It’s about presence, not presents

A breakup might seem an odd topic for a Valentine’s Day column. But the fact is, I ended the most significant relationship of my life the day before Valentine’s Day two years ago. But bear with me, this story has a happy ending. It may seem cruel to send a guy packing right around the traditional lovers’ holiday. But sometimes relationships have expiration dates that cannot be postponed.

I had been seriously involved with this fellow for nearly five years, and we had been friends for five years before that. I thought I knew his character well, but what I slowly learned over our years together was that he was incapable of love, in the sense of caring about the well-being of another person. He was charming, loads of fun and said all the right things. He called me his “soul mate” and the “love of his life.”

We had many good times together. The problem was, we had no bad times together. Whenever I needed him, he disappeared. When my landlord sold the house I was renting out from under me and I had to move, did he help me with the heavy lifting? No. Yes, he came over after I was settled in my new place with flowers, wine, dish towels and wooden spoons. Nice. Some packing assistance would have been nicer.

When my father was dying, well, I knew my boyfriend had a hectic schedule when I started seeing him. He brought lovely white roses to the funeral. I would have preferred his hand to hold in the hospital. I needed presence, not presents. I came to realize that my boyfriend had no interest in helping me through the messy, painful parts of my life. I started to think that to him, I was less a person than a fix, a drink, something to recharge his batteries. (He always said how “intoxicating” I was.) I confronted him, told him I needed more. He said he understood, but his behavior didn’t change. “Yes, yes,” he said, and bought me more flowers.

I began withdrawing my emotions from him bit by bit. Finally, one day I asked him, “Do you love me, or do you just enjoy me?” He seemed baffled by the question. He replied, “I love you because I enjoy you, and I enjoy you because I love you.” He didn’t get it. Which gave me the answer I needed. I ended the relationship. It was Feb. 13.

The next day, when I got home from work there were two dozen red roses, a custom CD and a pink silk negligee waiting by my back door. Apparently he also didn’t get the finality of my decision. Seeing the gifts made me feel sick. A friend once told me that when you definitively end a relationship, that is when the guy wakes up and offers you whatever you want. The trouble is, by the time a woman gets to that point, it is almost always too late. She has withdrawn her emotions from the relationship like money from a bank, and by the time the guy realizes it, the account has been closed.

Such was the case with my boyfriend. Once commitment-shy, he immediately offered to marry me; in fact, he begged me to marry him. He began stopping by my house several times a day and calling at 3 a.m., crying. I had the presence I had sought for so long, but now I no longer wanted it. He said I had broken his heart, and I guess I had. But he had been chipping away at mine for years, to the point I had no sympathy for his pain.

I promised a happy ending. I will be spending this Valentine’s Day with a wonderful guy. From what I hear through the grapevine, my ex will likely spend a quiet evening alone with the companion he hooked up with shortly after I left him: regret. My hope for him is that because of the fallout from our relationship, he has also made the acquaintance of compassion, so that by next Valentine’s Day, he may share the holiday with true love.

*

Samantha Bonar can be contacted at samantha.bonar@latimes.com.