Confusion at the End

I am in my unlit living room.

I am thinking, wow, I am alone here. She was here three weeks ago, right before I sent her an email that jolted her to start a train of thoughts that finally made her believe we aren't a good match.

That's what she told me under the Washington Bridge today. The same place where we started our relationship. It was a coincidence. That day was a rainy one, at the tail end of Hurricane Irene when she devised to get me to stay at her place. That was the weekend before Labor Day.

It has been a short but extremely intense five, six weeks. But that is the symptom of the problem.

She is someone who needs a lot of space. Things in her life are always upside down, thrown into chaos constantly, and at the same time, she has always had to juggle her problems alone, very independently. And emotionally she had to always shield herself from whomever she's dating. And this makes it very hard for her to connect to someone in the beginning. This is what she tells me, and I believe it.

While there I came, wanting to break down all her walls. I see all her problems, all her struggles, and I wanted to help her with all of them, whether she wanted me to or not. And she probably didn't want me to because she isn't used to anyone helping her. She has told me multiple times that I have "spoiled her." Not only with practical help, but also showing her how a man can really love her. It's not something she's used to since 2001 when her the dissolution of her last serious relationship left her devastated, and all the men since then have treated her far less than the woman she deserved. I spoiled her, and that shocked her and pushed her into a retreat.

That's what she said.

But what I also realized was my own pattern of misbehavior. This conclusion is with the help of that French girl, who experienced this pattern herself when I was with her. When I am crazy about someone, I forget about myself. I go doing everything for that person, make that person the center of my world. The French girl's complaint is that by doing so I don't give a chance for the girl to get to know me. That's true again in this case with the pianist. But one other major problem is that I keep taking space from her, not letting her breathe. Not only does she not get a chance to get to know me, but also she starts to become a stranger to herself because the network of her world was now being eaten away by my uninvited help. She needs space and I was not only failing to give it to her, but also taking away what she had before.

So she told me in the sunny sky under the awesome bridge that we weren't a good match, that she was convince of it. The final trigger for her conclusion was a reaction to an email I sent last Thursday that detailed a plan I had for this long weekend, how we would spend time together outside the city, etc, etc.

Mind you, this is a plan for two people who have only started dating a month ago. It has been an intense month, but the intensity didn't make her feel more intense about me, which might have justified such an elaborate plan for a long weekend.

I was devastated to hear what she said, even though part of me was not surprised. I have indeed been feeling the strain of the imbalance of feelings in this relationship, and lately, I have been feeling her apathy more and more. And now it made sense. Not only was I making her feel inadequate with all my help that she couldn't "pay back", but when I showed any sign of complaint, like with that whole intimacy problem, and now her refusal to go to this long weekend trip with me, her guilt of this imbalance was justified.

That was what she said to me; she didn't want to continue feeling so bad about the imbalance of the relationship. She said that although I always said "I like you", she knew that I really meant I was in love with her but that I was afraid such words would scare her away. That's when I realized how I have been lying to myself. Not just for her sake, for mine.

There wasn't much we could say, or that I could say. I am not for changing anyone's mind. I accept my fate. There was a few minutes of silence. I was plucking off blades of grass and breaking them. I couldn't look at her.

We walked back up to her place I had called the Castle a few weeks ago. It was a painful walk. And I started feeling really guilty. I felt I have made the same mistakes again. I thought about the French girl, about her warning. I realized I have been like this since I can remember.... Since when? Since Switzerland. I show my love in the way of unsolicited help, of getting into someone else's space. And in the meantime, I forget who I am, I forget to build myself.

I asked her if she liked me just as a friend. She said yes. I was devastated again.

In her apartment, I gathered the stuff I have left there over the past few weeks. Some clothes, some kitchen stuff. Memories, bitter now, memories of the fun we had together, the connections we built. Now there was no connection. I was just trying to finish the last bit of this relationship by finishing up a few things I was doing for her. I made sure she didn't give me anything. I wanted to remember nothing about her. No reminders. When she started to play, I begged her not to play anything. I was leaving soon, and playing would sadden me a lot. That point I could hardly hold my tears.

After I finished what was needed, I picked up the bag of belongings, along with the bag I brought with me, and walked out the door. Just before walking into the elevator, she asked if she could at least give me a hug. I said to her, "No, that would remind me how you just want to be friends."

I have something against becoming friends with someone who just dumped me, and not just anyone, but someone I liked a lot, and in her worlds, someone I was in love with. How can I not be in love with someone who plays the piano, who had shared so much with me?

After I left the front door of her building, and feeling absolutely devastated, I turned around and rang her apartment bell. And the next thing I knew we were embracing like, well, like a bad novel would have, I guess.

Embracing as friends with a very complicated connection. But the important point is that there is a connection, finally.

She asked me to come in and talk. She just wanted to talk a bit.

The embrace was the starting point of a connection.

But that wasn't the reason I came back. I told her that. And I proceeded to telling her why I came back. I wanted her to tell me in my face, and this time I wanted to look at her, if she really just saw me as a friend. She hesitated, not sure if that was out of amazement that I was so deaf, or if she wasn't sure. Then she repeated that it was true, she only saw me as a friend. "So like any other of your friends? You don't find me attractive?" I inquired. She gave in and said, "Of course not. I find you attractive!"

That didn't change matter, of course. That didn't change what was said above, how we aren't a good match, how we weren't giving each other what the person needed.

I was taken back to the world of the India girl. She told me similar things: I was a great person, an amazing person, but she constantly felt inadequate, felt I was giving a lot to her but why should I when I got nothing back from her.

And she said something else too: that in reality, despite everything I was giving her, I wasn't giving her something she was looking for, that no one was.

This was the same case again. I wasn't giving her space. I wasn't her savior to get her out of her emotional barriers. She believes the only savior was herself.

I got what I wanted: to hear that she still liked me. I am not sure what good that did, really. The outcome remained the same. We were no longer together.

But I told her one thing in response. I said, "I like you a lot. But I will give you the space you need. And whenever you're ready to take a step toward me, my door is open."

That is the conclusion I actually drew yesterday while I was on the beach alone. Going to Fire Island was part of that insane long-weekend plan. Now I was implementing that part of the plan alone. I had many hours swimming in the sounds of the ocean and the winds that competed with the sound of the waves. And in the end I concluded that for my own happiness, and for hers too, I had to give her all the space she needed. And if that meant she would stop dating me, then so be it.

"So be it."

Easier said than done, because that's exactly what she has decided to do. What we, now that we had a connection again, decided to do. Yes, she still likes me. She's afraid of me because she's afraid of hurting me, afraid of feeling even guiltier about the imbalance of feelings and help. Yes, I hope she would take some steps back toward me. But for now, we agree that she needs all her space back and keep it that way for an indefinite amount of time. I will leave her be.

We got tired of talking, so she started practicing, and this time her practicing didn't hurt me. It made me feel more connected. I was, with her request, helping her figure out what to do to make her computer go faster. Before that, before the practice, we cooked together. I don't know like what. We didn't say anything. In other words, she didn't make me feel we were "just friends", a phrase I hate with all my heart, though she, parroting unwittingly the French girl, said that for her friends were closer, dearer, and faced far fewer walls than a boyfriend.

What kind of crazy women do I have to encounter??

After the practice we went to the milonga together. Picking up my stuff again was suddenly hard. The evening since I came back in seemed like a dream away from the nightmare of the breakup. Now that I was picking my stuff again, reality hit me again that clearly, it was over, clearly, I was not coming back tonight to enjoy her beauty tomorrow morning, to listen to her breathing, to feel her warmth. Clearly, that was not going to happen, and probably never going to happen. Walking out of that door I realized it might very well be the last time I was walking out that door, the door that for a week in the beginning of the relationship I had my own keys to.

This is all very sappy, I know. It sounds worse than the cheese in the tango songs, and nearly as sappy as American pop songs. But as one of the dancers later told me, we love the sappy songs because we identify with them, because at least once in our lives (and in my case, multiple times) we experienced the sappiness not with rolled eyes and sarcasm, but with a great deal of pain and disillusionment.

And so the trip to the milonga was difficult. I invited her to dance the first dance. It was difficult to invite and difficult to dance. The memory of how we started, all the uncertainties and flirtation typical of the beginning of a courtship, now seemed so remote. I suddenly remembered all the things we talked about that connected us, and worst, how she introduced me to her favorite place in the city where we talked about personal experiences that shared a lot in common.

And at the end of the milonga, we walked out just one block. No longer would I be allowed to walk her to her train station like I was doing from the very beginning when the courtship started. That was our agreement: giving her space. I just reminded her of that, but that my door was open if she decided to take a little step.

Turning around and walking away from her, well, you can imagine how deeply that cut into my heart.

Part of cowardice way of dealing with all this was to tell the closest people in my life what happened. It's sad. This final week of our dating adventure was when I told two of my friends about her, introduced her to them. I wanted to be more open. Too late.

I guess no more taking morning rides across Harlem. No more frustrations with the A-train.

I find myself starting to think about whom else to date. Who is my next possibility.

Of course, I catch myself doing that and slap myself for being weak.

I have mentioned some important lessons here, lessons about how to really love a woman, how to give her space, how helping her, especially financially, isn't anything good when what she really wants cannot be bought by money.

But the most important lesson is about me. If I am more connected with myself, if I allow myself to remain the center of my universe, I wouldn't be chasing after someone, losing my own identity and trying to interfere with theirs by becoming part of theirs. This whole talk of space and patience wouldn't be an issue if I was busier giving myself space, giving myself patience and attention.

I think it's possible to be in love with someone but not make them more important than you. It's still my dogma in life to follow your heart. But that heart is not allowed to stray away from my soul. To love someone is actually very hard, even though falling in love with someone is a matter of luck and can happen quickly. To love someone involves giving them what they want, not what I think they need.

I am in the mourning mode. I feel lonely in this dark living room. I can't help remembering what we have done. I can't help remembering what else I wanted to do with her. I wanted to live with her so she could save on her rent. I wanted to help pay for the piano she had always wanted. And if she decided to move back to Israel, I wanted to follow her.

I write this out so I can see for myself how insane I have been, would have been, and how, as my best friend said (I finally got in touch with her 2 in the morning), it's better this ended now than later. True true, and she didn't know half of my craziness. As the French girl reminded me, this relationship was starting to make me unhappy. A few days ago I actually bumped into her in the train and I was telling her that I was unhappy enough to want to break up. That was about the long weekend plan that the pianist refused to partake. Now I got what I wanted, and more. This breakup did not end in the sort of drawn out drama that I had to experience with the French or the India girl. It ended rather sweet.

And the pain is really from the normal cut from the past memories and the future that would not be arriving. I hope this pain will pass. And similar ones in the past had always passed. What is important this time is whether I truly will do the right thing: take care of myself, whether single or deeply in love. I really don't want to lose another woman I like as much I did with the last few....