long in the tooth

I’m going to make an attempt at figuring out weather I’m being unreasonable or not by writing through my feelings towards Joe in the last few weeks.

I have begun to realize that there are more than a few things going on in this relationship that I was unaware of at first.  First of all, the language barrier.  I don’t think I had any concept–and I still think I don’t–of how much this really gets in the way.  The truth is that Joe is a fluent English-speaker, but of course, Korean is his first language.  I have never dated, much less been close to someone whose first language is not English.  Wow, that’s kind of a weird realization.  Anyway, I think I am starting to see that Joe probably doesn’t understand as much of what I say as I thought he did.  My thoughts until recently were that he was getting 100%.  The real percentage of what he understands is a mystery.  It just becomes evident at times that 100%  is aiming a little high, though this may be difficult to explain.  He seems to be fully listening to me when we’re in the thick of a meaningful conversation, but then days later, he’ll say something that will contradict what he said before, or maybe he will ask me a question I have already answered in great detail.  I don’t know what to make of this.  My first reaction was frustration.  I really thought he just wasn’t listening to me at first.  And truly, that could also be the case, but I’m having difficulty knowing which it is.  If he doesn’t understand me, especially in really emotional or tender moments, I would like to think he would tactfully re-frame it so that he could understand.  This seems the obvious logical thing to do in my mind, but I think I may be oversimplifying and being a little hard on him.

The second thing I didn’t realize until recently compounds the former, and makes it more complex.  So, Joe is 21.  Fairly young, yes, but I had the sense he was fairly mature.  I am only now discovering that, on some subjects, he’s really not.  He only seems like it because he often doesn’t really say what he thinks.  But we’ll get into that later.  Things that particularly point this out to me is how he talks about his high school days in the states, getting stoned and skipping class, with more than just a strong sense of nostalgia.  He talks about how he wishes he could go back.  He laughs and smiles at what fuck-offs he and his friends were and says, "man, that was the life."  He talks about his desire to vacation in India this winter so he can lay on the beach and get stoned.  I keep asking him, why India?  Why India? India is a place I have always dreamed of traveling to, finding it exotic and beautiful, rich with color and culture.  His response is always the same.  He wants to get stoned and drink on a beach. 

Another big one which may be more than immaturity, but definitely has something to do with it, are his hang ups about different kinds of people.  He seems to have very narrow views about gay people, black people, and in general, people he doesn’t like.  Now, the issues with gay people and black people are both things that I have to recognize as cultural stereotypes that Koreans have, and there’s a lot that he has to go against to get past it.  It’s not just Joe.  And I will give him some credit for at least seeming to want to work past some of his gay issues.  This coming about due to the mutual friend we share here who is gay (obviously, if you ask me), but Joe only realized this fact a few weeks ago.  A realization that came after the friendship had been fairly cemented.  He has since made a few comments about how that friendship is showing him how wrong some of his narrow-minded views are.  But it has also spurred other comments along the lines of "well, that’s just Tony. (our gay friend) He’s cool.  I don’t know about other gay people."  To say the least, I am feeling very challenged by these views and find it difficult to remain tactful at times when the things he says can be so outrageous, yet it’s clear he has no concept of that.  This brings me to the third major point. 

Overarchingly, Joe does not say what he thinks.  Korean people as a culture are VERY non-confrontational, non-combative, and excessively polite.  These are not bad things in and of themselves, but when I am in a relationship with someone, I want to know what they think.  I want to have meaningful conversations with them about our beliefs and values, about our interests and differences.  Because of some of the things I mentioned in the last paragraph, I think Joe holds back quite a bit from me.  I got a taste of it last week when we were out to lunch.  From time to time, enough for me to notice anyway, Joe uses "gay" as a slander on someone or something that is stupid or unfair or whatever other negative attribute you can imagine.  I have subtly told him in the past that I don’t like it.  He, in the past, told me it wasn’t a big deal and it doesn’t really mean anything, at which I rolled my eyes, and moved on. However, this day, he said it again in passing, and I made a decision.  I thought it was about time I was more forthright about some of the things I hadn’t been saying.  I told him that I know it sounds silly but it really is bothersome to hear him say that.  I told him that in honesty, it makes him less attractive to me, not only because of it’s derogatory nature, but because I view that kind of thing as just so juvenile.  I told him it reminds me of when I was in middle school, and that was the insult for everything.  I told him that I also have a lot of gay people in my life, and my feelings on it are it’s just the kind of thing that you’re not really allowed to use as an insult unless you’re a part of the group who is being insulted.  Much like nigger or bitch, or jokes of the Anti-Semitic persuasion.  I should have also pointed out that the fact that Joe openly admits he has some unfair prejudices against gay people pretty much removes him from the group of people who can get away with using "gay" as an insult, even in jest. 

Throughout this conversation–the only one to date where I have really got into what I think about some of the things we are not in the same space on–I could see him retreating further and further into his shell, the more I went on.  I tried to be tactful, I tried to be kind, I tried to be gentle, but I felt like honesty was important.  I asked him what he thought and he wouldn’t say much.  He just sort of nodded and smiled.  We ate in silence for awhile and then I asked if I was making him uncomfortable by being so direct.  He nodded, smiled, and asked how my ramen was tasting. 

This is hard to figure out.  Layer on top of this that since then, he broke plans with me once, and then dropped almost all lines of communication until I texted him a hello message a week later.  Ugh, re-enter freshman year and waiting, waiting, waiting for the boy to call.  And the thing is, I don’t really know if the "gay" talk and the MIA are connected.  Sometimes, I just don’t hear from him.  Most of the time, I’m okay with his flakiness.  It encourages me to seek out other things to do, and reminds me not to become dependent on one (Korean) person while I’m feeling the pangs of growing through transition and adjustment.  And the fact that I sort of forget I haven’t seen him in days reminds me that the relationship that Joe and I have is pretty casual.  (Though it is one of the handful of relationships of any kind that I’m spending time on here.)  

I can’t decide if I really need to "do" anything here.  I feel like it’s pretty clear our communication is terrible.  But what’s unclear is weather it can be remedied or not, or if it’s worth it.  I really, really value clear, honest communication.  In all relationships.  And most of the time, in my past, it’s been more reward than work. At least, those are the friendships that survive.  I guess we  humans usually gravitate towards people who communicate on our same wavelengths, and therefore finding this to be such a struggle is off-putting.  But where I am now, I am reaching out and making friends wherever I can.  It sounds terrible, but beggars can’t be choosers.  But does it really need to come to that?  Do I really need to be a beggar?  Oh, here we go, back into my dependencies.  At any rate, it’s a strange space to be in.

So, what is Joe to me then?  A companion?  Someone to keep my loneliness at bay?  Another distraction with which to continue to hide from myself?  Because though I like Joe, I don’t feel that close to him.  We are so far apart.  And though I like Joe, it seems like a lot of these barriers are not the kind of thing we can meet in the middle on, they are things that just take time and life.  Maybe we’re just different.  And though I would like to be honest and be closer to Joe, it reality, I don’t really think it’s because of who he is, but because of where I am–somewhat isolated in a strange land.  To which he is a native.  To me, that sounds sort of shitty.

But then, it seems that it doesn’t matter too much, all of these questions and concerns and conundrums.  When I step back and ask the question "what should I do" in any situation, it seems the easiest answer is honesty.  Tactful, loving, honesty, but honesty all the same.  I know from the past and from the strongest friendships I yet posses, being honest does most of the work for you.  Weather something works out or not is not in how you pitch the material.  The material speaks for itself if you speak from your true heart.  You feel what you feel, you are what you are, and so is everyone else.  The semantics simply delay the inevitable.  But, if you lay out your truth, and spare the semantics, you have nothing to lose.  You won’t loose time you could have been loving, though you might lose the stress and energy you would have spent in wondering, thinking, worrying, waiting.  You won’t lose but gain strength of character in knowing that you spoke right by your heart.  You won’t lose but gain strength in the relationship in question, if it is meant to survive.  And if you do "lose" the friend or lover in the midst of this loving honesty, you never had them to begin with.

I am getting long in the tooth, and it’s time I gave it some rest.  The morning will come, clear and bright.