the asking.

A good long while ago I liked a man, the reasons for which now somehow inexplicable. But such is the kindness and clarity of time—of knowing just enough or just a-little-too-much when all is said and done.

Because when the said-and-done had come he was not the right guy. He was not even a good guy. But before I knew too much or even just enough, I thought maybe.

And he thought maybe.

And together we lived in that delicious and fertile place that a maybe is--until we found ourselves on opposite sides of the same answer: no.  

Absolutely not.

And there in the wake of the said-and-done in the land where maybe became a no was the exposed mettle of a man just not good enough.

But I was lonely and had so long accepted his meager kindnesses that I confused his not good enough with my not good enough and that became the story I told myself. That I was not good enough.

Of the few men I’ve known and loved and cared for in this life I’ve stood before each and every one of them and asked them to love me. Not really asking, of course. Not giving voice to what fear rendered silent and desperate. But asking in the absence of those words. Asking in the silence of what I was too afraid to say. I asked by simply not having the courage to assert my worth.

And then I accepted their small and selfish answers.

Yes, but not now.

A little, but not enough.

Not really, but I’ll do what I can to make you think that I do.

None of these things stated explicitly, but derived from the morse code that is shifting feet, hands in pockets, half-smiles, gentle bows of the head.

But it was the asking that was the problem. Even more than the answers. It was the asking that unraveled whatever might have been.

say yes. and yes. and yes again

I have three photos from college that I keep together. They were all taken on the same night, in the span of five minutes, in a room that was warm in that way a room gets when everyone's drinking and dancing and celebrating the end of something really big.

In the first photo I'm sandwiched between two boys--two men--and there's a girl to the left of us. I can't tell you that girl's name. I can't tell you what instrument she played or why she was there that night. I haven't a clue who she is, but it doesn't really matter. It's not about her. The taller of the two boys--the two men--was holding my camera, using his long arm to take a photo of the four of us. The camera was on the wrong setting so two lines of light streak across the frame. Three of us are staring at the lens, all smiles, but the other boy--the other man, the one with no camera in hand, the one just on the other side of me, has his lips pressed against my cheek, his eyes closed, no smile.

What I remember most from that moment is knowing that the other two, the boy and girl on either side of us, hadn't a clue what he was doing. There we were, sandwiched between them, in our own private moment--a moment that lasted no longer than the the length of the flash. 

The second photo is just the two of us. This time, the camera is at the end of my outstretched arm. I'm looking straight ahead and this man is in full profile, looking right at me. I laughed good and hard as all this was happening, both endlessly tickled and endlessly frustrated. Would you just look at the thing? I begged him. Can't I just have one photo of the two of us together?

I don't remember his response--what he said or if he smiled, but the third is the two of us, our faces pressed together, looking straight at the camera. Click. None of the photos are high quality. The lighting is wonky and the pixelation is grainy and I look tired in all three---a certain puffiness having just settled onto my face--one that would span and define the story of the next several years. And yet I value few things more than this set of pictures.

The second one in particular. Because it answers so many questions. Because it is the story all at once, in a moment, a single click. I never told that boy--that man--I loved him. I don't regret this. I don't regret it because there was some sort of bone-deep-knowledge--that said not yet, not now, another time, perhaps. 

And bone-deep-knowledge, having nothing to do with fear, is the sort of thing that must always be listened to. 

What I regret is that I never gave him my own version of that second photo. And I don't mean a physical photo, I mean I never looked at him with the full weight of my love for him. I never looked at him as though he was the man who split my world into a before and after, but he did, and he was. And if I ever revealed that, it was at best a glance from across the room, or a glimpse as I rolled to my other side, a fleeting sort of thing, done before it really began.

I was so good at seeming fine. Seeming detached. As though the thing between us wasn't terribly important. As though he himself wasn't terribly important and never was there a thing more untrue. If I could go back, if I could do it again, I'd look at him as myself--as my totally naked and in-love self. I'd look at him with all that I felt and all that I could not say. 

There has been so much I haven't said over the years with a few different men for fear that those would be the words that would drive them away. And yet they left anyway. They left in the absence of my words, in the absence of my gentle unfolding before them. 

So say yes. To coffee in the morning. Or tea. When he asks you for a second time, after you've already said no, you should be getting home, please just say yes. It may amount to nothing. It may be just what it is, a cup of coffee or a cup of tea. Or it may be the beginning of everything. Say yes to the shower offered. Say yes to a man's fumbling attempt at kindness. Say yes to saying what you're afraid to say. Say yes to being bold and appearing uncool and revealing just how deep you're in it. Say yes to the full power of your femininity--to the full extent with which you're capable of love. Let him pull you in close  and nestle in the slope of his neck. Kiss him that second time even if he's already late and rushing out that door. Make him a little bit later. Say yes to what is so damn pregnant with potential that it utterly terrifies you. Say yes to anything that might count as experience or adventure--even if the adventure at hand is navigating the long, grueling road of heartbreak. Say yes to letting the guy help you get the dresser in the apartment--self-suffiencieny don't make you more of a woman and it doesn't protect you from the good, the bad, the ugly. Accept love when you want to accept it, accept help when you can, and accept that it'll be the second photo--the one you didn't plan for--that'll give a certain shape and meaning to everything that comes after. 

photo by Sam Shorey

on calling the guy. or not. and the best advice yet given..

a day shy of turning twenty-three my mother gave me the best advice of my life.

i was just out of college, the month was october, the weather was heaven here in new york--or just outside of it, in montclair, nj--to be exact--something tells me this retelling needs some exactness--a level of precision.

it was night and i was sitting on my mother's bed and we were talking about a boy. and i use that word deliberately--at just-shy-of-twenty-three the male in question was still very much just-a-boy, as i was just-a-girl.

this boy and i had been talking and messaging and beginning something-or-other and it was ever so thrilling--as it is when you find some version of the right person at the right time and there is even a hint of that nameless affection that cannot be pinpointed or dissected or explained away.

but we had hit some sort of wall. and there had been an exchange of words that wasn't terribly clear or terribly kind.

and it was nearly my birthday and i hadn't heard from him.

so my mom listened and then looked right at me and asked: do you want to call him?

and i just sort of stared at her for a moment, thought about it, took a breath, and revelation: you know, i don't. and that was that. and i've never looked back. i've never wished that i did call or did try harder or done any one thing differently in regards to that moment in time.

that question: do you want to call him? was so simple and so easy and so very much the point.

none of the well, i've called twice now or i've not waited a sufficient amount of time since getting his last text--no rules or regulations or impossible to follow tenants as handed down by the dating-gods (also known as other-girls-flailing-in-much-the-same-fashion). just a simple: what do you want?

as i'm getting older i'm coming to realize the simplest advice is usually the best. the path of least resistance, the most efficient--go figure!

want to act well? put the brilliant playwright's words into space. just speak the language. that's it.

want to lose weight/be healthy? stop with the counting and measuring and time-tables. eat actual food and move your body when you can.

want kindness in your life? show kindness to others.

want to talk to the guy? take a chance and pick up the damn phone.

of course, there are always exceptions. sometimes it's not so easy. sometimes it takes a little more work. sometimes you can't just pick up the phone because there's been too much time and too much heartache and something in your gut is telling you that you must wait.

but maybe sometimes it's as easy as doing what you want. following that gut feeling that says yes or no--that gut instinct so unrelated to pride and pomp.

because at least then you're owning you're own experience. at least then you make the rules and it's easier to live with the good or the bad that eventually follows. because you did what was right for you. and that's no small feat.

on anonymous commenters, those things that could be called love letters, appearing desperate, and what it means to be honest:

a good long while ago now i started writing little letters to the man i'd one day marry (should i be so lucky).

and much as i do believe it'll be fun to one day give them to him, to one day laugh about them, they are mostly for me, now.

they are a backdrop against which i suss out what's important--what's of value. they are part stream of conscience, part scrapbook, part hope for the future.

and they have meaning--for me, they have meaning.

i'm not suggesting they should have meaning for anyone else.

i am not suggesting that all woman should want to partner off with a man. or that all woman should want to have children. i am certainly not suggesting that everyone should marry (modern statistics indicate that very few in fact should). only that these are the things of value in my own life. and certainly people can attempt to belittle and make small and devalue these notions, but i'm not sure that they have the right. in fact, i'm quite certain they don't. because i am not attempting to proselytize this way of life, truly i'm not, i'm just saying, hey, i think this might be important to me. i quite think i want that one day.  i dated a man one time who lived mere blocks from his parents. who had the keys to their apartment on his home keychain. who would pop over for sunday morning breakfasts or simply if the mood struck. and he had the audacity to suggest to me that i was too close to my parents. my parents, 1, 630.6 miles away.

he couldn't possibly have known what those 1,630 miles felt like, least of all because he never asked.

how easy it is for all of us to assume we know another's mind, another's heart.

someone recently pointed out that my letter's make me appear desperate. it is not the first time it's been suggested and i doubt it'll be the last. and so i gave it a moment's thought before realizing if i was truly desperate i'd probably be in a relationship now--probably would have been in many.

relationships for relationships' sake.

how many relationships appear perfect up until the moment they are over.

how many desperate women--desperate men--smile behind the facade of a seemingly perfect life?

i certainly don't know. and it's not for me to judge. we remain single--or with ill-fitting partners for a whole host of reasons, most deeply personal and not the right of the public domain.

sometimes someone will leave a lovely comment saying they are envious of my life and all i can think is no-no! you have no idea! it is tremendously difficult and there are some desperately low moments and i wouldn't wish this on anyone! and yet i wouldn't trade another's life for my own.

and so i want to say let's all enter into a tacit agreement shall we? i'll not wish for your life. and you'll not wish for mine.

i used to look at really thin women and say to tom, why can't i do that? obviously there are other women who are better than me--more successful. they are able to lose weight and keep it off. why can't i be like them?  and he would respond, okay, but you can't just take that bit of their life, you have to take it all. and you don't know what another's secret shame or great sadness is. you don't know another's addiction. you can't imagine another's loss. 

and we all have something, don't we?

i consider myself a strong and independent woman. imperfect but also impossibly strong. relatively intelligent with an improbably fantastic group of friends.

but do i long for a man? yes, absolutely.

every shred of scientific evidence suggests that the reason we are here in this earth-bound-human-form is to make connections and form bonds. the bonds with friends being one, the bonds with family another, and the bond with a romantic partner all-together-different still.

i never realized that wanting a man--wanting to share my life with a man--made me less of a woman. made me somehow weak and an embarrassment to my sex. are the two things mutually exclusive? when did we as women do this too each other? is this the great, lasting legacy of women's lib?

because i don't want it. that's not the legacy i'll choose to take.

i am a strong, independent woman. and my desire for a man neither makes me more or less of these things. it simply is--and it is mine.

it makes me human. in need of sustenance. in the form of touch and affection and love.

but in wanting to find a partner--in wanting to choose the right partner--i want the man who compels me to be more. more of myself. who demands that i be as honest and as true and as good as i am capable of. and so in that sense yes, i want the man who will make an honest woman out of me. honest, having nothing to do with sin or sex or needing a man to complete me, but everything to do with allowing me to by myself--imperfect and messy and flawed in more ways the i care to share here.

....

i do want to take a moment to say this: if one more person says to me it'll come when you least expect, when you stop looking i'm gonna lose it. i can think of no more insulting cliche to throw at a single person. like saying, it'll be the last place you look for it. really, wow, thank you so much for the insight.

because to think that i haven't gotten to that place where i stopped looking, stopped searching, only to move on past it and circle back again more times than i care to count is a gross misestimation of me as person. i have felt deep affection for a great many men in my life. and i have found them when i was looking, when i wasn't, and at each of the many steps between those two extremes.

image by the inestimable emma hartvig 

maison

even as it was happening there was a sense--a need to remember and record everything.

the first thought as he approached me--oh, yes, that man. that he sat on the stool to my right, i on the left, my purse hanging between my knees. what i wore, what he wore--plum pants and the scarf my mother gave me after wearing it for too many days in a row; a black button down and thin rain jacket, his pants rolled just at the cuff. what i had to drink, what he had--some sort of white wine and heaven, help me, i haven't a clue.

i wanted to remember how he drank me in, his eyes moving so slowly, so unapologetic in their journey. how we both sat facing forward--facing the bar, just close enough to let our shoulders gently brush, one against the other. the first moment he tucked my hair behind my ear. and then when he did it again. the moment he took my hand in his or that split second eruption incited by his palm on the inside of my thigh.

i wanted to remember what we talked about--where we'd traveled, where we most wanted to go. India--i'm pretty sure he wanted to visit India. and how in that moment, i believed if he opened his hand he might reveal the whole of the country to me--how India sat on and then wetted my lips. how we spoke of what brought him here, what brought me here, and all the years between our arrivals. the gentle roll of his tongue as he spoke, the sublime cadence to his english--belying another life, another language, another world. how he lit up like a boy when discussing his brother's soon-to-be visit--how they would bike everywhere. that first moment i watched as he disappeared behind his eyes to some place i wasn't allowed to follow. and then when it happened again.

i wanted to remember the color of the night and the sense that we were standing on something more akin to the backdrop of a film than a busy brooklyn neighborhood. the moment he first turned and kissed me. and how easy it was. easier than anything. water. how perfectly natural--deliciously natural it felt. how as he kissed me his hands ever so gently rung round my face--pressing hair out of eyes and tracing the curve of the bone. how i laughed, telling him, it mostly didn't ever come easy the first time. how i felt as though we were both teenagers, making out street-coner after street-corner on our way to the subway. a parade of soft first kisses trailing behind us. the sort of little breadcrumbs that i sure as hell hope Gretel grew up to enjoy.

even as it was happening i knew it was the first date that all others would be measured against. that a sort of line had been drawn in the sand: all before this, and all to come. and that, much as didn't want there to be, there would be other first dates, with other men. that the whole night was already pregnant with a sort of loss. that probably we'd see each other once or twice more, that if we were lucky or brave or both a bit more daring than our natures suggested we might make a solid run of it, a good attempt. but that sometimes, much as you hope it might, an easy first kiss, and nearly perfect first night does not mean there will be life beyond those things. sometimes it just is. that moment. that one, spectacular evening in which you learn ever so much more about love and yourself and what lies on the other side of that line.

photo by olivia rae james