The Loneliest Year: Part Eleven

January 2021

Cesar and I wished each other “Happy New Year!” after midnight.

One New Year’s Day, I beat the computer at Chess. I had to use hints the entire time, but it counted. I'd lost with hints before.

The week after I started using my new lucky intention oil, I had incredibly terrible luck.

I saw that Cesar had added a new photo to his Tinder profile—which was strange for someone who said he was not in a place to date. And on the same day, Victor posted on Twitter about using Grindr.

For four days after New Year’s Eve, I didn’t text either of them. I played frequency music to raise my vibration, and l laid in bed for hours with manifestation oil on my wrists, visualizing, meditating, and trusting that the universe would connect me with one of them.

In those four days, while I was raising my vibes and thinking positively and trusting the universe, Cesar started talking to someone else (a month after he said he wasn’t in a place to date). And Victor decided he didn’t want to invest in anything long distance.

Before I knew that Cesar was seeing someone, I held him accountable to his promise to hang out with me. I picked him up from Santa Ana, and we drove back to work out at my home gym.

After we finished lifting weights, I had this happy moment. “Rita Morena” was playing, and I was putting away silverware, and I could hear him making noise in the bathroom, post-shower. Vegan Thai was on the way, and the apartment felt warm and homey. My eyes watered. Someone special to share the mundane with—that’s all I’d ever wanted.

Later that evening was when he told me he’d started talking to someone else over the weekend, but that he still wanted to hang out as friends. I was glad he told me, but it was also the same thing that had happened with Jesse all over again.

I unfollowed all of the psychic and tarot accounts, and deleted all the horoscope apps from my phone. I was tired of getting my hopes up and believing. Tired of being disappointed and getting hurt.

I started waking up at 4 AM again and crying. About Jesse. About Cesar. About Victor. About everything.

I had nothing to look forward to again. But I practiced resolve, and I did the work anyway. I lost seven pounds in a week from intermittent fasting and cutting sugar and calories. I did a songwriting workshop with one of my favorite singer-songwriters, Laura Veirs. I started revising poetry I wrote during my time with Jesse, and I recorded a demo for the song I wrote inspired by Cesar.

I continued hypnotherapy sessions with Rachel, and I guested on my friend Susan Ruth's Being Human podcast.

One Saturday, I reached 50,000 steps in eight hours. I walked most of it, then ran for twenty minutes near the end.

Cesar started reading Reality Unveiled, and getting texts from him about the book was the small highlight of my day. A week after he told me he was talking to someone else, Cesar worked out my place again, and afterward, we sat on my living room floor and talked, and it was just nice to be with him—even if all he had to offer was friendship. He was still considering moving in, which made me really happy.

One morning, my mom told me that she prayed daily for God to send me a loving partner, and it touched me deeply.

Even though I hadn’t heard from Jesse, I still felt this connection to him. He went through my Insta-Stories one evening, and it was strange, because I had a feeling that he would.

I still suffered with insanely painful sinus pressure, and after my CT scan results showed up clear, the ENT sent me to an allergy clinic where a nurse dug angry Legos into my back to test for allergies.

I watched the Inauguration on Twitter.

One day, I really needed to be held, but I had no one, so I spent the day in bed, crying and revising poetry.

The ENT wanted me to do a second allergy test that would require 150 injections, and I declined. I was tired of giving them money to be unable to figure out what was wrong with me. I could do bad all by myself.

I went on a tedious FaceTime date with a guy named Marcos.

One day, Cesar and I talked on the phone, and he said that he was grateful to know me and that he thought I was Jesus. I kid you not. Then, later he texted me that the other guy had asked him to be his boyfriend, and he’d said “yes.” I shed a few tears, then I went on with my day. Outside of sheer cruelty, I wasn’t sure why the universe was making me relive what happened with Jesse again, but I was handling it better this time around.

I immersed myself in poetry revision.

I worked out regularly again even though I hated it.

I went for a run one day, and it was incredibly beautiful outside, and I was grateful, even as I hated the idea that enjoying the beauty of one nice day was supposed to make slogging through a year of hell somehow “worth it.”

I reached out to the loud neighbors that lived three floors above me, and we reached a compromise. They started to play their music quieter, and it was the biggest of wins.

When I finally got my $600 relief check, I quickly discovered that it did not cover all the debt I’d accrued over the course of the pandemic. Huh. Weird.

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Part Twelve:

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Note from the Writer

This is part eleven in a thirteen-part essay series that details my year in quarantine from March 15, 2020 to March 15, 2021. If you enjoyed this essay, I hope you'll add a heart and continue reading the other essays in the series.

Tips are not mandatory, but greatly appreciated.

Thank you for reading.