Writing My Wrongs

Last night I was out to dinner and my friend said… let’s call each other stuff off the menu…

“So Honey Short Ribs…what are you having for dinner?”
“Not quite sure my Cool Cucumber Salad, how about you?”
“I think I’ll have the skirt steak, my little Parmigiano Chicken.”

Yea, you know who it was… the one who tells me “Spaghetti” because he knows I dread hearing “I love you”.

I think if I was to get with him for real (which I wouldn’t), I’d end up being as big as a house. He’s built perfectly…p-u-r-f-e-c-t-l-y…but he eats constantly. Plus, he likes to cook. Yea, I learned long time ago, he’s bad for my health.
Plus…eh, he’s just not the one for me. Sometimes I feel bad when I talk to him… he tries so hard…so hard to figure out what it is I want, that I sometimes feel like he’s not watching out for himself.
And fucking with me, y’all know…he should really be looking out for himself because…gifts of diamonds; does not make a long term relationship. Matter of fact, the last joker to give me diamond earrings wasted his money too…they’ve just been sitting. Would I be the ass if I pawned them? Just saying…they’ve been just sitting for well over a year now.
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My dad always had two pet names for me, Sweet Pea (below pic) and Alli-babe…and to me, they’ve always belong to him and I.
Well one Thanksgiving I found out that he’d been cheating on me by giving his wife-at-the-time my beloved “Sweet Pea”.
The year, 2003…the whole family had trekked to Maryland for the holiday. We were all standing around the table doing as we HAVE to do and telling what we are thankful for…some cry and others rush through a small thank you because “we” hate speaking in front of people…we all finish and prayer is said before we start to eat. Me, sitting two seats down from my daddy and his wife…she was some damn where at the table…it is not my damn job to watch where that woman sat!...

We are all passing food and reaching for food when my father says,
“sweet pea, pass me the green beans.”
Well…simultaneously I reached for the bowl…while she reached for it too. Well…y’all don’t know me like my family knows me and all of the sudden the table got quiet. Not a single peep. Everyone just looked at me…including my daddy…waiting on bated breath to see if I said something shitty to the wife.

See…what’s mine is mine. You take my shit from me and well…yes…you are gonna hear about it. So my words weren’t for her, they were for my father. ‘Cause he knew he’d fucked up. Like yelling another woman’s name during sex… he waited to see my reaction.
My reaction…just to be an ass…I held on to the bowl a minute too long, I didn’t yank it from her…didn’t apply any pressure…just looked in her eyes…then slowly looked at my dad...raised my eyebrows as if to say
“oh yeaa, your gonna get a earful on this one mutha-effa”…then I let go of the bowl.
Awkwardly, my aunt tried to start a conversation but it didn’t actually flow until I finally spoke… I realized it was my duty to make everyone at the table feel comfortable despite me being the one that was slighted.
My family knows that I am a spoiled little sumtin’ or other…sometimes. They know that I chose my words carefully when I am trying to kill you softly… they know that I am quick to pick up a knife concerning my daddy…but they have never seen me slighted by my father either. So… they waited. And I stepped up to the plate and made them feel better so that we could finish out Thanksgiving dinner.
I had some words for my dad in hushed whispers in the back room after the evening was finished. To this day…sweet pea and alli-babe remain mine. I've never yelled at my dad or cussed in front of my dad..and I didn't then...but I think I might have threatened him...and told me that it was unacceptable and that he hurt my feelings. My father promised me that they were...all mine...for all time.

And to this day… my family may bring it up…but it’s just in passing as they steal a look in my direction to see if it’s ok to “kid” about it… I either shake my head “no”…or I smile for them to proceed. At this point I don't too much care about the one time that happened...but for pretense, I keep it up so that they know that when it comes to me and pa...I don't fuck around and you can't come between.

I said all that to say…
Pet names…specifically for me…make me feel special… from Lady Love to Baby Girl… I love them. I scoot down into the comfort those words give me when I hear them from someone that makes my soul feel good.

But when they are used in a way to manipulate my heart… it bothers me.
AND…to use a pet name my daddy gave me…as a way to feel more connected and to get in the door that’s been shut to you… well…it confuses me and vexes me because… there is power in the name’s my daddy gave me…and there is still a love for the man that chose to use it this morning…
…so…
Texts that read…
“Alli-babe…dress warm, all that snow…wouldn’t want you to get the flu again.”
Leaves me feeling… a warmth in seeing my pet-name and in reading words of care and concern….but vexed that he’d use my daddy’s name for me…here at the finish-line of our relationship.
I recognize that shit for what’s its worth…and I am confused because I don’t want to feel good about reading that shit. How does someone feel good about knowing they are being manipulated…