Oh my gosh, guys, you are all so amazing, I am so happy to hear your thoughts!! I will post more later, I promise.
If I send an email, should I send it right away, or wait for him to try to contact me for a couple days?
(((JULIA))) I am so happy to *see* you on my thread! I went looking for you and I couldn'tn find you and thought maybe you had left the board. Yes, please be encouraged, if you told me 8 months ago this was where I'd be I would have said it was impossible, and look, now I'm here!!
I'd send the email sooner, rather than later. Tomorrow at the latest, I think. At this point he doesn't know that you really want to see him, he may be conflicted over the whole thing. But keep it light, with no pressure!
OK, a couple things I forgot to mention. There was lots of laughing and I was smiling probably almost the entire time. There were a couple moments when we made eye contact and I felt like I could "see" him inside, like that spark of connection.
It was weird because it was like very familiar and completely unfamiliar at the same time. Part of me was like, who is this strange new man in my beloved's somewhat unfamiliarly bearded body???
I think honestly I had subconciously numbed myself a little bit. I think maybe somewhere inside I was afraid if I really let myself FEEL the yearning and desire I would also FEEL the pain and rejection. Like I told a friend of mine before I left, this is very strange because I am going to have dinner with someone who I love more than anyone else in the world, but who hurt me more than anyone else, and I have no experience behaving in this situation.... It felt a lot more like old friends catching up than a first date, esp b/c I overconfided and also our talking turns were so long. There were maybe 3-5 times when we were walking together and our arms brushed up against each other and it wasn't akward... But there were definitely times when I was imagining being with his body, or touching his willy wonka!!!!
The bluegrass thing really surprised me. And I thought if this was the first time I'd met this person I'm not sure that we would really be able to relate b/c I know nothing about bluegrass and it seems to be his passion right now. And then I realized it is actually very parallel to my involvement with music from indonesia... and I can totally relate to that passion.
It felt SO different from our times together before the bomb, both that the air had really cleared, but also if we got back together it seems like it would be really like starting completely over. Unless there's some kind of stage I don't know about where both people drop their act and lay everything out on the line and admit their feelings and confusions. Like I really did not see the vulnerable, confused, tormented B I saw at bomb time at all. Is he still inside there somewhere, just not ready to show me that????
As for the spark, it almost reminded me of this time in our R a couple years before the bombs where B was having issues with being physical (long story) and I said, "hey, let's just pretend it's ramadan and not do anything horizontal or naked together until you figure out what you're comfortable with". And he told me during that time that he definitely didn't feel as connected to me when we weren't being physical.... like a whole dimention of the R was missing. It reminded me of that time.
Was no one delighted by my sock comment??? Or the fact that we sang "business time" together???
I had a thought... I *could* include details of my performance on Saturday in the "it was good to see you again" email, since he did ask about that and I didn't have all the info at the time. Or I could just send the one line email without any info about my performance... at this point I think LESS IS MORE.
Oh!!! One more thing!!! Before we met let's investigate his pattern of communication: -I email him times when I'm avail in NYC -I don't hear from him for 3 days -I email him to see if he heard from me -he texts me back twice that night -I don't respond -HE TEXTS ME AGAIN THE NEXT MORNING -I wait 3 hours to respond -HE CALLS ME AND LEAVES A VOICEMAIL...
it seems REALLY clear that when I step back he steps forward. At least that's how it worked this week.
Hmm... I feel like that's almost exactly what I said when I left him ("It was great to see you, maybe we could see each other again sometime" or something like that) so mabye I should just say "It was great to see you again" or say nothing at all....
It seems to me that there are three ways he can be feeling. 1. He is interested in you. 2. He might be interested in you, he's not quite sure. 3. He is not interested in you, it's still over.
OK, if it is number 3, and it is really number 3, it really makes no difference what you do. You can keep DBing him, and maybe things sill change, but it is going to take a long time, if it ever happens. Nuances of your response now won't make any difference.
If it is number one, it probably won't make a lot of difference, either. He will make a move to contact you, sooner, rather than later. But it probably isn't too realistic to expect this one.
So, the case we can most reasonably hope for is that he might be interested. In that case, you don't want to play too hard to get. You have his attention, but not his full attention. You can't reel him in, because he hasn't bitten yet. But if you yank the bait away, he's just going to swim off in the other direction. That's why I think you need to contact him, probably today. Say it was fun, and make sure he knows the door is open to see him again. After that, it's up to him. You've given the bait a little twitch, now it's up to him to take it!
thanks for breaking it down like that. I'm wondering why he hustled so hard to see me yesterday if it really was #3. But who knows, the minds of the WAs are so... mysterious!!!! It will probably just pain me to try to fathom it too much.
