Near Misses

There once was a girl from one coast and a boy from another coast who started communicating thanks to one of those modern devices called a computer. And from their individual computers, they both signed up for a service that promised to bring love-starved souls together.

She can't remember who wrote to whom first anymore... so much water under that there bridge. What she does remember is that they had oodles in common... he was once a skater in his youth, who spent time with the "great ones" in sunny California... she was once a skate betty in her youth, who spent a great deal of time wishing that the skate boys would do more than just ride their boards and get the occasional splinters in their asses in sunny Florida.

The day they began communicating was years later, after both had been married, become parents, and for differing reasons lost their spouses... her to adultery... him first to adultery, took her back, only to lose her again to a tragic death. Both losses were fairly recent... within the previous year or so.

They shared a love of the band WIRE... she had listed them in her favorites... he was actually wearing a t-shirt from one of their tours in his photo. Every conversation found them finding ways to drop words or phrases from their songs into active use. After a while of typing these things to one another, they progressed to phone calls... long, late-night calls that resulted in scary phone bills, which never seemed to be a deterrent to continued conversation. They spoke for months, a couple of times a week.

They agreed to meet soon... he spoke of a flight to her city... she expressed a desire to see that side of the country. Occasionally he would disappear for a week and she wouldn't hear from him, making her wonder if it was such a good idea... but he always returned to the conversations eventually, and always with some good excuse or another.

The one thing that really evolved, other than passions, in those long phone calls was her knowledge of what happened to his dearly departed and truly EX-wife. She became mildly concerned that perhaps he might not be telling all the truth that there was to tell. Here is what she learned...

After six years of marriage that resulted in one young son, his wife became aloof. In his investigations to figure out where she was spending long hours, he encountered her at a restaurant with another man. He confronted them and she confessed her new love. He told her to break things off or he would take their child and she'd never see him again... so she did break things off, for the time being.

After a few months of marital therapy, she broke down and told her spouse that she could no longer live with him... that they would have to try separation for a while. He moved out and within two weeks that other man moved into his family home. He would come over to pick up his son and have to face this new man fawning over his son and acting like the dad that he wasn't and it angered him with the fire of a thousand suns.

This set up lasted for 8 months or so, until something happened... the story is cloudy here, as no real details were given... but his estranged wife decided she wanted to make things work again. The other man had moved out, so he promptly moved back home again. The two of them re-affirmed their vows in a quiet ceremony. Then a couple of months later, they went on vacation as a family.

The trip took them to a cabin in the woods. Not remote, but in a camping ground where other families mingled, though the cabins were spaced far apart. The wilderness was vast, however, and breath taking. On their last day there, he decided to have a nap in the cabin while his wife and then 5-year-old son took a walk alongside a river and up to some falls.

He claims he heard shouting, which woke him from his nap and when he went to find the source, he heard someone yelling that a woman and son were floating in the river and that 911 needed to be called. He ran to the river to find his wife and son had been pulled out already, but neither was breathing. People were performing life-saving maneuvers, but nothing was happening.

After 30 minutes or so, the paramedics finally arrived. They managed to revive the man's son, but there was nothing they could do about his wife... her neck was broken and she was gone. From what everyone could surmise, though there were no witnesses, his wife and son had gone to the highest point of a cliff overlooking the river, right beside the falls. One or the other must have slipped and both fell the long height into the water, with his wife hitting the bottom and breaking her neck and his son merely falling unconscious and drowning until help arrived.

Hearing this story on first telling was tragic and heart wrenching. But over time and retelling, the curious girl began to ask questions.

"What happened to the boyfriend?"

"Well, he stayed away for a while, but then he came back again," he said. "As a matter of fact, she had gone to lunch with him a couple of times and was feeling torn... I planned our trip to get away from his influence over her, so she could just focus on me and our son. She talked about that guy too much though." Then he fell silent.

In another conversation, she got up the nerve to ask, "Has your son ever spoken about the events of that day? Has he needed therapy for that?"

"No, he's never spoken about it to anyone. Doctors think he has amnesia due to the trauma of the event, but he never speaks of it ever."

She began to put pieces together that didn't seem to fit before and wondered if that fall was entirely accidental.

"Did the police ever question you?" she inquired.

"Why would they? It was an accident and I was asleep in the cabin."

"Oh yes, of course," she feigned, "I just thought it was procedure."

Despite her mind conjuring images of dastardly deeds at the hands of a jilted husband, a la OJ Simpson... she continued to converse and make plans with the West coast boy.

One day, her plans came to fruition. For New Years, she flew out to the other coast to visit a friend from high school, who just happened to live about two hours south of the other boy. He told her that he would come get her and bring her to the beautiful wine valley, where they could have just one glorious day together at last, before she went home.

When she arrived in the far away land, she called the boy, but he didn't answer... so she left him a message. A day went by and he never returned the call... then another day... then another. Finally, it was about to be her last day there so she called again and left another message wondering what happened. After several hours went by, he finally called her back.

He then told her that he couldn't meet with her... and why.

"It would kill my girlfriend. She'd be devastated if she found out."

"Excuse me?" she was shocked. "GIRLFRIEND? When did this happen?"

"We've been dating on-again and off-again since my wife and I had that separation. She's been with me through all of this with me and she moved in about a month ago. She's only 19 and her 20th birthday is in 2 weeks... I couldn't hurt her this way, not on the eve of her special day."

"Um... you do realize that you and I have been talking for several months now and in that time, you never once mentioned a girlfriend... much less a live-in girlfriend. How did you manage not to bring this up?"

"You never asked," he said, rather matter-of-factly. "And I never really thought you'd come out here."

She wished him a nice life with his pubescent girlfriend and went back home to her corner, narrowly escaping a starring role on several episodes of Jerry Springer in one visit.

She still doesn't know what really happened to his deceased wife and she has tried searching for him years down the road, but he doesn't show up anywhere. She did speak with him a couple of times more after a few months had passed, but the conversations were brief and aloof, as would be expected.

She hardly ever speaks of this time with anyone anymore. It just seems too bizarre to be true... though other close encounters have come to push this one to the further recesses of her memory. More on those to follow...

UPDATE: She found him, on his birthday, no less.

Beautifully Illuminated

"He was a miserable, sad, and angry man in the last years of his life," said my father on the phone to me last week, speaking about my grandfather, once his father-in-law.

I couldn't fathom why at the time, but his words just didn't ring true with my memories of the man. I remember his smile and how his eyes would become soft slits that curved slightly downward, as if to meet the corners of his mouth that were curving upward and wanting to complete a circle. I remember him taking me everywhere he went and I remember him rolling cigarettes and sharing his tricks with me.

"Wing! Wing!" My parents claimed that I would say that whenever I saw him, from the moment that I could form words, and no matter what time of day or what time of year --bitterly freezing Chicago cold, bundled up in so many layers and a big furry hat; stiflingly hot Chicago heat, stripped down to nothing but a sleeveless undershirt and some lightweight boxers-- rain or snow or sunshine he would take me, always with that smile, out to his backyard to sit together on the old swingset... the one with the two bench seats facing each other. He would sit with me for hours if I asked him. And he never once complained or declined my request for our special time together.

I had many cousins too... around that time there were at least 8 others all clammoring for his attention... but I was definitely his favorite, which made me a target of jealousy in private later. I was the only child of his only daughter, who was a daddy's girl herself. I was a golden child and could do no wrong as far as he was concerned. And I felt that I could do no wrong when I was with him. That I was perfect just for being me.

I remember when he was visiting us once in 1977, and I had come running home from school, because I knew my grandparents were supposed to be there. But in my excitement to get home, I forgot to use a restroom and hadn't used one all day. By the time I reached my house on my long walk home, I was in so much pain, I couldn't hold it any longer... and the warm liquid streamed down my legs with each step I took up our stairs to the porch. By the time I reached the top, my pants and shoes were soaked and I was a sobbing mess. I imagined the reprimands that I would be getting from my father about being so foolish as to forget to go all day, and the shaming look in my mother's eye as she would help me change.

Instead of either of my parents coming to let me in that day, it was my grandfather who came to the door to greet me. Seeing me shaking and sobbing, he looked down at my wet clothes and the puddle streaming from my shoes and said sweetly, with that same warm smile, "It's okay. I have accidents too sometimes." He brought me inside, helped me get changed, and never once told either of my parents about it.

Later that same year, I woke up in the middle of the night hearing a woman crying... wailing was more like it. I thought someone had left the television on, until I got up to investigate and found it was coming from my parents bedroom. I walked in to see both of them up and my mother crying uncontrollably. I hadn't yet reached my seventh birthday, but I understood in that instant that something had happened to my grandfather. They said he died of a heart attack in the bathroom of his home just a few hours earlier.

I remember his wake and the three days I spent looking at him in his coffin and wondering who would sit with me on the swingset now. When we would go back to my grandparents' house in the evenings, I tried to get my own father to sit with me, but he was distracted. And my mother couldn't bring herself to sitting in her dad's spot. So I sat on the swing alone each day and stared at the spot where he used to be. The next summer that old swingset was taken down. My uncle said it was falling apart and wasps were building nests in it. Just the summer before it seemed perfectly fine, like it would be around forever. Then again, so did my grandfather.

So when my father was saying those words to me last week, telling me how he remembers my grandfather being miserable and angry and sad in his last years of life, I couldn't fathom it. He would never fit that description in my mind.

That night, I decided to watch the first of several videos that I'd rented for the week. It was EVERYTHING IS ILLUMINATED. For some reason, I kept pausing the movie and getting distracted by other things and couldn't concentrate on just watching the movie. The next day, I was headed to the gym, when I remembered that the movie was still on pause. So I decided that maybe I could watch a few more minutes of it before heading out. I had no idea that I would never make it to the gym that day, or what kind of cathartic experience awaited me in that moment.

I don't wish to ruin the movie for those of you who haven't seen it... and if you haven't, you should... but there is a scene, after this long, bizarre, seemingly pointless search, where everything comes together. Why everyone in that moment is there... why a collector from the US would be standing on the porch of an old woman in the Ukrain he wasn't even related to, in the middle of a sunflower field at night, searching for another woman in a photograph with his grandfather, and being given her wedding ring that he didn't think was his since he wasn't related to her, saved first by burial in the ground to keep from the Nazis, then carefully dug up by her sister and kept in a box marked "in case" and for over half a century. He was meant to have that ring, because it hadn't been saved "in case" something happened to the woman who wore it, but "in case" he existed... and that he existed because the ring was waiting to be found by someone just like him... it was the reason for his whole being at that moment... for why he was who he was.

The tears started rolling down my cheeks. My father's words about my grandfather made sense finally. My grandfather may have been sad or miserable to some people in his later years, but I existed for the sole purpose of bringing him moments of pure happiness and unconditional love for a few short years.

I smiled as the tears ran down my cheeks, as I am now, knowing how good those years felt and how cherished those memories are to me. There have been only a few memories in my life that come near to those, and sometimes I wondered what I might have turned out like if he'd been around longer to share that smile of his with me, but I'm grateful for the moments that I had.

Although seven years can feel like a lifetime when you're feeling constantly misunderstood, it can also feel like a blink of an eye when you're unconditionally accepted. Sometimes I dream of that swingset and the two of us there, like I did last night, warmed by the crinkle of his eyes and the curve of his smile. It's hard to leave that dream, but I know that I will have this same kind of moment again one day. Someone else might cherish that blissfully quiet contentment on the swing as much as I do... no words needed... just a smile.

The Heart in the Age of Collectible Reproductions

"Should we recycle everything?"

That's one of the many questions I asked in FOUND. My answer, the one you don't hear in the film is, "No, because some things aren't meant to be shared or re-used."

Derivative works and homages aside, there are a few things that should remain with the original intended meaning. Sometimes it's hard to tell when sincerity is being feigned, because the actor himself doesn't know the difference any more.

I received an envelope yesterday, as I seem to do every other day or so, from my previously mentioned paramour. Like the others, this one contained articles that he thought I might like and saved scraps of paper from our time together with notes from him scribbled on them here and there.

Yesterday's package had all of the above mentioned notes and sundries, with the added bonus that it contained poetry... something new from him and also having an air that the idea comes from somewhere or someone else. In addition to the recycling of someone else's thoughts toward him, he gave me one sheet that was literally a recycled note meant for someone else... one of his previous paramours, with whom he was spending time when we met. My guess is that he gave it to her at some point, she kept it and cherished it until, having gotten her heart broken by him, she returned it to him along with any other things he might have given her or left behind.






This poem/notes combo, along several other similar examples, are things that make me thankful on some level: I get to release yet a little more of those beautiful memories that try to cling to parts of my heart and mind with such resiliency.

There is a more bittersweet consequence to these kinds of experiences in life, however. The most lingering will be that trying to discern "Mr. Right" from "Mr. Right-Now" becomes murkier and cloudier and grayer. There are collectors in the world who simply exist to collect more and more and more, who don't care if what they collect is original or unique really, just so long as it's another one to add to the growing pile. It must be quite a thrill to look at the numbers and think: I did those.

But some of us can appreciate a truer thing of beauty in simplicity and less. We downsize our hearts so that we may more deeply enjoy the connections we make. When you amass so much bric-a-brac, eventually you forget where you put what or even if you've already got one of those. But when you stop collecting and choose to simplify things, the experience can yield a treasure trove so much deeper and richer than any 1000 others combined.

I too save things, but I don't save everything. The contents of these envelopes of the former paramour have been getting discarded since the very first, because part of me felt no real connection to any of it. At the time, I thought it was merely my heart being stubborn; now I think it was being realistic.

Five-and-a-half years ago, I was in a Chinese restaurant on a date with a man who had just matter-of-factly stated that I wasn't his "Ms. Right," but he had no trouble with keeping me around until she came along. Inside my head, my spirit began to sink as a laundry list of numerous times this would happen to me in the future played out before me. Sometimes being able to see the future isn't so much fun.

While I sat there feeling like "what's the point" in this information age of too much quantity and not enough quality, the waitress arrived with our fortune cookies. One cookie seemed to roll off the mini-tray and come right up to me, so I figured that it must have picked me. I held it in my hands and announced to the tactless man sitting across from me, "This cookie contains the answer to the question: 'How will I know my Mr. Right when I meet him?'"

I opened the cookie and the message read: "He who loves you will follow you."

My first thought was, "How'd the fortune cookie know I was into males? Did it magically put in 'he' in the pronoun section based on whoever touched it? What if I had been a woman's pro golfer or John Travolta? Ok, bad example."

I tend to ramble when I think, so if you see me deep in thought, it's usually some sort of conversation like this going on in my head. Don't ever ask me, "Whatcha thinkin'?" if you're not prepared for the onslaught of odd theories, postulations and multi-sided debates that are being concocted on the spot and will then bubble up from my brain like a baking soda volcano after the vinegar is poured.

And my second thought was, "Great. Guess I have a stalker."

But after I thought about it for a while (and had time to search the bushes around my house), I came to the conclusion that maybe this was one smart cookie. The person that I wanted in my life was someone who followed me... both in life and in thought... someone who not only wants to be with me come what may, but who also gets me. It might seem simple and generic, because who deep down doesn't want that? But I think most people forget about what's real and go for the superficial ideals or a flash-in-the-pan. Our biggest downfall is distraction via an unending stream of newer, better, faster, bigger, slimmer, sexier, more, more, more.

As I looked back across the table that night in that Chinese restaurant, I remember feeling a bit of pity for the jerk sitting across from me. He knew nothing of what really mattered, as all he was looking for was a redhead. He was convinced that he'd find happiness in what was on her head rather than what was in it.

I'm not waiting so much like Sleeping Beauty for this fantasy to come true, mind you, and I'm not hoping someone will be a puppy dog either. But that cookie did help me to realize the importance of a person's interest in you and how they think of you.

"Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow. Don't walk behind me, I may not lead. Just walk beside me and be my friend." That was on the poster nearest my desk in my 4th grade homeroom class, right next to the "hang in there" kitty. I had no idea that it was Camus or even who he was, but looked at it every day and thought about the meaning of those words and it has stuck with me.

(Was the "hang in there" kitty Nietzsche? I bet it was.)

When I got home that night from the restaurant, I taped the fortune to my computer monitor, where it greeted me every day for over 4 years. I finally gave away that monitor and I decided it was time to retire the paper, since it was permanently under glass inside my head next to Camus and the kitty.

("Camus and the Kitty" ... the new film from Ron Howard.)

The fortune cookie was incorporated into that same thought. Sometimes you need to be followed... to be understood and to be admired in a way that others don't get... to be the teacher. And sometimes you need to be led... to be protected and shown the right path... to be the student. But always there is balance.

I don't mean to sound morose or possibly even critical of others at this point, and if I did, I truly apologize. My only intention is to illuminate my own path. Whatever doesn't sit well with any of you, please discard it the way you would a paper fortune, as maybe it wasn't meant for you. But if you find a slip of truth while you consume this, add that slip to your own collection of knowledge and use it however it fits.

Over and Over Again

I never know how to start these things.

But I'm always looking for an ending.

And of course I found one again.

Originally, this was only going to last a couple of days, but somehow after discovering how much fun it was, it lapsed into a couple of weeks. It's over now. I'm back to normal... well, as normal as I can be when I'm pretending to be normal.

Why did it crumble?

I sensed him pulling away... planning another rendezvous, but not with me. I felt excitement, like when making travel plans together with someone, but definitely not with me. The guilt he was hiding was not hiding well... like when my dog wants to remain outside looking for squirrels when I'm calling her back inside, so she chooses to stand directly behind a tree to hide from my line of view, but her wagging, white, plume-like tail betrays her attempts at concealing herself... she knows I'll be angry, but she's preparing for that while she continues the hunt. For him, it was coming across in his voice and in his actions, which only makes me squirrelly.

When I pick up on those vibes, rather than stand and hold my ground, I dump everything and run. This time was no exception. I felt myself getting annoyed with him... bubbling to the surface... first just a little sarcasm, then a lot... then... the inevitable apathy.

I just can't be that girl... the one who turns the other cheek... who ignores reality and plays along with the charade. I can't be that girl. But, oh, how I wish I could be that girl.

Perceptiveness is a curse, really. When you can read what is in someone's heart and behind their eyes better than a psychic... When you can hear tones and smell fear in a way that rivals a police dog... When you can find the well of untold stories better than a divining rod... That's when it's a curse.

I am a soothsayer and a truth slayer... the deepest, darkest fear of all men. I see through... I see in and around... and when it isn't brought up to the surface, I manage to reach in and pull it up.

You say men secretly want this, to have someone perceive all their secrets... but they don't. Men who want a version of their mothers do, however... and they will cultivate that kind of relationship for as long as they can get away with it. I married one of those, I know.

The other part of my senses comes from a different angle. When I feel something else is happening outside my little circuit... when I sense some power being siphoned and diverted... I seek to recharge it elsewhere and to replace it. I make eye contact... serious, long, unbroken eye contact... with strangers... people I would likely have not paid much attention to at all while in a happier state of mind. Men who seem to be everywhere when I'm feeling the extra-sensory perceptiveness rise. All of my radar goes up... including the part of me that looks for something shiny and new.

I just don't understand charades or acting, for that matter. Why say one thing to a person and be thinking about something or someone completely different? It takes away from the moment. It kills all the REAL fun and replaces it with plastic diversions.

This is why it had to end. I am looking for the real thing, not the temporary stand-in for someone, but the REAL thing. I am looking for a deeper experience than just the description and whatever happens to be lying about on the surface. I will go deeper and if you will not go with me, then I will leave you behind.

I choose not to paddle around on the surface anymore with boys who prefer breathing through a snorkel and keeping an eye on dry land. I want to get wet... completely wet... to submerge and to feel the pressure as the depth changes... to keep my head clear but my heart racing forward... and most importantly, I have to learn how to breathe at these depths.

I've wanted this since my divorce six years ago, but I simultaneously ran from it... so much so, that the first guy whom I asked out after my divorce took five months for me to build up to that moment, and about 20 serious panic attacks, where I had to swallow Rolaids, Pepto, aspirin, heart medication... anything I had been carrying around with me at the time... except that I forgot how to swallow, so it took hours to get everything in me. Literally. And then I had to figure out how unglue my grip from whatever solid object I was clinging to for safety. Luckily, either my muscles would release on their own due to fatigue, or the buckets of sweat pouring off of me would make me lose my grip.

Now, years and many dates later, my grip is loose... maybe too loose. I let go so easily that I don't know if I remember how to hold on. Remember that airliner that went into the river in DC in the middle of winter? And how despite the coast guard's best attempt at rescue with life preservers, many of the passengers just couldn't hold on, because they were too frozen? That's me. I'm that poor woman whom they were pulling up and almost got her to the safety of the chopper when she plummeted back into the icy waters. Unlike her, I keep resurfacing. But like her, many are losing hope for me as they watch me fall back again and again.

How did it crumble, cookie-wise?

I found myself thinking long and hard about a brief relationship that I'd had five years earlier. Both men are very similar in personalities... very similar. Oddly enough, this new creature comfort in my life had bits and pieces of all the best relationships over the years... he looked similar to one, acted similar to another, had the spirit of yet another, the desire of another, and the parts of this one and that... oh, those parts... of so many good beginnings. But mostly, I was reminded of the unresolved parts of my past lovers... and one in particular.

Five years ago, while I was in a very different spot in my heart and head, I wanted nothing but fun fun fun. And when I met up with him, the former, he was instantly smitten... as was I. But he was in a deeper, more serious place than I was. He just ended something that seemed all wrong for long-lasting love, but his friends were all getting married off and his life seemed so unlike theirs. He was longing for what they had, but afraid at the same time.

Along comes me... all fun and freedom and unfettered fantasy... and a whirlwind couple of days spent pretending to be coupley and having the most exquisite time... all unicorns and rainbows and surprisingly well-timed music. On my last day, we walk into a pizza place for our last meal together in that city and as if timed just for us, the music piping through the speaker system starts playing the Beatles "All You Need Is Love." We looked at each other and began to laugh hard. I know people thought we were drunk. And we were.

But then the serious questions crept into his mind... can she move here with her kids? Can I afford an insta-family? Can I handle all the pressure and responsibility all at once? I tried to calm his fears and tell him this was all supposed to be fun... just fun, nothing more... just come visit me in my city and the fun will continue... you'll see, it'll be a blast. But he wanted more and couldn't stop thinking about that. On the day of his arrival here, he called and cancelled instead. Rather than taking the 2-hour flight to come see me and let us resolve any wounds with care-filled stitches of respectful threads, he chose to tear the end open and leave it gaping and bleeding and unresolved.

I was in agony over this moment for weeks... then traumatized by it for months... and the scar remained for years. It was the constant reminder of what kind of girl I was... the kind one can play fantasy with, but then throw away when things about me don't fit neatly into a box. It affected and infected other relationships that followed... well, one in particular more directly than others. A few years later after a leave of abstinence, it only affected things peripherally rather than directly.

I have to say, taking a year off can do a body good... clears the mind and the soul, removes the debris of the past. Five years later, following another long leave of abstinence, it was like I had been given a new prescription. Here I was, the man that he had been facing the woman that I had been back then. We had changed roles and a new actor who still fit the role was playing opposite me, but it was the same script. This time, I was in the position of being asked to just have fun, when instead I was looking for more than just fun.

With the shoe on my foot this time, I could feel the discomfort here that it caused in me. I tried to walk in it a little while, and I really did enjoy myself thoroughly... until the irritation became inflamed and a blister formed. I found myself after knowing the man only 7 weeks (par for my old pattern), and "knowing" him in the Biblical sense for just 2.5 weeks, that I needed and wanted something deeper than what he was willing to give... he's too new into the post-divorce world to see that... he's me five years ago, unable to see a full partnership with another again, but still enticed by the fresh memory of it.

When I saw him doing what I was doing those 5 years ago... trying to keep myself open for more and more and more back then... spinning off in other directions and being tempted by so much choice... I decided that I had two options: (1) stick with the fantasy and wait it out while turning a blind eye to his other whims; or (2) end it now and focus on finding the real. I chose at first, as you've read before, to wait... but quickly I realized that it wouldn't be true to myself to do so. So I chose instead, option 2.

I almost pulled the same escape that was pulled on me 5 years ago... to leave it torn open and unresolved, just to not have to waste more energy or time or emotion, and to "make it easy" on the both of us and "spare us" the face-to-face agony. A phone call could have done that trick... or an email.

But when I realized that I had an opportunity to end things in the way that I wished had been done unto me previously, I chose to make that extra effort. As difficult as it was going to be for me, I chose to face the end head-on. So unlike the other man that I was emulating, I packed and made the 2-hour journey to see the me that I was, though I admit that I was hesitant and dragged my feet a little, but still... it was the right thing for both of us... the me that I am now and the me that I was... him.

We spent a quiet, windy, yet glorious day walking around the city... holding hands and acting coupley. There was a sadness to me that day that was partly cloudy, like the weather, but still very optimistic deep down inside that the rain could be held back a little longer. I lifted the air with comedy where I could, and when we returned for food and shelter, he lifted the air with sensuality... which I gladly accepted. It would be the last time that passion would be in season, so I sated myself on the fruit and drank heartily from its cup.

When it came time to discuss the end, we were wrapped in warm embrace. It was nurturing and comforting and bittersweet, but very necessary. I know I almost cried a time or two and I think I even saw his eyes well up a little as well, but we were careful not to let anything but passion overflow. By the morning, the role reversal was complete... literally and figuratively... and our goodbyes felt deeply moving and fully fleshed. In a way, though this affair of the heart was but a stand-in for something real to come, the ending I chose made it more real... and also made the pain of an old scar disappear.

The only thing left unresolved is the collaboration that I mentioned previously. I don't think it will be possible, with the passion as good as it was and the temptation that comes from working together. He claims he'll respect my wishes, but my desires are far stronger than my wishes... it's me that I worry about, not him.

But as he left that door open for more work in the future, I left the door open to more depth in the future, should he find himself ready to stop paddling around on that surface life of his. The only problem I see with that ever happening stems from where he's paddling... some tricky waters.

When you involve yourself with someone so young and inexperienced and brought up in a highly reserved and conservative environment, and an accident happens... as accidents often do... there is no fire escape for a fast exit... only responsibility will come down that road. Oddly, that's what he most fears... yet he seems to be tempting fate. Perhaps that's his predetermined path though... and maybe it will be the best thing for him. Or maybe he just let the best thing for him go. That's not for me to decide. But I can see the future sometimes... or future truths at least... and I saw that as soon as he confessed to me his other life. Tread with care or you will find that road you're on leads you back to the home you've been trying to leave all your life.

My path, however, is now open. New endings mean new beginnings. Time to take what I've been given and move forward. And I've been given a great gift this time... wisdom and maturity... without pain or the feeling of loss. I do feel a loss... a great one... but I also feel that more than anything, I've been true to myself. This time an intimate relationship crumbled and I didn't.

It's such a beautiful day, almost painted on canvas.

I think I'll take my tea outside.

To steep and to soak it in.