnership.

Extracting myself from Dracula's vice grip allowed me to resume my literary life which she secretly feared and actively discouraged because it caused me to have "literary admirers".  She and I met after I sent her my first book, 'Drug Holiday'.  She came to fear what she once treasured about me!

This piece is dedicated to my friend in the hope that she will have the courage to reclaim her happiness.  At the end of the day one's ability to be at peace and be happy is self sustaining.  No one can give it to you.....