Not really piecing and trying not to jinx it, but

[Freckle6]

I'm going to try to be as brief as possible because this would be a novel otherwise. If anyone happens to read and has questions I will answer them. I haven't posted here in a long, long time but right now just need somewhere to purge my brain and maybe get some fresh perspectives.

I've been separated for just over 4 1/2 years. Me-36, H-36, Son now 5. Known each other since we were 12, dated for 6 years, married for 6 years at point of separation (legally married for 10 years now). WAH, possibly something life crisis precipitated by our son. No OW, though he has dated since. I tried but freaked myself out so it never went beyond the phone and texting.

Divorce has been in the works for about 2 years and stalled at various points, not because of contention, but because of money for the various stages.

He ran hot and cold for the first 2 years or so of our separation and then stayed cold for a while. He filed for D, I accepted that this was probably it, refinanced the house in my name and started being happy again in my simple, relatively drama free, quiet life with my son.

This past summer he out of the blue asked if I would be interested in taking a day bus trip to the Bronx Zoo with our son later in the summer. Seeing as how I never said more than hi and bye to him while exchanging our son lately, it took me by surprise but I agreed to it because I hadn't been there before and one of the things that sucks about D is missing times like this with your kids when they do stuff with the other parent.

He did a few other surprising things in between that like random calls to me for no reason and ended up calling me in the middle of the night one night and insisted on coming over. He missed me, don't forget about him, blah, blah, blah. He spent the night, but I wouldn't have sex with him.

He asked me if I wanted to go with him and our son to see fireworks on the 4th of July that weekend a few days later but I knew by that time that he had already talked himself back out of whatever feelings he had resurfaced. I was upset for a few days, but honestly wasn't surprised and as a 180 I never said another word about it to him. A few weeks later we had fun on the zoo trip and I made it a point to act as if we were the happy little family we were pretending to be.

Everything back to as before until 2 months ago and he figures out how to text me. He sends me a text saying that sometime if I'm out with our son that it would be nice if I texted him to let him know what we were doing??? OK, it kind of felt like he was wanting to keep track of me but I told him sure, whatever. A couple weeks later he texts me again and asks why I haven't texted him at all.

Anyway, these small things (enough to get me wondering, but also make me think I might be reading too much into things) continue until a couple of weeks ago and he asked me to sign back up for MSN instant messenger and talk to him some night on it. He starts with how he wants to be a big part of our son's life every day and he's wondering if that's an option. He misses me, wonders how I've changed, etc.

Since then we've texted often and talk almost every night on IM for hours. Stuff about us, memories of the past, day to day stuff, lots of stuff about our son, but nothing firm as to let's try again and make this work. Which is ok with me because I want to take this slow because, and I told him this too, that he has a habit of saying one thing to me and then running in the other direction (he said, "good point" LOL).

Last night we rode together to our son's school for a parent teacher conference. We chatted but it was all weird at the same time. It's easier texting or IMing or even on the phone. I don't know how to make that leap from talking to what seems like my old husband virtually to in person with this man who looks like the alien I've been dealing with for the past 5+ years? I still love him and want to be a family but it's been soooo long that it's hard to remember what it was like when their wasn't this weirdness, kwim? I put this part in red because I know anyone reading has probably dozed off by the time I actually got to my "problem".

OK, I lied and I sucked at trying to condense this. Sorry for the length.