The First Week Of The Summer Semester

the first week of the summer semester

girls&boys

on sunday i spontanously got to work a bit. i wanted to go see our newest play anyways, so it was great that i could take a colleague's shift who was sick.

so i checked the tickets for one and a half hours, light the candles and counted the people. my colleague who manages the bar area of the theatre said he missed me a lot, he is from bangladesh and he's chill and fun. he always makes me coffee and jokes around. i had missed the theatre. it's very unique indeed. we play so many plays with relativly few actors in our ensemeble. each play is incredibly thought provoking and sophisticated. this play, boys&girls, just premiered last week to an exclusive audience. so on sunday it was the first regular show. my colleague ka., a dramaturge, shortly introduced into the play beforehand. and then i sat next to my colleague pa., one of the stage tech guys, to watch the play that was set on the small foyer's stage. he had prepared himself by reading the book. which surprised me. many of the stage tech people are very simple people, somewhat bogans (that sounds condescending, but they are just not the kind of people to read a book for fun, you know?)... the actress did her job so well. i love her facial expressions, so natural, so real. the play was directed by that woman who is the very known affair of the current theatre director. apparently through her very intimate involvements in the theatre life she keeps climbing the career ladder in that theatre. she started as a simple press officer and within two years managed to become an actress and director herself. i look down on her though. she is very fake. she is married herself and the theatre director himself is married as well, to the woman who will be the new director from summer on. what they have is pathetic and disgusting. she'd have potential on being somewaht of a role model if she got her positions through honest work, but not like that! though i must admit she directed this play very well. the scenery was very minimalist, i liked the choice of and use of music very much as well. the play is about toxic masculinity i'd say. about how even somebody who seemed perfect for the longest time can develop to be toxic and even: dangerous. the nameless woman's husband ends up killing both their children and later himself, because he could not bear the fact that his wife was more successfull than he himself.

in my own relationships men always ended up being violent and aggressive towards me. every single time, even somebody who i percieved the most calm and nicest guy ever. of course at some point one must seriously question oneselves. is it my fault? am i really as horrible as to make every man go insane and violent? that's at least what b. told me in one of our most recent fights. he said how when he first got to know me he "was on my side" when i told him about how my father abused me. but now he was "on his side" because he actually knew me and knew how i deserved this treatment. hearing those words out of b. mouth is the worst ever. and i am endlessly afraid that i could fuck up my relationship with js. like this as well. and to be honest, i am already somewhat afraid of js. he is calm, he is reserved, but i feel if he freaks out it would be worse than i ever experienced it with a man. he is the first guy i am with who is very physically strong. n. was tall as well, but he was rather weak and untrained - still i was weaker than him. b. is not tall and not trained - still he was stronger than me. my first boyfriend wasn't tall either, but very trained - he was very strong, literally abused and hit me, the sex being extremly violent and hardcore. to be honest most of the times he fucked me it was not consensual. and what does this mean? that he regularly raped me. now, js. seems a good man. he's very mature and understanding, very calm as i said. but he is very tall and trained. i feel if we ever get to the point that this violence awakes in him, i will be doomed. i am really intimidated by him. i know i should not, i should trust him and trust myself. but this play made me overthink...

i think it made all of us think. my colleague ended up sobbing next to me. the atmosphere in the foyer as extremly intimate. many people in a small room, the actress on a small stage close to us. the room dark, the candles i had light up flickering. the applause lasted 4 minutes and 27 seconds, we have to measure it. there were standing ovations. and it was very quiet for a long time. i myself did not cry. i don't know why. i cry easily. i was touched indeed. it hit home, literally lol. perhaps i have just grown resilient against this kind of family drama. it does not surprise me anymore, i perhaps am hardened. i don't know. i feel if i stayed with my family longer when i was 16 a big catastrophe would have happened. i mean, an even bigger one than our lives were at that time already. i am not in the mood to elaborate now, but perhaps it was good i left at lived with that boyfriend who raped me. perhaps it was still better than living with them.

yesterday i spent much time with j. in the afternoon we went shopping together, afterwards i prepared dinner, then some of his friends, a bangladeshi couple, came for a visit. i cut oranges for them and cleaned the mess in the kitchen. then j. and me had dinner. afterwards i went for a bike ride: 4 loops around the city. when i got back, i js. had sent me a message saying "he forgot to tell me something". i was prepared for the worst but he instructed me to check the dedication of j.'s edition of jonathan frantzen's corrections (i had spotted this book in j.'s shelve earlier and shared it with js.). turns out: frantzen dedicated the book to js.' uncle and aunt. this international bestseller was dedicated to my boyfriend's aunt&uncle. i have not read it yet, but i will make efforts to now. his family seems more and more interesting. still, i cannot believe my luck in finding js. and giving him many chances. i remember complaining on here how boring i thought he was, but how i was not ready to give up on the idea of him yet. how the first times we had sex were rather disappointing and in general he just did not share much of himself at all. but there was always something that made me want to stick with him. when i slept he sent me pictures of new haven he took when he went on the walk up the east rock. afterwards he sent me a bunch of pictures of sketches he did. he is a good artist himself. i love this guy, hopefully it's not just the idea of him. we spent about a month together, almost every day. throughout this time i understood him more, he kept surprising me with details on his and his family's life, with how understanding, attentive and calm he is. and ultimativly with how he loved me. he is a pure, honest and sensitive guy. seemingly everything i have ever wanted. every single quality seems to be fulfilled. sure, sooner or later we will disappoint each other for the first time. humans are not perect. though i am fearing a day i fuck things up. for now, we are planning his stay here in may. who knows where things will go. on our way from the cloisters to jfk he had talked about how expensive it is to study in europe as an international student. i more or less jokingly said how if he ever wanted the european passport he should just let me know and he instantly understood. i made this joke before with other people, but they did not.

on the weekend out of boredom i made this nectar love print test. my result is aieg, i asked js. to also do it, his result is ripg. if one decides to somewhat believe in that kind of test, it was not a big surprise at all. the js. and my results of the other tests they have are completely the same (relationship readiness 9, permissive boundaries, created family as family attachement, monogamous, growth as relationship believe, and hyposexual). in order to compare our results to a third party i made my best friend e. take the tests as well and her results are completly different. i pray that for once things work out. it feels to just be allright with him. it feels like we are very similar. perhaps too similar. our main difference: i am bubbly and he is not (a common pattern in male-female relationships i'd say). if there will ever be a big fight between us, i am afraid it will be the worst i have ever experienced in my life. and with my parents, i used to believe i have been through the worst. as bad as this sounds, i cannot wait for him to show his true face. i want to know what i am at. it sounds absurd but i cannot wait for him to hurt me. i prefer that to the uncertainty of just being intimidated by him and not knowing what he is capable of. he hasn't given me much reason to fear him actually, it would be very unfair to make it seem that way. though i can just sense that there is something underneath that surface. surely there is with all of us. so that per se is nothing bad particularly about him. time will tell.

spring + uni <3

12 bottles of wine

what a nice day yesterday was.

i woke up at 4am with no alarm. spent the first two hours rather unproductive in bed, chatting with js. i eventually proceeded into the kitchen, making matcha and a sweet breakfast bowl with strawberries, peach, oatmeal and yogurt! how very healthy of me!!! watched some videos on politics&news and around 8am rode my bike to the café to finish fraser's book. at 9.30 that was accomplished, so i rewarded myself with two new books!! one big publication by three sociologists and a collection of essays by jonathan franzen. i feel drawn to him since i know that he is a good friend of js.' uncle. i started the corrections, but it is just so exhausting for me to read. the language is so sophistaced and there are so many american concepts, things or places i don't have a clue about... i definitely want to read that book, but i intentionally have to dedicate extra time to it. so reading those essays is easier for me...i spent the whole morning and early afternoon reading in the café and at some point in the library. i also read about 70 pages of papers for uni, so that's good!

at around 3 i went home to meet j. when yesterday he realised that he is out of wine, he proposed going to get some at his favourite merchant together. he first had to go to the hospital for some mobility training to keep him fit, during this time i showered. weather was amazing and he felt overambitious, so he only took his walking stick with him. at some point i receive a call: him saying he does need his walker. so i carry it to the hospital and from there on our adventure begon. slowly but steadily we headed down that lively street. when we eventually arrived the merchant, i could tell j. comes here quite regularly. the merchant treated him like a vip. j. began enumerating what kinds of wine he would like to have and asked about new kinds available. i was struck! he just never stopped enumerating and so the bottles got more and more. i think i will never acquire as many bottles of wine ever again. another casual proof of how posh he actually is.

we (I) carried only a part of the bottles home, the merchant delivered the rest to us by bike. on our way back we stopped by that café that is attached to my favourite cinema. the outside area was so crowded, but we managed to join some lady. it was so lovely sitting in the sun chatting with j. i told him about my books, he shared stories about his son. so nice! also, as this town is just so small, of course i knew the girl that served us: i used to study with her for a bit.

after we had gotten home, i collected my stuffs and again left outside for a walk. i attempted finding a new spot to read, but ended up reading on the exact same bench in the park i read before on the weekend. directly when i had settled there i realised a., my former fling (the actor guy), was in the park playing some game with some people. he is just so insufferable and obnoxious, one could not not notice him when he is around. i am pretty sure he also noticed me reading there. - to be honest, i don't give a shit anymore. i have so many weird open conflicts with people hereat this point that if i wanted to go sure not to see any of those, i wouldn't even be able to leave the house. so i will just not give a shit anymore. people shall think i am an asshole or whatever. i know that i am not, i know i had my reasons, i am not going to put effort into convincing people otherwise and kiss anybody's ass. especially not losers like him! seriously! - anyway, sitting there reading after only a few i minutes i encoutered another person i know: my boss from the theatre! he is so chill and has my back, i like him a lot. he was carrying two beers, got delighted to see me and just said hello. funny interaction somewhat.

but yeah, now that the weather gets better i realised i know people everywhere, if i stare long enough into the nothingness, sooner or later there will be a person i would rather not like to see... i think this will be a good practice for me of becoming more focused and careless really. living here the next two years will really require me being above all that meaningless social shit.

i am not saying i am too good to have friends or social contacts, no lol. but i want to spend time with actual good people for once. there is actually a group of people i am curious about already for some time. they seem to be hip, chill, but also into what they are studying, which is somehow humanities/law related. i keep encountering them at the café and the library. in fact, they are also friends with former colleagues of b., they worked at the same research facility. and of cocurse that also means that they are somewhat older than me. with one of them i even danced once at a party of that very lefty student establishment. i don't normally party, but that time a. and me had gone together and that was actually really fun. because that i have to admit: a. is great fun at parties and social events. because he is just so eccentric and is seemingly confident in his body, performing. well, exactly what one would expect from an actor!... but yeah, i hope that eventually i'll actually get to know those people somehow. i am not sure how though. just a few minutes ago three of them gathered next to me in the café and i overheard their conversations. apparently they are involved in some student podcast project about recent research, quite cool!

today i woke up at 6am with no alarm. chatted with js for some time and stayed in bed until 7.30 unfortunately. i got ready only slowly, because i decided to ditch that international relations class. the lecturer is just so bad and the students are just so stupid. the quality of this class is really not good. though i had read both papers extensivly (and was most definitely the only person that did that), i really was not in the mood for that. i also ditched the class after that. i don't know, out of laziness really. i am not proud, but i figured that i would get more done simply sitting here and reading. and perhaps that's true. tomorrow is labour day, so i have the whole day for catching up on things and being productive. i overheard the "cool kids" (my new code word for that group of interesting people) say that they will party today&tomorrow. and yeah that reminded me of how the start of may is a reason to celebreate for people here. on one hand i am proud of myself for being rather focused and living a quiet lifestyle. on the other hand it would be nice to once join people to go party, especially because weather is nice and all. going to bars or clubs alone is not a thing people do here at all! it's not a thing at all to get to know people spontanously unfortunately. in other cities and countries i have done that and would do so with no problem, but here it's just very weird. it's a pity, but i am not too sad, because in two weeks js. will be here and i will be able to take him everywhere i go: libraries, cafés and bars!!! i am so looking forward :) especially to getting drunk at bars and making out lol. i also wanna go to some party with him. i am sure he will be in awe with how alive this town is. i mean, he has been to buenos aires, a fairly european style city i guess. but this town here is unique. it has many young student people and all features of a big city, whilst still being cute and historical.

now i will go shopping, later will clean my dorm room for a boy i sublease to for those two weeks, then attend a lecture on comparative politics and right after that cover a shift at the theatre! my first one after three months! so excited! especially because i will get to see my theatre crush ja., son of my other theatre crush jü. lol

my, now former, professor crush

my professor crush just approached me when i was sitting in the park reading...

back in december i had matched with a lecturer from my institute on bumble. only after matching he realised i am studying at the same institute, so we had a little exchange about how naturally we couldn't actually proceed with this and agreed on being chill about that having happened. it was a fun exchange and all it made me feel was flattered and amused. because then for two months i lived in the us and had already forgotten about this incident.

when i moved back here and moved in with j. the semester had started. i was unhappy about the seminars that i got assigned with and approached several professors of changing to their seminar. unfortunately one seminar that was really interesting was one that exactly this guy was supposed to give... so i sent him an email and unfortunately he notified me that his seminar was cancelled due to him being busier than he thought he would be with his research project.

luckily i had felt somewhat secure and anonymous sending him that mail, since in december i had used my middle name on bumble and had gone sure not to really show my face. back then i already knew how such weird encounters could happen in this small town. the reason he was matching with 21 year olds seemed odd to me first, but his explanation was that his profile was so new, because he had just been broken up with a longterm relationship and it was the first time for him trying online dating. when matching with me he had not paid attention to my age and what i study. idk, i believed him. he is just so dorky, so that really seems plausible.

okay, so far so good. i had felt safe sending him that email. he didn't know my real name, nor really what i looked like...

the very first week of the semester i had encoutered him at least three times in the institute, back then i just smirked in a real weird way not knowing whether he knows who i am. we did always have weird eye contact when we met though. but then, soon it should become obvious that he knew who i was:

i was on my way from j.s' place to my rowing class, in my sports cloths on my bike. he was walking on the sidewalk into the opposite direction, weirdly gesturing and talking to himself. riding by him seeing this weird scene just made me laugh out loud. he is just such a dork. unfortunately though he realised i had laughed because of him and turned around when i had already passed him. what in turn realised again which just completely made me burst into laughter. i cycled away as fast as i could i was so embarrassed. but it was just entertaining at this point.

later that day i couldn't believe my eyes when i recieved an email from him! he said "i don't normally look that much of a fool!". argh! i was so angry at him. this was just so unprofessional. because now he stepped over that line. i know he knows who i am, but i knew that before he sent me that mail. i know he just wanted to be funny and wanted to tell me "ha! i recognized you". but now i didn't know what to do... because i really wanted to be able to someday participate in that seminar!! because unfortunately though i actually am so interested into what he is teaching and researching on. and our institute just isn't that big. in fact, he and that professor whose seminar i am taking with lots of passion right now, they went to yale together. they researched on a similiar topic and therefore got to work together here as well. meaning: i already am engaged with both the people whose research i am interested most with. unfortunately one of which i have this weird history with now.

and it even got worse: i sent him a mail only days later saying "just to ensure i can parttake on your seminar one day i want to make clear that i was really only interested in the seminar when i approached you, nothing else" and it was true. i have a boyfriend now that comes all the way from america to here just for me!.. i do have to admit though that i somewhat liked the idea of playing with that tension a bit, but nothing else than that!

he replied to that saying how he admits to having regret sending that mail. he said that he was just caught off guard. which i myself was.

and worse: the next days we would see each other just so often. one saturday i saw him three times in one day!!!! what a horrro. and never had we spoken to each other in person really....

until now!

i grabbed a book, collected stories of chekhov that i had bought from book trader in new haven, took my bike and sat down underneath a tree to read. at some point i called b. to talk to him about the book i will be allowed to edit and about him looking for housing in that different city he will move to soon. and then i realised he, my professor crush, was sitting on that bench just opposite to me! i had acted like i didn't notice him, i just kept on being myself. after finishing talking with b. i just continued reading and listening to music. i did not want to make him uncomfortable but also wanted to give him something nice to look at lol. because i knew he was looking!

eventually i again called b. for a short time and whilst i was completely lost and concentraded in talking, he approached and interrupted me! i had noticed earlier how he was kind of circling around me, perhaps contemplating whether or whether not to come up to me. apparently it took him some time to gather the courage - how cute, lol. to be honest i found the fact that he completely interrupted my phone talk a bit rude, but well it seems he was just nervous. otherwise he would have probably realised that...

so he introduced himself and asked whether we want to finally talk a bit in person! i shook his hand and from then on i was just so excited i started talking and rambling and basically all he did was just giggling and being the dork he is. i told him how much i enjoy his colleagues seminar and how i fell in love with her research areas. how i had lived in new haven and had the chance to take part in some seminars of very famous scholars. i shared how i had worked for that one academic i am befriended with and how he was the reason i could live there. how now i live with this old gentleman just a street down there. i asked him whether his project needs a student assistant because i am just so jealous of that one boy working for his colleague because i had recently talked to him and he said he isn't even too much into that field of research. i said how they should let me work there instead of him, lol. i had complained about my silly jobs and how deeply i longed for working at the university. he unfortunately disappointed my hopes by saying that they don't need anybody and he also agreed with me that the boy seems to not be into that work much. he showed me in which street he lived and - oh my god: it is the same damn street my ex-fling a., the actor, and also the two dircetors of the theatre live in! what a damn small town this is!

i just rambled on and i couldn't stop myself. he was giggling and we had some tense eye contact from time to time. i could tell he enjoyed himself a lot, but i was also cringing by not having myself under control and being so god damn annoying and oversharing.

well - eventually it was enough. we had introduced each other to one another. we had established a common ground for that when next time we meet it won't be as akward. he said that was what he wanted and i told him how i think that that was a very good idea and also very neccessary. he said how this was "his hood" and well i said it's mine now as well...

and i am telling you i will go sure that once js. arrives we will spend a lot of time sitting in that park reading and making out hahahaa. i'd absolutely love to make him see that and make him envious, in a really weird sick way.

the best thing now: my crush on him is almost non-existent anymore. because when talking to him i realised that the way he laughs is just so silly it is a bit too over the top dorky! he's really cute, that's for sure. but it's just a bit too much. and i am just so happy that i feel that way.

on tuesday night js. arrives from america. i am endlessly looking forward. both of us are also endlessly horny, lol... i am just so happy how life just happens. how i met js. through bumble in the same city that my now former professor crush had also lived. how my now boyfriend is coming to europe just to see me and how ironic is it that most certainly my now former professor crush will see us together.

life really is funny sometimes. and the world is damn small.

life feels bittersweet nowadays