-I used to be a believer, like you, in that somehow, some way, when we got through whatever it was we needed to get through, or when we grew up, that we would wind-up together. I always believed that. That’s why I am fighting so hard now, because I’m starting to doubt.

-Am I being a hopeless romantic or just an idiot to think that you will find your way back to me and to us?   I know that I’m a romantic (remember your car stereo), but I also know that I’m an idiot (too many to list), and in this case I feel like I’m starting to lean towards idiot. If I look at the chronology of the past 12 months there is a case for both romance and idiocy:

• December 2014: You ask me to come see you before the new-year, so I did. A hopeful start and a terrible end.
• ME: ROMANCE. YOU:IDIOT
• February/March 2015: Mardi Gras in New Orleans. I want to see you and kiss you, but your mother breaks us up. We both have partners there. You want to get back together but I have someone else.
• YOU: ROMANCE. ME: IDIOT
• April 2015: I put all my cards on the table and say enough is enough. I ask you to stop this game and this cycle we’re in and move down with Lola into a house I was planning to buy. You take a few (long) days to think and decide against it.
• ME: ROMANCE. YOU: IDIOT
• June/July 2015: You go on vacation and I am forlorn without you. I send you my heart-felt thoughts about you, me, and our future. You’re intrigued.
• BOTH: ROMANCE
• July 23, 2015: We talk on the phone for the first time in months. You are open to getting back together if I meet your preconditions: 1) I go to therapy (check), and 2) I buy you a ring (also check, FYI). We make a plan to spend a week in Nola and a week in LA together.
• BOTH: ROMANCE
• August 2015: We discuss getting together for the US Labor Day weekend. It doesn’t happen and you say let’s just stick to the Nola/LA plan. You drastically slow down any communications. Obviously this is where/when the house came into play.
• ME: ROMANCE. YOU: IDIOT
• September 22, 2015: I fly to see you for all of 30 minutes.
• ME: ROMANCE/IDIOT. YOU: ?
• November 2015: After almost a year we spend some time together and I don’t think that either of us could believe how strong it still was between us. Though I loved you, part of me thought, as you had, that maybe my feelings had just been nostalgic, and didn’t really apply to you and me at this point in our lives. But that theory was shattered, wasn’t it? I wish, as I’m sure you do too, that it hadn’t felt so good, and that those deep emotions weren’t stirred up again. But they were. They were hibernating just beneath the surface of contentment. And though it feels like you are willing your feelings back into their cave to slumber once again, mine are very much wide-awake, spurred-on by dying hope and longing to be with you again.
• • BOTH: ROMANCE

   

  -By the way, I don’t know where any of this shit comes from. I just start writing, and it flows from somewhere. If I were a country singer, I’d probably have a few hit songs out of this.