Islands in time.

Well, Xmas this year was different, but quite nice. I wandered around Berkeley for a little bit until Bonnie called about 10:30 am. She was kind enough to let me check my email, and then we started to slowly get to work on the lunch. She has put a roast into the slow cooker the night before, and so it was by now very soft. We prepared the vegetables, and she took a moment out to chat with Lauren, who was celebrating the first day of Hanukah on the East Coast with Chinese food.

We were having a fun time, and the dynamic between us is much different now that we are no longer dating. Some of the old power dynamics are still there, but we are perhaps more at ease now. We were discussing who should get custody of the strap-on that we had bought at Good Vibrations in the Summer. In the end, amongst much giggling, we decided we were going to clean it up, wrap it up nicely and mail it to our friend Judy. We don't think she will kill us, and that it would provide us (and hopefully her) with a laugh.

We ate Xmas lunch at about 2 pm, with roast beef, potatoes and carrots. Our conversation covered a great many things, which makes me eminently glad that I came down to Berkeley. We discussed our personalities, how they meshed or conflicted, the personalities of Lauren and Kadie, and the flaws and gifts of each other. After dinner we walked back up the hill with a bottle of wine, a loaf of bread and a DVD. After the DVD we sat around talking for longer, and it gifts my heart to have had such a personal and intimate conversation. I am so very happy that she is my friend, and that we can talk so intimately and openly. Truly it is the sort of conversation that only two women who know each other and themselves so well could have had.

She headed home about 10 pm, and I crashed out. This morning I awoke at 7 am, and at 8 am we walked through the abandoned university down along Telegraph Avenue. Bonnie had a dentist appointment, and I am now waiting for the Post Office to open so that I might get Judy's present in the mail.

I met up again with Bonnie about 11 am amid the cloudy day. She'd been told that she needed 10 fillings and that didn't put her in too good a mood. We had lunch at an Indian restaurant on Telegraph Avenue. Afterwards, she went to try and study, and I watched the “Young Ones” on DVD. Later she called me as she couldn't focus, and so we walked down to Shattuck for alcohol and some DVD's. We watched “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”, had a dinner of fajitas and booze, and then watched “Sin City”. Both movies were adequate, although neither was particularly thought provoking. Tomorrow I think I will go into the city, and she will try to get some work done.

Bonnie is very happy with Lauren which is a very wonderful thing. This evening I called Kadie, and then she called me back later on. Our phone call was quite short which I thought was a little surprising, and when I told her “I miss you” I didn't receive any response. With women of course, everything is in the subtext, and yet I feel blind in many ways to this. I know that neither Kadie nor Lauren is thrilled that I am visiting Bonnie, but this is something I had to do. After the pain and heartache wrought by Tiffany, I wasn't going to go through that again with Bonnie. If it is too much for Kadie, then we will both fall. If it too much for Lauren then I will be saddened for her and Bonnie. Perhaps the sacrificial lamb in me would be content to internalise the pain; to save the others from inconvenience, to ignore my own heart. Well, no more…