Voices Carry

I've been thinking a lot about relationships lately, for...reasons. I said before that I wasn't ever going to do it again, the relationship thing. I said it over and over again for at least a year. I don't date. In June, I was out dancing, as I tend to do when I can, and the DJ played a cover of Voices Carry that I'd never heard before, and it made me tear up a little.  Okay, enough that I just kind of left. I think it was the last song, anyway. I've heard the original a bazillion times, and it never really inspired anything other than a love of Aimee Mann's voice. I mean, I know what it's about. But it just kind of hit me, like a locomotive, how much I really relate to it, in a very uncomfortable way. See, for almost fifteen years now, I have been, or at least felt like, either a placeholder or a side chick in every relationship  I've been in. Or both. I understand being social, I do, but a lot of times it has been perfectly clear that whoever I was with was looking for something shinier to come along. I've never had anyone be proud to be with me. I know I'm quiet. I know I'm difficult. I know I'm not a pretty girl. Goddess knows I know my failings. I've never had a facebook relationship status (not that that is real life, but I guess it drives home to me the point of how I feel about these things.) My last relationship was 7 years or so. There are people who know both of us,  that never knew we were together. There were people he specifically hid our relationship from, because they would be upset. "Don't say girlfriend or partner, she'll be hurt, because I never called her that...

There is someone I spend time with. This is absolutely not anything to do with them, it's just why I've been thinking about relationships. We've gone a few places together. They've held my hand in front of people we both know, which almost made me cry in public. This is in no way an attempt to change their behavior, it's coming to terms with something in me. I feel bad trying to explain things, because I've seen so many people use it as a form of manipulation.  I'm insecure, so you can't (fill in the blank.) That's not how life works. I'm not insecure about how they feel about me. Whatever it is, is new. We are still figuring things out. It isn't defined. We haven't had any big conversations about it. It's not necessary right now. Is it perfect? It feels pretty close. Do I know what I want here? Yeah, I really think I do. Is there something I would change? Sure. But I believe it will, organically.  I don't want something because I demanded it, I want it freely given. I have made the thing I want known. When they want it, too, really,  it will happen.  You want to know a secret? I've known this person for a long time, and I have more faith in them, as a person, than almost anyone else in the world.  Which is truth, not pressure.