Boo-hoo, baby.

Okay I'm waterworks. Granted I have PMS right now and a general mood disorder. I just wanna talk to Elena. I FINALLY, I don't know what happened, I dialed her number up and it called. Long distance. It's never worked before. I've been e-mailing her for months to call me. Well like a month and a half. She promised she wouldn't just disappear again. And she's the only person I want to talk to, and need to talk to, right now. And it worked. She's going to call me back. She said in an hour. I need to talk to her NOW. Oh well if she doesn't call me back I can CALL HER. How's that?! If it works again, that is. I'm so upset. I don't know why. Maybe this is bad. I imagined Julian telling me he couldn't see me anymore yesterday and I broke down. He was nice today, he was funny, gentle, kind of vague, but, I realize everything he says can be seen any way I like, anything. I can SEE it. Honestly, I can FEEL it, how he feels. But I just can't trust it, and the way he answers everything, his almost lawyer-rate ambiguity, it just makes me doubt it... and I don't know what it matters, what I can do, but- oh my god- he even mentioned today "there isn't even really a hard-and-fast rule about dual relationships... seeing your therapist outside the office setting..." But yeah, I guess today I just felt like he's going to stop liking me, if he likes me, if I don't say something. So today we stared at each other and he said, what are you thinking? It looks like you're editing. I said Of course I'm editing. He laughed. He said, what are you editing? I said, you KNOW what I'm editing, we don't need to dwell on it. He laughed, hah, We don't need to dwell on what you're editing because I know what you're editing? He said, Why, why can't you express it? And I exasperatedly said, Julian I just can't. And he laughed at that too, and then he said, well, maybe your trouble expressing this is something to look at it, maybe we could work on being more assertive...

And that's when I wanted to slap him. I said, okay. You want me to be assertive. I'll be star-patient, ok, he laughed... I asked him if he was in therapy. He said no, not now, he'd done it before though, once with an old man who had really wanted to become a sailor so he became a sailor and then became a therapist and then master of his own universe, and I laughed, and then once with woman, because he wanted to challenge himself and it was less comfortable, and she was close to his age, and I thought he was going to say the challenge was, you know, being attracted to her, but he quickly said, Because I'm really contemptuous of other psychologists, so I wanted to get over that, I laughed at that, wait you're really contemptuous of--? My colleagues.. I mean I was.. Ohhh, I thought you were going to say... I'm contemptuous of women?? No! Of course not! I just didn't get what you mean the challenge was... but, close to your age, I get it, like-- It was a challenge for me-- To like leave the competition out of it, I see, I said. Yes, he said ... and then he asked why I wanted to know and I said, Because I was curious about how you see-- oh, I don't know. Laugh.

So then I said Okay. Well. Another question was, how long have you known how I've felt... About what? ABOUT YOU. About me, oh, I kind of felt it for a few months... and intensifying... but I wasn't sure... The first time I really suspected it was when you got so mad when I interrupted you, and then your e-mail, all the comparisons, like the girlie pictures, the bars, were about men or kind of romantically-oriented... so... and, you used the word 'heartbroke.'

And HE used the word heartbroke! Heartbroke is not a word-- it's one of my words. He didn't automatically rephrase as heartbroken... He remembers it, and my e-mails... though like a detective, kind of, I guess how he would have to analyze...

And I tried to bring it up, he said, but you didn't go there, so I thought maybe I was wrong...

And did you have a plan, of what to do about it?

Yes.

And that was...?

To wait and see if that was the issue, to be prepared, if you were going to go there...

Well, that makes me feel stupid...

Stupid? Why?

Like, you were watching my behavior, for this, strategizing, until I got to this point and then use my feelings to address the next issue to be sorted through...

That's not what I said... I just meant I was trying to be present and aware...

OK. So. This thing I noticed, I'll be sitting here, and you're holding the Minnesota Multiple Personalities Inventory- I know that's not what it's called- and you're sitting here, and I like lean toward you, and you move away like this-- and I jumped over on the couch, like he did.

I wasn't aware of that- it's just- well in therapy, I had this one woman who got really uncomfortable and I've heard of a lot of doctors that sexually harass women and, well I might not have even been aware of it, I wasn't even, at the time, confident that you felt...

It wasn't when I took the test, it was afterwards, reviewing it, it wasn't that long ago... Do you shake clients' hands?

Yes- usually when I meet them-- I do...

You didn't shake mine.

I know, okay, that might be another thing with young pretty women...

Okay...

There's no hard and fast rule about...

Contact?

No, like with children, you have to hug them and hold their hands and-

Of course...

I think you're thinking of the rule about-- well there's no hard and fast rule about that either, these days-- about dual relationships. You know what I mean... seeing your therapist outside the office setting...(Julianpause) I mean there are exceptions in like small towns, or in the transgendered community... If you're a transgendered therapist you'd never have any friends because they'd all be seeing you as a therapist...

And I laughed.

Well, our time is winding down. And next week I accidentally, put someone in the 5 o clock slot-

I have your check-

Oh- so, I'll have to call you about the time, Tuesday is fine, but I have to wait for a cancellation, there will be...

Here.

Oh, thank you...

Can I shake your hand?

Sure...

::shake::

... and I walked out... no door, again...