Still Breathing II

I was gonna call it still breathing but realized I had that same title last year.

Hemingway Rock and I recently celebrated our three month anniversary. In gay terms, that's like being together for almost two years. *LOL*

This past Friday the two of us had dinner at Grand Lux Cafe. I needed the dinner considering the day I had earlier (I'll have to blog about that another time but let's just say it involves another speeding ticket...*LOL*.). Actually it took a bit of convincing on my part to get Rock to go. Rock has a thing about riding the "L", which was how I was proposing getting there. He hasn't ridden it in over 20 years and had safety concerns. But he put all that to rest and went with it because it was something that I really wanted to do. As it turned out, he didn't find the train ride nearly as bad as feared.

The restaurant is located on the intersection of Michigan Avenue and Ontario. The atmosphere was really nice, though the decor reminded me of Cheesecake Factory. Cheesecake Factory does do some of their desserts so I'm assuming it's owned by the same chain.

We were able to get a window seat overlooking Michigan Avenue upon request. It was cool sitting there looking down at Friday afternoon traffic and general chaos. It's amazing how much goes on at any given time. Folks hurrying up to destinations unknown.

The evening was going really nice and continued that way for a while. It wasn't long before things started to derail before my eyes.

It's the age old issue of miscommunication. One of the things I'm trying to do is be more vocal about doing things I want to do. I have the tendency to go with the flow, which is fine most of the time, but can eventually cause issues. Rock has the tendency to take reins of the plan making and even though he asks for my input, he winds up doing what he wants to do.

It was really important that Rock went with my plans tonight. Rock is good at getting me to change little things about my plans and that's fine most of the time. But it makes me feel like nothing I suggest is worthy of his time.

After dinner, my original plan was to catch a movie inside the Loews located inside the same building as Grand Lux Cafe. Rock immediately was concerned that the theatre would be too ghetto (the one he thought was ghetto was the AMC on Illinois Ave). He requested that we catch a movie in the burbs instead.

Then after the movie I suggested we go to Gentry's. I knew of the place from a date I had with a jerk but nonetheless I thought the place was decent. But Rock objected to the place because there were too many what he termed 'faggoty white men'.

I thought about it a bit and during dinner I decided that catching the movie in the burbs wouldn't be such a bad idea. There was a chance of more snow coming in late Friday/Saturday morning plus there wasn't really anything showing that Rock and I could even agree on seeing(another issue...*LOL*).

So Rock and I took the CTA back to the burbs. I was driving towards my home turf theatre when Rock made the suggestion to stop for some liquor. I thought it was a cool idea for after the movie. Rock got pissy and said that I couldn't do both. It was one or the other. I had assumed both (and we probably could've done both had we stuck to the original plan...but that was neither here or there). So I told him that I was still planning on us seeing a movie (mind you we still hadn't agreed to what we would see). We started debating on what to see and he said that I should pick since it was supposed to be my plans. I drove to a nearby theatre and unfortunately the movie I wanted to see wasn't playing for another hour and a half.

I was resigned to just going home when Rock suggested getting a drink at TGIF's. That would've solved the drink and movie plan but I poopooed the idea. We then started arguing. The gist of the argument was that I was being wishy washy about the plans and I thought he was pushy whenever I tried planning things.

I drove up to another theatre because I knew I didn't want to go back to my place with the tension. I wound up buying two tickets to Ghost Rider (which Rock didn't want to see...and I knew it) and we both went to the theatre with attitudes.

Rock became a bigger baby when I asked him for input as far as where to sit. I had forgotten that this was opening weekend for Ghost Rider (and I hate going to see movies on opening weekend) and we arrived about ten minutes before the show and practically all the good seats were taken. Rock was all 'I'm not suggesting anything. It's on you.' So I rolled my eyes and we wound up having to sit near the front.

We got through the movie and I looked at Rock a couple times (he started off dozing but surprisingly he seemed to perk up mid-movie) to see his reaction. I had no real expectations for the movie but it wasn't half bad (even though.... please Nicholas Cage may have a nice body but it's not that nice...I think he used a body double for his mirror scenes.)

Rock and I argued some more after the movie. He felt that I didn't appreciate that he went out of his way to get off work early so he could spend the afternoon going to a restaurant he really didn't want to go to but did because I really wanted to. Then he came back to that issue of how I'm never happy with what we do (which is soo not true) and how it comes back to bite him weeks later.

This came up because I made a point about how I'm always going along with his program. I tried telling him I don't mind what we've done and I was just wishing he wouldn't object totally to what I want to do. For once. His point was that he came so he wasn't objecting (aside from making little suggestions here and there....which I never do...but that's me...*LOL*). So then that led to him telling me that I need to speak up then and there and not bring it up two weeks later. Which led to me saying 'but I didn't have an issue with what we were doing'. It was a vicious cycle.

There was a cute moment in all the arguing where he still showed how much he cared for me by telling me that he didn't want me freezing my hands while getting gas (it was a little after 11PM). I told him that I'd just get back in the car. Then after I finished pumping gas and the station turned off their lights and I asked Rock in amazement if they were closing and he told me calmly that yes they were.

We were silent by the time we drove back to my place. We both went inside and as we both went to the living room, I noticed Rock stopped and was staring at his nightbags. I stopped what I was doing and was staring at him. He turned his head for a second to look at me and then stared back at his bags. We stood in our spots for several minutes before Rock finally said that he thought it best if he went to spend the night at his mother's place.

I looked up at the ceiling as I felt tears falling down my eyes. I heard Rock say not to cry as he came up and hugged me. He told me that he wasn't going to leave and I tearfully told him how much I cared about him and appreciated him taking a half day even though he had lots of work going on. He suggested we sit down and talk. It was sappy I know...but it was needed.

We worked through our present issues and after watching a couple episodes of In Living Color reruns, went to bed.

The next morning we went to breakfast at I-Hop and after hanging out a bit, he took of for his mother's and other plans.

Things are okay between us for now. Just another blip on the road to understanding each other.