Separated for 2 months... ice is thawing a little

[Choosing_Life]

Thanks, ITH! I like your statement about being as "safe a presence as possible." It is funny, your post almost retroactively predicted the path of my day yesterday.
1) Did not initiate contact with W.
2) W called in the afternoon asking if I would bring her a bookcase from the basement. I said "Of course," in the most positive tone of voice I could muster. She then asked if she could come over and get some books out of the basement since she was bored at her new place. I said, "Heck yeah" (not in those words, but that was the emotion).
3) She came over yesterday evening and walked around to different parts of the house. I had everything nice and clean. After getting a lot less stuff than I thought she was coming to get, she sat down on the couch (in her "usual spot") with our daughter and watched a show with her (in our house!). "Ah ha," I thought, "Maybe this book thing was just an excuse to test the waters at home..."
4) We took the stuff back over to her place, I helped her get it all where it needed to be. We were done, and we were looking at each other, and I could tell she wanted to talk but was too emotional to make the first move, so I invited her for coffee at a "neutral location."
5) We ended up talking for almost three hours. (Aside: Why didn't we ever think to do that when we were "together!?!?") It was a serious conversation for the most part, with a lot of heavy emotion. She was definitely "Venting about the R." Tears were spilled. I validated and validated and validated the feelings, took responsibility for the things I felt I had done wrong, and kept trying to gently steer the conversation in a positive, future- and solution-oriented direction. The great thing was, we also made time in the conversation to talk about the kids (fun talk, not child-rearing problem-solving talk), to laugh together about the terrible Muzak, and at one point W even seemed to find a sense of humor about the bizarre and explosive way we ended up separating.
6) At one point, we locked eyes for a solid minute. The desire to reach out was palpable; her hand started to move out, then pulled back. I just said, "I want to hold your hand, too, but there's no hurry."

So, wow... I am still trying to process this huge conversation, but overall it felt like a positive step. Knowing W, this gentle motion back toward intimacy will likely stimulate some fear and anger in her, so I am going to stick to my policy of giving her space. I really feel like she was testing the waters yesterday, and I don't want to put any pressure on her. I guess maybe that's something that I have worked on in myself. It just feels right to me that we both have that space right now.

We have another mundane reason to meet today. We'll see how that goes.

Thanks for listening.