2003-01-01 - 8:55 p.m.

So it's 2003 (that's how I used to start the first entry of every year when I was keeping a diary in high school and uni). Happy New Year loyal readers.

I wrote a long entry a couple of days ago and then managed to lose it, I don't know how much of it I need to recapture. A rundown of work (my six day cycle started on Christmas Eve and ended on the 29th- kinda made it feel like Christmas was absorbed into my everyday routine but it was okay). Wrote about trying to work out how to react around Annie now that things were different, but the way I was feeling two days ago was different to the way I'm feeling now. Wrote about Jane, that despite my paranoia she obviously has not lost interest because she's been saying some really sweet things. But last night we had another one of those drunken "talks" and I think it's clear that she's certainly not ready for a defined relationship, for a number of reasons. But we both acknowledge that there is a lot more to "us" than what it started out as. It's just confusing. And every time we have one of these talks I come out of it paranoid that I've made things worse, scared her off, said too much, put my heart on my sleeve.

I'm not used to being in this situation- maybe it's karma. Jane is doing nothing wrong, she's not leading me on, we are staying true to what framework we do have and she's not willing to take the next step if she's not sure, so she's being honest. But it makes me feel... something. I don't know. I feel like this must be how Cindy felt. Putting aside all the stuff between Cindy, Ellie and I, because that's another story, the entire duration of our- I guess I describe it as a "pseudo-relationship" -I made it clear that I couldn't offer anything else because I was in love with Annie. And I was often talking to her about my feelings for Annie, and as a friend she was listening but in the context of what was going on between the two of us I think I'm beginning to realise how difficult it must have been to hear me talk that way about Annie, even if I never pretended that wasn't an issue.

Jane has made it clear that she still has some residual feelings for Carl, and that Mark, who has kind of been to her what Annie is to me for about two years, will always be something of an issue, even though he has a girlfriend and she accepts that and they are fine. I conceded that I couldn't guarantee my feelings for Annie would never be an issue because the way I see it my feelings have been for "my Annie", and the reason it feels like I don't have those feelings anymore is because "my Annie" hasn't been there for the last month or so. She was there last night- my Annie. And I didn't feel like those feelings had returned but I realised that maybe I couldn't discount that they could be a factor at some point.

I told Jane that Ellie and Cindy weren't issues. I think things just keep getting better between Ellie and I, in that we can be totally honest about our feelings for other people and I think that in the last few months we've been able to finally show that we are the best of friends without ex-girlfriend/boyfriend issues getting in the way. And I think it helps that there will be no "fall(ing) into old habits" when she comes up to Sydney this time, we will just be friends. With Cindy I think I've managed to show her that she does still mean a lot to me as a friend and that I'm not choosing a shag over her and wouldn't do that, and I think it's a lot better now that she knows that my feelings for Jane run deeper than they did, so spending time with Jane does not equal putting my sex life before anything else. I don't know why Jane would think Cindy would be an issue- maybe because of what happened last time she's worried that she'll be seen as getting between me and my friends.

It's just confusing and kind of frustrating after having these conversations, I think I'd be better off just letting what we have happen without questioning it so much and trying to define it- the last couple of "talks" we've needed to have but if we keep getting into state-of-the-relationship talks every time we get drunk I think it could get messy. That's a word Jane used last night. "Messy". If we were to define this differently to what it is now and take that next step things could get messy. I guess I see where she's coming from.

She brought up that we'd never really discussed if this was 'exclusive'. And I don't think we really ended up defining that, except to say that (while from her point of view she had no reason to think I was being exclusive, because I wasn't obliged to tell her anything) it had been, perhaps by default but I think it's more than that- after my last 16 months I don't want to go there again. If I had an opportunity at this point I'm pretty sure I wouldn't take it-technically I'm allowed and there's no question I'd be completely honest about it, but that's not who I want to be anymore. But if she did want to take an opportunity I couldn't stop her, but I think it would hurt. I'm on the other side of the coin this time around.

One of the main reasons I wouldn't take an opportunity even though we haven't agreed on being 'exclusive' is that I want to show Jane that I am serious about wanting to take this to the next level if she ever wants to. All other issues aside she's admitted she simply runs from things like this, and freaks out. If it comes down to the only thing stopping her from taking that next step is fear (at the moment it's more than that) then I want to be able to show her it can work. I'm not about to say "I'd like this to be a relationship but right now it's not so I'm going to take advantage of all opportunities". That would be hypocritical. That's not who I want to be anymore.

I'm going to go think up some New Year's Resolutions. I'll come back here with a proper rundown of New Year's Eve (including the return of "my Annie"- fingers crossed she doesn't disappear again) in my next entry.

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