Dear Seaturtle:

Doing treadmill is so boring, another 1/2 mile in 10 min or so and another part of your post: ” As young as 13 I remember wishing them apart… I put my ear to the door and could hear him leaving voicemails for my mom, asking ‘where are you.’ It was late. I stayed at the top of the stairs cause I was curious and wouldn’t be able to sleep with his pacing anyways. She came home. She walked in, there was silence, he asked ‘where were you?’ he asked out of pain, not anger or shouting, he was asking genuinely and a sadness peaked out of his voice (I feel his pain right now). She just fell into tears. All I remember from that point was her crying, thinking she was drunk and not answering his question”-

– crying is her way to disarm/ manipulate a person, quite a common technique, one afforded to girls and women, not to “real” men. But men hurt just like women do, maybe more because they are not allowed to release the pain by crying (“real men don’t cry”). Men are not allowed to cry genuinely or manipulatively. So.. men like F and N find other, non-crying ways to manipulate. I develop the latter thought while on my net boring half a mile.

anita