And Then One Day...

I woke up and realized I had come so far and didn't know how I got there.

And then I remembered...

It was because of all of you.

You've changed my life.

You've made me realize I can do it...whatever 'it' is.

So will you come with me to the next place? To help me figure out where I'm going next? Will you let me be a part of your next 'it'?

I hope so...

www.bubblesdeux.com

I'm going to start fresh. Like, new, all over again. But wiser, more ready to listen, better able to learn: Thank you for giving me the ideas to even start.

Look At All The Pretty Stars...

When I started blogging a few years ago I was just trying to figure out what was important to say and what wasn't.

There are times where I am still trying to figure that out, but I think I've gotten just a little bit better and the trick was to be honest.

Too often, as writers, people get in the habit of saying what they think the reader wants to hear. Me?

I am happy to report that I am a mess of emotions at any given time. I worry about A and my friends; I wonder if I am making the right career decisions, or education decisions, or even triathlon training decisions.

I wonder where the world will be in a few years and how we've gotten to where we are now.

And I wonder if people want to know the real story on any of us or are they happy to just go along with whatever illusion we paint.

Me? I just want to say that I don't always know what's next, only that I believe I am capable of accepting it and adjusting.

I'm moving, yet again.

Through luck, or kismet or sheer coincidence, I have two people in my life who expect me to get better at this writing stuff and it's time for a blog home change. It's okay because I've been working on the graphics here for so long that I'd like to see how the other half lives. The truly creative half.

So, ladies and gentleman, wordpress it is.

But I need some help:

Do I want to be Bubblevishious there or BubblesDeux? This is big. I took both names earlier because I am greedy.

But I'm branding, bitches, and need your help.

I mean, I'm branding, friends, and need some input. :)

So...what do you think?

Ladies and Gentleman, Mr. Jimmy Ruffin...

As I walk this land of broken dreams,
I have visions of many things.
Love's happiness is just an illusion,
Filled with sadness and confusion.
What becomes of the broken hearted?

I wasn't going to write this, but then I woke up and realized I'm a little tired. I think part of it is that I am exhausted from Sunday and if that triathlon wore me out, then in 20 days, I might be put on bed rest.

Part of it is that I have grown weary of people spinning the public relations machines for other people and part of it is that I just don't care to pretend anymore.

I'm watching a good friend lose his marriage it makes me sad because he is sad.

No matter how many times I hear his wife say that I hate her, or that I spread lies about her or, or, or, it doesn't matter.

Why? Because people have a right to believe what they want. They also have a right to say what they want, as long as they keep it away from me.

I've chosen to stay away from her words because I want to be able to say, honestly, that I have no idea what she's talking about when she posts on AFF.

I've listened to her husband tell me how much he loves his wife and family and I feel for them both. I want to say it's going to be okay, but what does that really mean?

The truth is, I've tried to be completely unbiased and keep saying that his wife has a right to be happy and he should respect that. We aren't who we were at 18 or 19 or 20. And there is nothing wrong with that. It is empowering to admit that we change and that our needs become something we might not have imagined.

I have to respect someone who says: I am not happy, and this will be for the best.

Maybe right now it doesn't seem like the best for all, but honestly, who gets to decide that? Only the people making the decision.

So, while I'm told how I feel, or what I think or what I'm saying, the truth is, people have every right to be happy.

Sometimes, the balance between self and family can't be found. That's sad, but there are ways to make sure that promises kept aren't all broken.

But this is why the AFF-y is not for me, I've grown tired of reading too many stories about too many breakups or too many people who don't realize that you can read a person's 'intent' in their words. For years in some cases.

Even if they can't.

If therapy has taught me nothing else, it has taught me to be honest about how important it is to follow your heart.

And that goes for people I love and people who are just passing by in life.

Bobby Womack Called And He Wants To Tell You Something...

I wanna dedicate this song to all the lovers tonight
And I expect that might be the whole world
Because everybody needs something or someone to love
....If You Think You're Lonely Now, 1981

I thought last year was about lessons.

It wasn't. It was about being prepared to grow.

Wait. Isn't that a lesson?

Yes, I guess it is.

About 20 years ago, I made a decision to spend every year learning something different. I don't know why, at 18, this seemed so important, but it did.

I have studied religions, languages, the Vietnam War, presidential elections, water rights in third world countries and architecture.

You name it, and I've either spent a year learning about it, or I want to.

My friends call me 'The Oracle', but in reality, I'm just a girl who thinks the world is inspirational.

I never want to be complacent in my own life.

Last year I went out and met people I might not have otherwise found a reason to engage.

Some I have loved, others I have not. But in all of the cases, I have learned.

I have had an opportunity to be a friend to some people and had them return the kindness and we've all grown from the experience.

I have watched people write about their feelings but not talk about them; I've seen people act out their feelings and not accept that they are not being fair to those around them.

And I have learned.

I have learned what it means to say you're someone's friend and actually live the words. It is life-changing.

There have been a couple of times recently where I have been asked to 'be there' and each time, I have surprised myself by how willing I was to do it.

Last year, I hesitated because I worried about how things would look. Now?

When you know the truth about something, maybe that makes it easier to act. Or maybe I just made that up.

I'm finishing off a series on love on AFF because it feels like my class there is about to graduate.

And I think that is amazingly wonderful.

Here I Am, On A Cloud...

As I drift through the sky
Shooting cupid's arrow you just might try
So don't miss baby, take your time
.....Erykah Badu, 4 Leaf Clover



I went out to find the ever elusive 'North County Trail' today and found success!

I found the 1 mile mark on the south end of the trail and unpacked my bike for a ride. I got a few miles in before I hit some flooding so I took that as a sign that it was time to go home.

Or at least to the book store.

It's funny: When I ride my bike I prefer to have nothing going on around me but the sound of my breathing, birds and the cadence of my spokes turning. It's so very unlike when I go for a run. Maybe because I often want to pretend I'm not running, or running somewhere else, I find that it's better to have music playing, or at least a song in my head.

Lately, it's been 'Jesus of Suburbia' for some reason.

But the other day it was 'our song'.

I remember the day I was walking to work while on the phone with 'The One'. Erykah Badu had just finished playing on my iPod and it hit me that I was in love. That's probably the first time that I said 'I love you' even though I knew how he had felt for weeks, or maybe months.

Even now, I love him.

Yesterday I realized how angry I am at him. Because he thought I was hiding something, he set out to find someone else, then spent a year hiding it.

Yes...the man I call 'The One' had a girlfriend for a year, while saying to me that I didn't love him enough. While arguing with me that we needed time apart. While telling me we were meant to be together. Forever.

Sometimes I don't really know what I think about this. I have been married twice and both husbands found other loves while with me. Perhaps that is my role in life: To help people find what they need.

I thought I was over the affairs of my exes, but while I was supposed to be focused on my training, it hit me for a moment that all the while I had a feeling that something was off last year, I didn't think it was another woman. I thought it was me.

Now I know it was us. That's not any easier in many ways, but it is more balanced.

I've had a lot of dating, romance and love in my life, but as I was trying to remember which way to head downhill on my bike today, I got a little hit of fear in my head about what's next.

My girlfriends here want to set me up, but I'm not interested.

Even people that I like say that I don't seem to be all that into them and maybe it's true or maybe I'm much more cautious about relationships without even realizing it.

Sort of like riding downhill. I keep the breaks at the ready, just in case. I spend probably way too much time scanning between my front tire and the road ahead, waiting for something to happen: A rock, a bad road, a chipmunk or even another cyclist. With all this preparation, I'm still not enjoying the ride downhill, which sucks because I worked so hard to ride uphill and reach the crest.

I hear that to be a better cyclist takes practice...a lot like being a better partner in a relationship.

I'm starting to forget where Tri training starts and relationship building starts.

Hello, God, Are You There...

It's me. Bubbles.

Where have you been? What have you been doing?

Oh, you've been busy? Right, I know. The world is a crazy place, isn't it. Oh, yeah, you already know that.

What do I want? Oh, not much.

I'm just sort of checking in. Thanks for taking care of A this weekend while she was on time off from work.

Yes, I know that I forget to say 'thanks' to you. It's so hard, you know? I can't take communion at church, you know. Yes, I am quite aware that this isn't your fault. But they are doing it in your name.

So I don't really go to visit you there all that often. Well, aside from work. Does that count? I sort of hope so.

My friends can't get married in your house, either. Again, not your fault. But it's done in your name.

And we're still at war. In two countries. Still. In your name. Or your brother's. Whatever. Same difference.

Dear God, are you watching over 'The One'? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Get over the past few weeks. I am trying.

But I'm still worried. I worry about a lot of things. But right now I'm worried about him. He's stubborn. Never admits to being wrong, or even wronged.

And I hear the stories and I don't believe, but I do. So, if you think about it, check on him. Plus, Chicago has a new mayor and I hear he's doing a good job so it should be a nice trip for you.

Can you also watch over my sister? She's making a mistake. Again. But she's one of those people that must learn things the hard way.

Check in on my friends, please. And my family. And since you're at it, may as well check in on everyone else around the world.

Me?

You still want to know what I want? I don't know.

Maybe I'll just figure it out as I go along. Is that okay? It isn't so bad, you know, not waiting for someone else to come along and figure things out.

Besides, I know that when I want to come visit one of your houses, wherever they are, you'll be cool with it.

For now, training has been my 'religion' of sorts. Oh! I should say thanks for giving me a body that moves. There, I think I've gotten it all out.

But if you do visit Chicago, can you just let it know that it will always be in my heart? It's just that kind of city.

Thanks.

(an open letter to God, just in case she has internet access)

The Road Has Got Me Hypnotized...

And I'm spinning into a new sunrise...
"Radar Love', Golden Earring.

I was showering this morning when it finally hit me:

I'm an athlete.

I'm not fast; or built in a traditional way; I don't come by running, biking or swimming easily; and sometimes I have no idea what I'm doing...

But I'm an athlete.

In coming to sports later in life, maybe there is just a bit more of an appreciation for just how much one has to juggle to fit it all in.

My schedule looks crazy. Everything that I eat has to play a role in giving me energy, or recovery or whatever. But it's making eating so much easier for some reason for the first time ever. The stress of regular life has to take a back seat because otherwise, it will affect training.

When I was running a few years ago, I always downplayed the work. Oh, sure, I'm a 'runner', but hey, anyone can do it.

Or so I kept saying. And on many levels it is true.

But this time around feels new. For the first time, this isn't about someone else's splits, it's about mine. It has little to do with someone else telling me I can do it. But it has everything to do with knowing, on my own, that I can. It's so very scary to be accountable to yourself, but it's also quite empowering. Today, I could feel the strut before I realized it was happening. Yeah, I just finished another 10 miles on the bike. And yes, I do have 6 days of training planned next week. Watch. Me. Work. It.

I have a friend who is training for one of the same triathlons I am doing. He says my enthusiasm is infectious. This from a 'real' Ironman.

Something tells me he'd say I'm the real deal, too. His coaching is a tremendous motivation. And I try to remember to tell him all the time. Hell, your motivation (yes you, out there) is even more inspiring. Thank you.

My heart broke this week in a way I never thought possible. The more I write about 'The One', the more I was missing him. And the more I continue where 'we' are at the moment, the more I just want to train. Am I training away a person or a thing? No, not at all. I’m training ‘in’ myself.

Train. Goodbye. Grow. Start all over until the goodbye part is gone.

Yeah, this can be done.

(image from seriousrunning.com)

One. Awesome. Search.

It took me forever to decide what to title this blog.

Then it took even longer to figure out a tagline. My blurb. An intro.

What is awesome?

I still don't always know.

But I went with it anyway.

And then I began writing a cast of characters and people said...well, how did you find 'The One' and I realized...well, I didn't make it clear. How did he get his name? Uh, it wasn't always 'The One'. For the longest time it was 'Chato', but I didn't want to use that here.

I wanted to start from scratch.

But having someone called the one implies an end. Yet there isn't one. There is, as always, a cast of characters to work through. Real people. Real feelings. Real stories. Real joy. Real pain.

So yes, there is 'The One', and it is just part of the full story. One I didn't have a road map to tell until I realized that I get to make the map.

X marks the spot.

Oh, I Know Something About The Ways Of Love...

Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.
.....Oingo Boingo

A is home for a one night only appearance. I was happy she was leaving for camp, now I am happy she is home. She is working with an older group of girls this year so her time spent at camp will be slightly different.

For one thing, the older girls say goodbye in different ways than the younger girls.

Older girls know camp will happen again next year and so goodbye is not forever. Younger girls think this is it. The last goodbye.

It usually isn't.

But A is smart because she knows sometimes it is.

It is funny how memories cloud goodbyes. Some people see a time of joy while others see pain and still others see a combination.

This week has become a week of goodbyes. Red says it means something else is opening. I feel like I have tried, on many levels, to let life be. Maybe I have simply over-estimated my role or non-role.

But here we are...

Smarty asked what I wanted. I want to train. I went swimming tonight and tomorrow is a long bike ride day. She asked how I do it. I made a joke.

The truth? I am training my way through goodbyes. I hadn't realized it until I was in the pool tonight. I have spent the last year asking people to be who they are, and accepting.

And it was wonderfully enlightening.

Goodbyes. It is how I first got started as a runner. I needed to say goodbye to my mother after she died, then a marriage, now...the past year.

And now it is time for a more iron-centered focus. And an apartment search. And to go back to letting life just 'be'. And, like the younger and older girls at camp, I will just be reminded that there is often more to come. Next year.

And working through all those goodbyes. Like at camp each year. Goodnight, A. Goodnight, blog. See you tomorrow.

'Cause Everyone's Heart Doesn't Beat The Same...

I just recently starting ramping up my triathlon training. I have been good about sticking to my schedule. Right now, I'm running about 25 miles a week; biking another 20 and doing daily strength training routines. Last night, I added swimming.

Or tried.

It seems that I have forgotten how to swim. Apparently, it's been enough years that my arms don't know what to do; my feet don't seem to want to kick; my heart rate never got down to a normal pattern during my laps and I have forgotten to breathe out while above water, not breathe in while I am under.

But I'm going back tonight. Yes, right after I do another round trip to drop off A at camp, and then a five mile run, I will be back in the pool for an hour. What will I accomplish? I am not sure yet. Perhaps it isn't always about accomplishments, but rather an effort. Sounds like a metaphor for my dating life this past year. It often feels like I have never gotten so much wrong all at once before, but maybe I am simply romanticizing some memory or another.

I went to see 'The Actor' over the weekend. He is in my favorite play right now and I made the trip down to cheer him on, and, on some level, to see what we felt after 10 months of not seeing each other.

Funny...ask anyone and they will say he adores me. He does. And I him. Total love. But sometimes, people live their lives doing what they want and they don't always remember there are other people in the universe.

Ask us why we stopped seeing each other and I will say that he did something that he knew would hurt me. He will say I held a grudge because of it. We would both be right.

On Saturday morning he told me the truth about his new girlfriend. She worships him. She believes he is perfect. His words, verbatim. And he doesn't like it. But he does accept it.

His issue with me? I don't. My feelings for him are based on knowing he is human. That's not the same. And I get it.

I left MD on Saturday and cried on the way home. Or at least until NJ. Why? Because this is me. The woman who loves people for their flaws and their perfections. How else can I be honest with anyone? I don't want a god. I want an equal.

'The Actor' is my friend, but on Saturday morning, even though I know he loves me...he made me remember why I was afraid to see him.  I was worried he would do or say what he knew would hurt the most, and I was afraid I wouldn't know how to feel.

Sadly, I felt just what I was supposed to, I guess.

I was reminded of the day my ex-husband told me that it wasn't that he didn't love me, it was that his mistress made him feel like a king.  I did not.  He told me he was torn between us.  I asked if he loved her and he said he wasn't sure.  So I told him to be with her.  To treat her well.  To be honest.  Why? I guess it is because I don't ever want to force a choice and have someone regret their decision. I have a lot of stories like this. One day, I won't have to say this to someone. I am sure of this.

But anyway, back to now. Even with someone you love, sometimes you just have to step back and be prepared to be a friend when, and if, they need you.

Even if you end up being the odd person out.  Or especially when.

I guess I am a far better friend than a lover. That's not such a tragedy, you know?

So tonight, I'm off to swim. I expect to be in the pool every night for the next four weeks. Why? Because I am all heart, even when I am very little skill.

Oh, wow, this does sound like a metaphor for my love life.

And that's not such a bad thing, either.

(image from funny-potato.com)

Maybe You Will Always Be...Just A Little Bit Out Of Reach...

Usually, at this time of year, I am returning from my trip to Chicago. I love the city during "Taste of Chicago" because it was there that I truly knew what it meant to be falling in love with "The One".

This year...I went to DC for a day and saw "The Actor", but more on that later.

Now, I want to talk about what was happening around this time last year.

I had just seen 'The One' for a few days and we talked about all that had gone wrong and all that had gone right. I told him that when I left Chicago, I would be doing it as a single person. That I thought we should take time to think about what we wanted or needed, but that the only place I really wanted to be was with him. I also mentioned that I was still having the trust issues of him having left me in Austin and I needed time to work on this.

Meanwhile, back at home, both 'The Prince' and 'The Actor' were checking in on me. I think they knew how hard it was for me to be in Chicago.

While I was driving back to New York, my cell phone started going off like crazy. None of the texts were really to me, but rather, about 'The Prince'. Our hostess from Maryland was trying to figure out how she could find time alone with him in DC at our next blogger bash and people kept asking me how to answer. To be honest, I wasn't sure. No one realized that he and I had agreed to share a room with 'The Actor' and one other blogger, and I didn't want to be the one telling everyone so I just said: It will work out. I honestly believed it would be just fine.

And there it started...weeks of learning that regardless of if we called it a blogger bash or a swinger's party or a rodeo in the outback, people made plans to be with people and then hid the plans. People cried and they manipulated and they told strange stories to get others to do what they wanted.

One gentleman asked if I would be his birthday present...

Yeah...exactly. And that's all good, except, knock on wood, I didn't go to these parties to hook up. Ask Smarty, I was always upset because I was trying to get out of them. They weren't fun for me. They were work. And frustrations. And lots of other things. But I am a firm believer that no one else had to know about this, at least not the guests.

So, here we were, in the weeks leading up the DC Blogger Bash and all I wanted was to be far away from it. Now there is a weekend I wish I could un-do and never do again.

But, wait, that's a story for later. For the time being, 'The Actor' and I were having a blast doing the silliest of things like museums and making popcorn and sharing stories about our mis-spent youth. Ahh, what a start to summer it was...Oh, and I was quite sure ‘The Prince’ was in love, or something like it, with our hostess, and that she felt the same.

And there is the story you won’t hear in the Grease-edition.

You Want What Lovers Have...

It feels like so many years ago that 'The One' and I were making plans to meet.

A friend of mine from AFF, 'Smurfette', was throwing a birthday party in Rhode Island. I was just understanding that my marriage was over and she invited me to get me of New York for a weekend. It seems that my time on AFF has been filled with girlfriends finding things for me to do to get over a broken heart.

Sidenote: I dare say I am not good at being in love. New blog topic for another day.

When 'Smurfette' asked me to join her and her swinger friends I didn't hesitate. Not because I was a swinger, but because I was going to ask 'The One' if he would fly to New York from Chicago and then drive to Rhode Island with me.

I asked. He didn't hesitate with his yes. And my life was changed forever.

When we met at LaGuardia airport I was still a bit in shock that we were doing this. However, the next three hours flew by while we laughed and told stories as though we had known each other forever. Maybe, in some way, we have. Or had. Whatever.

When we got to our hotel we ordered in and watched ESPN. In another time, on another site, we wrote about this night. Two perspectives but the same outcome. I woke up and could finally say that this was no crush, no joke, nothing but the real thing.

We took our new relationship to a swinger party that weekend and we didn't swing. I danced and drank and he observed and watched over me. A year later I learned what our attendance at that party had done.

You see, I was some random girl from NYC in a red silk strapless dress and silver stilettos and he was a random boy from Chicago in black. But apparently, when we kissed, or danced, or sat together just being, another woman, in another couple, asked her husband why he didn't look at her the way 'The One' looked at me. And their marriage was broken forever.

Years of her swinging, and his allowing it, had brought them to this...a stage of resentment. When the husband told me this during their divorce I didn't know what to say. His answer: We had done nothing but share a moment with a fantastic couple who thought swinging could save their marriage. Instead, two random people showed them that what they really wanted was to just be able to look at someone with passion and love.

Does swinging 'work'? That depends. But I do argue with my friends that it has a shelf-life and that at the end of the day, people want to be loved by someone they consider their partner. Complete love. You know, grow old love. Maybe not everyone. But lots more people than will admit this to themselves or others.

Soul Love...And This Love Won't Let Me Go...

Overheard at a diner yesterday:

"Just follow your heart and ask him. If he says yes, it's meant to be. If not, move on. There are plenty of other men out there."

Wise words from an 8-year old girl.

As adults, how often do we (women) remember how wise we were at 8 or 10 or 12? Not often enough.

We date, and then marry, men about whom we often have had our doubts and then we are confused about why it doesn't work out.

I have spent the last year waiting. Or so I thought. This was no one's fault but my own. I wouldn't let anyone in fully because I was waiting for a sign. A sign of what? Who knows.

"The One" predicted that year apart for us and maybe I believed it on some level. But what have I learned this past year? I learned that I would be okay sending off "The Girl" to college; I took myself to Paris and London and even had a stop-over in Geneva where I almost got lost; I started running again; I traveled to Chicago, Denver, DC, Las Vegas and Boston. I started learning French. I learned to knit. I dropped off of a sex-site, I remembered to write, I became an urban gardener and I re-discovered the joy of me.

"The One" might not recognize me now. I hardly recognize myself when compared to person he met three years ago.

So what is a year? A long time. Feelings change, decisions are made, plans are made and new paths are staked out. Can you love someone not near you? Absolutely. But without realizing it, life went on. And it did a pretty good job, if it does say so itself.

I said that I would undo a lot of last year, but at a diner, a random young girl made me think for a few minutes and the truth is: I own all of last year. And it was pretty amazing.

Image: Massiel Mancebo, Illustrator.

Standing In Line To See The Show Tonight...

The thing about having an affair when you're a parent is that you doubt everything about yourself.

If I could go back in time, I would tell my 'pre-affair' self to run far from the relationship I was in at the time.

I would have told myself to listen to what I knew was the right, which was to focus on A and leave the rest of my life to grow like ivy, on its own.

Oh, fuck it. Who am I kidding?

No, I would not have done that. I would have simply told 'The One' that I loved him sooner than I did instead of waiting for the 'right' time.

And, for all I know, the end result of our breaking apart would still have happened. But the hindsight of knowing that I would have had those extra few weeks of 'love' would have been nice.


I started to look at cost of living indexes for Philadelphia today. I remember doing this for Chicago about two years ago. Could I make it there in a relationship and out of one? It's part of the issue of being in a relationship for me: I need to know that I can take care of myself if it ends.

Sometimes, I wonder if that dooms the relationship at the onset, but I don't know how to be any other way. I think men are given a pass for this because that's just how society works. Women are supposed to still know, on some level, that someone will be taking care of them.

It's the beauty of being independent. And the horror of it, too.

I can't always make a date because I have work or some other committment that comes up last minute, but that could come across as not giving enough.

I go through this with friends, too. I find that some of them are totally understaning. And those are usually the ones with jobs more intense than mine. Or children. Same difference I guess.

I spent last year learning a lot about myself. Some of it I truly did not like. Some of it was wonderful to know.

But all of it was what has brought me to this point...this place of being able to say that there was a point where all I did was smile on the outside and be sad on the inside.

I wouldn't go back and be 'that' Bubbles again because it really doesn't feel like it was all that long ago.

No, There Is No Such Thing As "Too Soon"...

I remember when "The One" and I returned from our April trip. He to Chicago and me to New York. We waited a full three hours before we started talking about our next trip.

I swear I thought that we would leave each other that April weekend and probably stay friends, but nothing else. That's not true. I had hopes that I could ignore what I felt.

Then I asked him where I could send him a birthday present. He said to send it to his house. Gasp.

His house? He laughed at me. Over the years, he did that a lot. Laughed at my naïveté about how he felt for me; laughed when I pushed; laughed when I tried to shut down. Laughed at my inability to see where he already knew we were going.

But that April morning, when he laughed, I cried. I had no idea where to go with 'us'. I just knew that I had to try to figure out how to make a lot of people happy from that point forward. Well, a lot of people excluding myself. Years later, when my then-husband and I were filing for divorce, he asked if I was happy.

It is hard to be happy when you put everyone else first. There. Now that I've said it, you can see why I have been seeing the same therapist for two years.

"The One" and I talked every day from that April trip, onward.

We made plans for me to visit him in Chicago that June in time for "Taste of Chicago". I laughed because I thought we could get away with seeing each other every three months or so. He laughed, too. I thought that was enough. Then I couldn't wait and he flew me out to see him for Mother's Day Weekend.

And that began two years of crying each time I had to say goodbye to him. Especially when I left him on an amazingly beautiful May Sunday in 2008 and said, with tears in my eyes, 'when can we see each other again? Three months won't work. I'm sorry I suggested it would.'

I wrote my first love letter to him on the plane ride home that morning. And then I allowed myself to breath. I knew exactly what would happen if I ever had to make a decision to not see him.

I knew there was no way I could do it. Not willingly. But I tried to resist everything that was abnormal about our 'lives' together and instead, focused on raising a teen ager and keeping a husband who couldn't see me unless we were in a crowd, happy.

A few weeks later I was back in Chicago for that "Taste" weekend and again, I could hear my heart break when it was time to say goodbye. I think that is when I started considering that not only was I in love but that nothing had ever been so scary to me before then.

Sometimes, when I allow myself to think about it, I wish I had never understood what it feels like to have that much love given to someone or received, in return.

It's made the past year all that more difficult.

(no rhyme or reason to the choice of images, other than I heart Chicago and the Bean. And so does Kanye).

Let It Burn, Let It Burn, Let It Burn...

I really wish I could write a story in real time. Perhaps that is the problem. Life is not always 'real time' even though it should be. Clocks say so.

Last night I asked "The Prince" a very simple question:

'Were you more in love with her than you told me? And, did I undervalue the importance of the relationship with her, based on what you have been saying for almost a year now?'.

That was at 3:37 PM. I will let you know when he answers me. He called, twice, while I was in a meeting. Then I worked late and he fell asleep.

Ahh...the differences in a time zone, huh?

I seem to do this a lot. Select men who are far away. Sometimes it is mileage. Other times it is emotionally. Don't let anyone tell you that an emotionally 'independent' man is any easier to deal with than a man who keeps his heart on his sleeve. He isn't.

So I wait. I wait to hear if the words "The Princess" wrote to me have truth, or if I will hear something different.

But...and this is the kicker of this story: Will it matter?

That's always the thing, right? When you already know what you will do, you just haven't done it for whatever reason.

Right now, I'm not even sure if I am feeling my own emotions or if this fucking Adele CD is just messing with me. I'll let you (and myself) know if I figure it out.

Red...I joke that you set me up with "The Prince" so it's partly your fault. I am kidding.

I knew what I was doing. And I know why I did it. I never expected to be 'here'. That's on me. I thought "The One" and I would work out after time apart. I hedged on that for a whole year. Even after Austin, I couldn't get it into my head that maybe I was wrong.

You know what "The Prince" was supposed to be...a fun 'thing' to help me deal with "The One" and our ending. I know that no one is perfect. I know it isn't easy giving up your heart...

Crap, there goes Adele again. Crap. I need to take her off of the auto-play.

Do You Know Where You're Going To...

Do you like the the things that life is showing you..
.....Diana Ross

Those first few weeks of talking with Chato were simply amazing.

I remember our first call. I told him he could call while I was walking to the subway because it was a short walk. I didn't expect to sit on the steps outside of my office and talk for over half an hour. It wasn't until he got paged to go back to work that we realized how much we had said.

From that point on, we spoke daily. What did we talk about? Everything. Nothing was off limits.

A few weeks later I asked if he would come with me to a birthday party in Rhode Island. A part of me had hoped he would say no. Then I wouldn't have to put my money where my mouth was. He said yes, without hesitation.

That started the flurry of planning.

Now here is what I will say about being a parent who is about to embark on an affair: You want to take your child and run.

Run because while you can see where you have been and where you are heading, you want to protect your kids. I am sure of this.

I hear the stories. I know that good parents don't ever want to hurt their kids. Ever.

By the time Chato and I met in April, we were friends. The kinds of friends who would say anything to the other. But, I wasn't sure we were anything else.

He told me he loved me. I said 'thank you'. I couldn't say it back. As much as we talked and shared, he wasn't real. Not really, real.

We met on a beautiful spring day. He was perfection. I had never imagined that this stranger would show up in NY and drive with me for 3 hours and that those hours would feel like minutes. We laughed and we shared stories and we teased each other.

But like any good movie, we started our trip with a crash. A bridge that for years had stood lowered, was raised for a boat to pass through. As I stopped and looked back in my rear-view mirror, the car next to us was rear-ended. I rememebering saying to Chato: This is unusual. This bridge is never used. It must be the universe telling us something.

I still believe that. I fell in love that weekend like I had never fallen in love before. We did the most random things. We watched bad MTV shows and he laughed at me as I sat, mesmerized, by the NFL draft. We ordered pizza in and watched CSI marathons. And we woke up the next morning like we had been together 50 years.

And I wondered how I had never noticed that look before. You know the one. The one that says: You are my love.

Where was I all of these years? Maybe I had decided there was no 'one' for me. I'm not sure. All I know is that by the time I was driving home on Sunday morning and he was flying back to Chicago, I had changed my life in some way.

And I wasn't go to 'un-change' it for another two years.