Monday, February 04, 2008

Strange but true, apples make me feel better about the world.*

I've got a problem that half my world, the internet, and my family [cousins, honestly, bastards with big mouths] has managed to pick up on. Let me say from the outset that I do not believe myself to be in love with anyone. I have some fairly well established crushes that are not and will not go anywhere largely because I am a fuckwit and am generally unattractive, unappealing, and a total pain in the arse. Granted, this doesn't stop some people but the people I am interested always seem to have mightily good taste and the sense to run rather than deal with me. (Cunts.) However, I can deal. Also, I quite realise that my chances of turning into a sad old spinster with way too many cats and a penchant for inappropriately fondling young men is extremely high. I suppose I'll cope with that too, sooner or later.

My problem is a young man. A very young man. And a case of overwhelming physical attraction that, well, defies all my logic. It’s actually quite difficult to admit this as he ticks absolutely none of my usual boxes being, as he is, kind of the anti-Jarvis. He is completely unread (his main reading material being pr0n-lite) and knows so little about anything that all conversation includes prolonged explanation and frequent recourse to a dictionary. In short, I have a seriously disturbing physical attraction for a boy who really oughtn’t do anything for me.

At least it’s reciprocated, right? Well no actually. I mean, it is reciprocated but this causes more problems that it should and although I’m almost certain that a quick fuck behind the bike sheds would solve the problem there are some really irritating barriers. (If any one can find me a good reason for having a conscience I would very much like them now. This is doing my head in far more than I would like to admit.) The barriers are his being a colleague and his teenage girlfriend. (Fuck I hate teenagers; I didn’t even particularly like being one.) Seriously, though, me vs nubile teenager – just who do you think is winning here? Given the frequency with which he utters the painfully irritating phrase, ‘I would never cheat on ---.’ I am not entirely sure. It’s not like I’ve propositioned him either. I am not the one doing the asking of the very leading and very sexual questions or most of the borderline inappropriate touching.

Of course I can’t win against the teenaged girl. She’s everything a disturbingly young man is supposed to want in life. Well, so he says anyway. A paragon of fuckable virtue. And me? Oh really, I’m nothing. The font of all knowledge, the one he spends his days with and his time trying to please, the one whose space he invades because oh because he can. The positions feel locked and I just don’t know what to do. I know what I ought to do. I should be the grown up, I should diffuse the situation, I should sacrifice my desire to a) common sense [colleague – very bad form indeed] and b) maturity. But I don’t want to. It’s been a long time since I’ve wanted anyone so much and he’s there all the time and I can just reach out…

* Kisses on the cheek and a chocolate digestive to anyone who makes it through this mishmash horror of a post.

56 comments:

Martin Kingsley said...

Consciences and morality do get in the way, don't they? The girlfriend particularly complicates the matter. Possibly this little shit is getting his kicks from torturing you, but he may not actually be that clever, from the sound of it.

What a quandary. I suppose you could always push him down the stairs. Failing that, either force the issue one way or the other, maybe. That or set his house on fire.

In the event of arson, I was in England at the time.

Mish said...

The part I find the most worrying in this post is the self-name calling. That shit has to stop. The second most worrying is what the dude above me says.

In lieu of violence, I'd suggest some straight talk with the young man.

Shelley said...

* Kisses and cheeks and virtual chocolate dgestives handed out.

Martin, oh foolish mortal, like I haven't tried violence. Being a boy he's only about forty times stronger than me. Alas, not actually stupid either - just somewhat immature and also (mutters) I may be sending out some very mixed and confusing signals (you did not hear me say that). I'm a bit surprised that his brain hasn't exploded actually.

Mish, you should hear what I call him and to his face. I am being awfully fuckwitted though. My common sense has fled the building. Hell, I posted this - ugh! So getting him a little drunk and taking advantage would be wrong, right?

Mish said...

Mature men are so much... cooler. I don't know what's wrong or right, but I'm good at generalising and therefore I think he might be pulling your string. Guy in a relationship gets bored and starts looking for thrills elsewhere, only to hurt people in the process. Is it really worth it?

Shelley said...

So much more mature? Oh yes.

I really don't know if that's his style. Oh who knows, maybe. He certainly knows how to push my buttons.

Dan said...

I too am into someone who has a significant other. The problem for me is that she is fed up with him, but still thinks something can be gleaned from the situation. Is this boy still into his girl? Do they seem to get along, or is he always complaining about her? Either way, you can't say anything about their relationship to him because it would be awfully self-serving and bad in the long run.

Part the second: Stop calling yourself bad things and being so damn down! We all have periods of time when we do this, but you seem to be very stuck in the muck. If you change the way you think about yourself, you will come across very different to others and be far more attractive. It has nothing to do with your looks (which, by the way, and not bad at all). It has to do with the self confidence that you (don't)radiate. You are only as beautiful as you think you are. Just don't overdo it and become a cunt.

Anonymous said...

Dan is a very smart man.
You oughta listen to him Nails!
Let your inner beauty shine through, girl.
Hold your head up!
Fuck the 19 year old guy,(and I don't mean literally)
You deserve better than that!

Shelley said...

Dan, he almost never mentions her. I suspect that she kinda bores him but, well, trophy. Don't really care. I don't want a relationship with him - I just want to borrow him for a few hours. She is merely an obstacle. Well, that and I don't think he's all that into me. Attracted yes but unlikely to do anything about it. Annoying. Very annoying.
Lol, Dan, I am a cunt - at least part of the time. And take it with a grain of irony - I'm in danger of having my head turned by all his attention and great belief in my intellectual prowess without you lot starting as well!
Admittedly though there's a something else going on in my head that's fucking with my cool and my self-esteem and stems from sheer bloody idiocy and an unfortunate tendency to believe the stories my imagination comes up with. It filters through. I know it filters through. But, I guess, this is a diary, right?

Kathy, but literally is what I want! All I want! Okay, not all but all from this particular situation. And, yes, Dan is a star.

JahTeh said...

Feed the fantasy but don't feel the boy.

And you'd better see 'The Graduate' after all.

Shelley said...

I thought the two things were not unrelated, jahteh.

I feel the boy anyway. What a whore [er, him, loves to be touched especially by older ladies [not me!] who like touching young men [well I do but I'm not such a touchy person].

The fantasy that's fucking with my head is quite unrelated to this boy. And, honestly, it needs to be starved to death. Unrealistic. Far, far more so than this little storm in a tea cup.

Anonymous said...

I think you need to fuck him and get it out of your system.

And surely this is your place and you can refer to yourself however you want? Nearly everything I do or say is followed in my mind by "Stupid bitch, why did you say/do that?". I don't know if it makes it 'better' that I don't write this down or reveal it on my blog.

p.s. I'm really enjoying your writing.

Shelley said...

Pomgirl, thank you! I know I do but he's not so willing [once again mutters something nasty about teenaged girlfriends].

As much as I am beating myself up I am being honest and trying to gain some perspective. I really can't see how I would possibly come out looking good - physically - next to a pretty little seventeen year old. For the record I'm pretty sure I'm way smarter and way more interesting but, well, how can you really compare? Oh well, eh?

P.S. Many thanks.

Al Cad said...

Well, you’re out of pocket one packet of choc digestives and half a tube of lip-gloss and you’ve ended up with less help than you’d get from a random fortune cookie – printed in Chinese!

It doesn’t matter if he’s 19 or 90; as a work colleague, once it all goes pear-shaped every day for a very long time will be a nightmare. So unless you’re either 98+% sure it’ll work out or one of you is planning to quit their job...

Shelley said...

al cad, I know, I know, I know.

I don't think anything will happen. We'll just keep up with the incessant bickering and mock fighting until one of us leaves. Such fun, yeah?

Al Cad said...

The bugger with that is that it stymies your love life.

Work relationships where there’s an attraction have a nasty habit of getting emotionally charged – not surprising as you’re often spending more time together than a couple living together would in waking hours. You can end up feeling as if you’re in a relationship (with a capital R) or heading towards one, and lose interest in pursuing anyone else.

Have you thought about internet dating? The impression I get is that your Mr Right would be very different from this guy: a few years older than you, dominant in the bedroom and a gentlemen and friend outside it; plus someone who knows his J.R.R from his J.K. While trying this might fill you with trepidation, that can be a pretty good feeling, and would probably be sufficiently overwhelming to snap you out of this impasse. Of course, you’d need to be careful, but hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

One more thing, if you go cold on this guy at work while you’re trying this he might (instinctively) start getting fresh on you. Don’t let that sway you – stick to your game plan. Good luck!

Shelley said...

Got anyone in mind, al cad? There really isn't a love life for it to stymie at the moment and I'm hardly going to stop being interested in more interesting people because of some impossible boy. I think I'll concentrate rather more, for the moment, on finding a better job which is something I badly need.

You're quite right about the emotional charge though. That, coupled with the sexual tension, is probably what does my head in.

Al Cad said...

Anyone in mind? LOL! Well I’m in Melbourne, plus I haven’t tried internet dating myself, plus my good intentions with, for instance, my hardbound complete Lord of the Rings usually fail to get me far beyond the frontispiece!

You might not think you’re hung up on this guy, but who is it you think about in the evenings? It might not always be positive thoughts, but if the answer is him...

If you’re generally not satisfied in your job, that idea of finding a better one sounds like a sure-fire plan. But I still think you’d find it eye-opening to see what criteria it’s possible to specify on the dating sites.  ;-)

Shelley said...

My night time thoughts have divided loyalties. That would be the other little matter that I mention above. And both need to be starved.

Oh well, you seemed to have the answers so I thought you might have someone in mind :p

Al Cad said...

;-)  But you’ve never been to the best city in the world? How come?

This other little matter wouldn’t be Cocker-related, would it?

Shelley said...

No, the other little matter is a real person though just as untouchable [quite literally I suspect] as the Jarv.

Best city in the world..? Oh, you mean Melbourne. I'm not much of a traveller - mostly through lack of fundage and being almost totally unable to tell my mother that she can't have all my holiday time. Oh the emotional blackmail!

Al Cad said...

Curiouser and curiouser... Seems almost as if you’re setting up obstacles and giving yourself reasons for cop-outs. Of course mums want to spend time with their kids, but what they usually want even more is to live vicariously through their kids’ adventures in life.

If you choose to spend an entire holiday away from your mum, doing something amazing, she’ll understand. Trust me, I’m a doctor!*

* Not actually a doctor

Shelley said...

I live very far away from my family, al, and they don't see me very often so the only times I do tend to see them are when I am on holiday. She doesn't really understand my desire not to visit her or spend my holidays with her here because she thinks that means that I don't want to see my family and therefore don't love them. And, yes, I know she has issues [at least one being that her mother did exactly the same thing to her and despite her resentment she would do it to me].
If my circumstances were different then her mentality might be different but mothers do tend to think they own their spinster daughters! :p

Al Cad said...

*sigh*  It’s certainly been unsettling for me to witness some less than selfless characteristics in my mum, but, like all of us, mothers are only human. With email, video chat, etc., there are lots of ways to stay in touch these days, and if you do your own thing sometimes your mum will come to terms with that, and ultimately be happy for you.

Shelley said...

You forgot telephones - the parents were annoying me by phone earlier. I do do my own thing most of the time. Almost all of it, in fact. I'm certainly not a slave to my mother - that's what my sister who lives near my parents is for...
My dad keeps her in line too but he also tends to want to see me.
I'm sure that if I had the cash for a real holiday things would be different but I never really do and so never really have one.

Al Cad said...

Me thinks you get around a little more than you let on. Monsoons?

Ah, telephones. I’ve had to resort to the answerphone-that-says-to-big-sis-I’m-not-in more times than I care to admit!

Shelley said...

In my limited way, I do. Although, alas, the pun on that is not true.

Monsoons? As in Eddy or lots and lots of rain? Possibly both.

You reminded me of the message my sister left on my answering machine yesterday, 'NO! I will not leave a message!' It took me a moment to realise that it was my sister and not my aunt leaving the message. I can't wait to tell her how like her least favourite aunt she sounds on the phone.

Al Cad said...

As in lots and lots of rain. Not Eddy – I don’t believe that for a second!

It was a bit oblique of me, just throwing in a single word from your archives!

Re your sister: LOL! (Actually, LQTM, but that one’ll never catch on!)

Shelley said...

Oh, I don't know, I've certainly seen my mother squeezed into clothes two sizes to small... [I may be lying. She is a tiny bit really very vain though.]

Yes, they live in the far far north.

You do keep throwing my archives at me. Been reading up? Goodness, any minute now you'll know my name and address. Discretion may not be one of my virtues.

Al Cad said...

Yes, I have the Mechanical Turk working 24/7 to find salacious titbits – they get 1 cent for each one, so it’s costing me a fortune!

Not really. But I did run into your Monkey obsession, which reminded me of one time – I may, possibly, have had a few sips of something alcoholic – when I tried enthusiastically explaining the show by plucking an invisible piece of fluff from my neck, putting it in my palm and doing the karate blow move. My friends looked at me in horror – jaws may have even dropped – as if they now had to urgently reassess my sanity!

Mind you, I never went as far as getting the box set – that would just be weird!  :-p

Shelley said...

Then there are those the horse-that's-a-dragon-that-turns-into -a-human moments... It made way more sense when I was a kid.

Also, Monkey is a deep and abiding love [and just about the only religion that I got as a child], Jarvis Cocker is the obsession! Sheesh, I though that was like totally obvious.

Al Cad said...

What looks like a horse is really a demon which reverts to being human when it’s cleansed by the words of the Priest. Sheesh, how much more straightforward could it be?

I hadn’t really thought about the religious influence – I guess it was a weekly dose of Buddhism for our impressionable young selves. (The kind of Buddhism where you attack your enemies with staffs, and don’t bother with boring things like meditation.)

I was also seriously into Blake’s Seven, which probably wasn’t a very religious experience, but did, at least have a computer in it called Zen...

Shelley said...

Only my version is more accurate...

I still maintain that the only real way to solve problems is to beat them with a magic stick. Alas, I do not have a magic stick. A broom handle does nicely though.

I don't recall ever seeing Blake's Seven. I was in the wilderness though and it might not have managed to fight through.

Al Cad said...

Yeah, thinking about it I may have rolled three things into one in my drunken Monkey spruik: I think the staff was shrunk and kept behind his ear or somewhere, the cloud summoned with the karate blow and the fluff used to make Monkey clones. Would that be about right?

I used to watch Blake’s Seven in the UK. When I came over here my dad would write me about the plot twists, which meant a lot to me. The show was a bit Star Wars -like, except there were only seven of them and they’d stolen the fastest and most advanced ship in the galaxy. With teleporters, laser sidearms and wristband communicators the show rocked. And it was darker than Star Wars, Avon making Solo seem like a boy scout.

Shelley said...

Han Solo was a boy scout. A very, very sexy boy scout with a bit of an attitude. Also, possibly the only man ever to look sexy in a vest.

Chest hairs make Monkey clones. Yes to the magic wishing staff. And the cloud summoning was slightly more complicated but yes.

Al Cad said...

Cool. There’s hope for my memory yet.

Shelley said...

Even while drunk..?

Al Cad said...

No, at that point it clearly becomes like something out of The Fly. However, afterwards I remember every last cringe-worthy detail! Actually, I don’t allow myself to get bladdered any more; my remaining brain cells are pretty relieved about that...

Shelley said...

I never saw The Fly. I think I'd much rather not. Wait, was there a Simpsons version? Why am I getting Bart-fly images..?

I find that alcohol related memory loss is my friend even if no-one else is after I've had alcohol. Fuck it, booze will stand by me as it has for generations of my family!

Al Cad said...

Yeah, I think there was a Bart-fly – not as disturbing as Homer eating some of his doughnut head!

I put my ability to remember the night before the day after down to some impressive chundering abilities. (Alas, this is yet to be added as an Olympic sport.)

So what’s your poison, or is it anything with alcohol in? There’s some new research that’s found there’s a comfort/de-stressing drug in red wine. Partial to cider myself.

Shelley said...

I'm pretty easy. Beer, wine, vodka. They all create different drunks though.
I try not to vomit though - ugh, one of my least favourite things to do ever.

Al Cad said...

Yes, and so much worse when you’re drunk. If you’re ill then you’re probably at home with a bowl or something. But if you’re wrecked at a pub/club... Best not to even go there! But the great thing is, after some water and unconsciousness/sleep – no hangover!

So what are these three drunks like, and do we see a fourth if you mix?

Shelley said...

I think they must be experienced to be really appreciated.

Mixing drinks turns me into an evil harridan who turns innocent Indian boys to drink and does other less charming things.

All alcohol loosens my tongue which, really, ought to be glued to the roof of my mouth for the evil things it wants to utter.

Al Cad said...

Excellent. I’ll look forward to you posting some suitably demonstrative mobile video clips on YouTube for my edification...

Shelley said...

Ah, an optimist. One with a sick sense of humour at that.

Al Cad said...

Is a sick sense of humour a good thing in your book?

Shelley said...

One must be able to find the humour in anything and, if all else fails, set up evil little traps for others to fall into...

Oh dear, I wonder what demon borrowed my fingers and typed that?

Al Cad said...

Perhaps you have a panis fixation...

Shelley said...

Was that supposed to be an oven for me to walk into?

Al Cad said...

Just a quip. I’m not a trap-setter – least of all for you, to whom I wish only good things...

Shelley said...

And what good things might they be?

Al Cad said...

Oh look, my very own oven!

You’re the one with that answer. We spend a lot of our time speculating that we know what’s good for others, but rarely get it the remotest bit right...

Shelley said...

Ah, back to being a Guru again. Well, Yoda...

The best good thing I could wish for right now is a very good night's sleep and a very very quiet day at work tomorrow. I suspect that work will yeild more irritations in the guise of pesky reporters though.

Al Cad said...

(A little taller than Yoda...)

The great thing about being a writer is that pesky people begin to become goldmines of inspiration.

Sweet dreams...

Shelley said...

And the crapness of my job means that one pesky person walks out the door and another one comes in the window. Okay, that's not true, the windows don't open.

Even Luke was taller than Yoda and in all other situations he was a freakin' midget.

Ann ODyne said...

NO! Run away FAST.
If you let pron-lite muddy your pond:
think about 'after'

he will be smirking and
his GF will stalk you
and you will feel used.
he is not worthy of you.
Distract yourself with something else.
please.

repeat this mantra:
The Male is hard-wired to want ALL the mares in the herd.

(all this is Copperwitch's bad influence, but when she catches one of her toyboys, HE is the one who comes out of it feeling used)

Shelley said...

I was going for abused but if he felt used I'd be all good with that too. I must sit at Dame Copperitch's feet and beg the oracle to tell all!

The stupid boy has rather solved the issue by moving departments and choosing not to work very much all of which means I will not have to deal with him very much. That should be quite helpful.

His GF would stalk me too - tragic little bogan!