To Rant or Not To Rant

The Gardener mentioned last night that he thought my comment about his keeping old girlfriends as woman friends was a rant. I didn't feel like I was ranting. In no way was I comparing his weekly dinner with ex-girlfriend-now-friend to Mr. Match's ex-fiancée asking him to cook dinner for her every time she's in town and his occasionally sleeping over at her (their ex-) apartment and her buying furnishings for his new apartment. No way. No comparison.

I can see where it's good for someone to have a friend of the opposite sex who knows you well on whom you can try out theories and get honest what-on-earth-were-you-thinking feedback. I believe the Kayaker and I have that with each other. I worry when I haven't heard from him for a couple of days. One or the other of us will send an e-mail when two or three days have gone by with no contact. We rarely see each other face-to-face (it's been four months now) but the connection is still active, still there, still of great use and comfort.

I wonder if the exes-as-friends capability depends on who was the breaker and who was the breakee. The Gardener explained that these were women who had broken up with him but wanted to stay friends. That made me cycle through my mind on all the men in the past eight years with whom I had relationships. I kept a very erratic e-mail relationship going with the Maryland Man, but he now, finally, has a significant other, so that has fallen off. An e-mail from him was always good for my ego or to pick me up when I was down: he thought I hung the moon. EEFFH - don't wanna be friends, don't wanna know anything about him except when he dies. The first E in EEFFH stands for Evil. The real estate investor? We've been in infrequent touch and he helped me with a few items regarding buying this house, but I don't like being around someone when you can't tell what's talking - the alcohol or the real self. The Bad Combover guy in El Paso? What would be the purpose? The Lemonade Tycoon. He broke up with me. If he doesn't want to be with me, then he should not be with me! Don't bother to call. Mr. Match? The jury's still out on that one. I do have to see him to trade "stuff" — books of his, CDs of mine. But my therapist really gave me the business the other evening when I was noncommittal on whether I'd go out with him again. So in the interest of being a healthy adult of sound mind, I guess I have to say that I am not able to be post-relationship friends with Mr. Match.

Oh yeah. The Kayaker? Post-relationship friends of the best kind. And the Traveler? To be determined.