I am on the New York Times. Unbelievable. I didn't even have to do anything. My name isn't mentioned. It's a picture of sunset just before Hurricane Irene arrived the next day. I was standing there, watching over the Hudson River, watching the great George Washington Bridge span over that gray torrent contrasting the light blue clouds of dusk.
Next to me in that picture was the Princess of the Castle, who took me in as a refugee from the impending wrathful storm even though I didn't need to be evacuated. That was all in the last blog, or the one before, at least.
Washington Heights is hilly. At 7 in the morning there's a huge crowd of people waiting on the Uptown platform for the A train to shuttle them to their work in the "City". I squeeze myself in and get off in Harlem to catch the crosstown bus, one of the two, to the Metro North station in East Harlem. I have done this twice. The first time was different from the second time.
There are three fushia (can't spell) color roses in her practice room, next to a baby grand. It has been inflating from the size of a goose egg to my fist. And unlike the cheap stuff from Mom-and-Pop stores all over New York, these actually smelled of roses. She wants me to smell them every time she noticed them. The petals slowly get relaxed as the each flower opens up. Sort of like her heart. Though not as quickly as the roses, her heart opened up over the past month, and finally let me in this weekend.
And she did, little by little, one by one, my own walls start to erode away. And talking to her, who was first a friend to me than anything else, a friend I could connect to, I realized what some of those walls were. In the past few years, the women I was involved wanted to hide what we had, and definitely didn't want to call it any name. There was the insane game of words to dodge more clean-cut names like boyfriend or dating. In retrospect I realized how foolish it was for me to tolerate their uncertainty. Not just foolish, but sad, that I would put up with their uncertainty in return for sustaining something they didn't truly want. To walk down the street, or the hills of Washington Heights, with her arm around me, or her hand in mine, something so simple, without any sense of commitment, any drama, any fear, my own rose started to relax and open up. She has no qualms about telling her family, her friends what crazy boy was after her, what crazy boy was staying at her apartment this weekend.
I felt comfortable enough to fall asleep for four hours on Monday while she practiced away with the drama in her music. When was the last time I felt comfortable, relaxed, with a woman who wasn't a friend? It wasn't my fault that they were unable to make the situation relaxing, but it was my fault to have stayed in such a situation.
I am wearing her pants. I didn't expect to be coming to work straight from her place. On Sunday I was dressed for the Sunday milonga, where I like dressing in the craziest way I felt comfortable in, and this time it was white linen with super red pants. I realized late Monday night that I couldn't wear those pants into an investment bank. Wearing those pants I wonder what had happened. Why things suddenly went so quickly. And I wonder if I was living in a box, the box of preconceptions, preconceptions of how relationships are supposed to start. There's some rule somewhere that you start everything slow. I never really understood the rationality behind that. I simply assumed it was right because it was one of the rules to protect me from getting hurt. Of course, in the end, I got hurt anyway by all those women. Rules or no rules.
She already is hinting she wants to see me. I am far from being sick of her, but I am hesitant. I am afraid I must be breaking some rule. Like the rule that you're not supposed to see someone so much in the beginning. Sooner or later she would say, in an awkward manner, "I think we should cool down a bit." So many rules. I am supposed to be playing the game of hard to get. If I let her have me whenever she wants, then she wouldn't get too excited. That's another rule. She wanted me to come to her place right after work. I told her I had my New Haven best friend had just moved to the City and was meeting up with me. I was afraid it would upset her, but then, it fit in the rule very well. That rule about being independent; women respect men who are independent even though they hate when men get tired of them.
All these rules have one immediate effect, regardless of what they are trying to protect in the future, what unknown risks they are hedging, and that is they make me nervous. I can't believe I am dating again. To be more precise, I can't believe someone actually wants to date me, someone I am crazy about. It's so new and unfamiliar that only a dream can be the explanation. I look at that photo from the New York Times, us standing there, me looking at her, not at the river or the bridge, and there was about two feet of distance between us. It's not a dream, is it? Now there isn't any physical distance between us when we meet. But the rules form a clear gulf between us. One thing is clear: an adventure has started, regardless of its length, a new adventure has begun.
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