Something new

Well, simply put, I found myself single and divorced.  I sat down and thought about dating.  What does it REALLY look like for me?  Because, I wasn’t going to go out seeking to bed women.  It would never be about quantity.  The purpose of dating was to find a woman that I could spend the rest of my life with.  Quantity was not where it was at.

But then a friend helped me realize that you still need to meet that special someone.  And kismet isn’t going to happen on the couch and probably not at the grocery store either.  So, I sat down and thought about how to meet women that I might be interested in dating.  In the end, I realized that I just needed to meet them, one way or another.  But, more importantly, I needed to befriend them.  I wasn’t planning on dating lots of women, as my friend implied he did.

When I really got down to it, what was the difference between friendship and dating anyway?  If you’re not fooling around sexually, then what’s the difference?  You sit close? You hold hands? You kiss good night?  Realistically, that’s about it!  So, if I’m dating for the purpose of seeking marriage, then I shouldn’t need to “date” at all, unless I’m pursuing marriage and I would only do that with one woman at a time!  What I need to do is make friends… just friends.  Hang out, watch movies, do stuff together, but sit on opposite ends of the couch, don’t hold hands, and no kisses.

So, I did that.  The thing is that I, of course, gravitated to the women I wanted to date.  And, to be honest, making that plural is giving myself too much credit.  I gravitated to a particular woman that I was attracted to and wouldn’t mind dating.  So, we started hanging out just as I described above.  And, as mentioned, I was interested in dating, so after a few times of hanging out, I simply asked… and was simply told, “No.”  OK, it was more than that, but the details don’t matter.  Still, hearing “no” actually wasn’t bad.  At this point, I found myself friends with this woman and without any “dating heart” vested, so to speak.  Since the relationship never went deeper than friendship, I just put the idea of dating her in a mental box, packed it up and put it away.  It was actually pretty easy.

With that I was free to continue making new friendships.  So, I tried.  Honestly, not nearly as hard as I tried with her though.  I didn’t persevere like I did with her.  And, frankly, I was still hanging out with her a lot.  And I really enjoyed my time with her.  We talked lots.  We just spent time together.  She challenged me, we fought, and kept being friends.  And talked through it all.  Our friendship felt so honest and true.  I found myself incredibly fond of the relationship.  In retrospect, I wasn’t sure I would find another friend like her, so I don’t think I looked very hard.  And, why should I?  She was my friend and I was her’s… no one’s going anywhere, so I don’t think I tried very hard to make more friends with women.

So, we just kept hanging out.  I recall one evening that was “awkward.”  That night felt different somehow.  We did a fairly normal hanging out for us… a meal… a movie on the couch… talking… laughing… hanging out.  But, it all felt different.  But before you think this was the beginning, it wasn’t.  Nothing happened.  But, we weren’t content letting it sit.  No, we don’t do that.  We talked about it.  ”Why didn’t we kiss tonight?”  Ultimately, it was the question we were both thinking and wondering.  And when we asked it of each other, we might have faced the fact that our friendship was growing towards something bigger for the first time.  That box I packed up was taken back out, opened, unpacked, repacked and put back away.  But, it was honest… awkward… but honest and real.  I just figured that if I was going to lose the friendship over the awkwardness, I was at least going to be honest with myself and with her.

But, once again, we remained friends.  Maybe even better friends.  But, the box was put away again.  We shared more moments and continued to hang out.  Still friends, still growing in that… until…

One evening, again, no different from any other particular evening of us hanging out, we had the same feelings we did that one night.  This time, we knew where each other stood.  This time… we kissed.  Naturally, I thought this meant we were dating (see earlier in the post for definitions).  I also thought I knew where she stood.  I was mistaken.  Because in the following weeks, I was “dumped” a few times.  I was confused… and it turns out that she was, too.

Then, one day, in a moment of accidental honesty, more came out than I anticipated.  But, as is the crux of our relationship it seems, it was the catalyst for more honest conversation and, ultimately, a squelching of the fears that plagued us both regarding “officially” dating.  So, here I am.  I find myself in something new.  For the record, I love it.