What is love? 1.1

This is a photo of me holding my daughter, Sarah Daisy, when she was a baby. She transformed it into a birthday card for me this past April. When she was born, I had black hair, I was 32, and I'd never before encountered a creature such as her. She was so gentle and sweet, right from birth, that we called her the "Buddha."

One time, when she was still very young, I sat her on a bed and snapped her picture. As the flash went off, she fell backwards onto the bed, her legs up in the air. Her gentleness was such that something as ordinary as a camera flash could knock her over.

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Tonight I spent with another gentle soul, a special friend, whom I will call J-2, since her first name starts with the same letter as my ex-girlfriend's. For the first time since J broke up with me, I am truly attracted to someone new. But as fate would have it, she's not ready for a new relationship at this point.

In fact, all I accomplished by expressing how I feel about her was to make her cry.

My question is this: why is it so difficult for men and women in our time?

I suppose, as the cliché goes, "timing is everything." J-1 would appreciate this. When she left me she explicitly said she wanted me to be free to meet someone new, and she predicted that that would happen sooner than I might think it could.

I don't know that four long months after she left me qualifies as "sooner than I might think," given how painful this all still is, but it is true I am attracted to someone new now, even if she is not ready to return my affection.

So, where does that leave me? Back here, alone, wondering if anything can ever work out for me. It's not like I fall in love easily, or that I pick women who will automatically respond to me. For reasons I do not understand, something deeply chemical and definitely irrational is involved in all of my choices. I guess I like things to be complicated.




The most I ever do, however, is make the first move. Once rejected, I inevitably retreat. From then on, it is up to her to make anything else happen.

What does any of this have to do with love, you ask. Stay tuned...