Being Enough

          Monsieur Lawyer texted this morning to know what time he could see me tonight. I told him désolée, I have a diner tonight with a girlfriend at 18h30, when she gets off work, which is nothing but the truth. He then asked "du coup" when we would see each other again.

           I wanted to go into fit of rage. 

           Uh, when pigs fly? 
           When you can pull your head our of your own rear end?
           When you decide I am enough and stop seeing other people? 
          
           Instead, I sent the loaded text message I've been holding back in my brain all weekend, you know, the one about him messaging other girls on Facebook. It goes a little something like this:

            "Monsieur Valmont [allusion to Laclos' Liaisons dangereuses, which ironically, is a book we both love and discuss and have teased each other about for a while now], quand tu te souviendras de te déconnecter de ton FB apres avoir utilise mon ordi pour pas que je voie tes messages aux autres filles ravissantes dont tu languis de revoir [ haha. ohhhh i have been on the receiving end of THAT PHRASE]. Ca complique bien tes dimanches, non? Bonne journée." 
 
            His response?

           "You must have well seen then that I didn't see anyone else last night or the night before."
           Me: "I'm simply telling you that I don't support indecision very well. If you're indecisive, I'm not the one for you. That's all."
           Him: " You put pressure on me from the start?"
           Me: " No. I just prefer to tell you honestly that I have already been through enough caprice and I don't tolerate very well being someone's 2nd, 3rd, or 4th choice. I've already had enough of that. It's to protect myself and I'm telling you that very sincerely."

             This is my way of putting the breaks on whatever-you-want-to-call this before I get more attached and hence, more hurt. This is my way of withdrawing from the situation so he cannot hurt me. I need to protect myself too.

              My generation seems to think that it's a better idea to float around and multidate and sleep around instead of being with someone, perhaps because if one remains unattached, one certainly cannot get hurt, right? It's a lie. We attach anyway, despite not trying to. And then we pretend like we haven't attached, or we finally admit we have and deal with the complicated fall out afterward.

              I'm not against multidating, but there comes a time when you have to decide (or should in my opinion) to just see one person. Maybe the problem here is that I've gotten to that point and he hasnt. Am I wrong to expect him to decide or not decide to see one another exclusively? I was seeing other people too. I was dating around when I first met him. I didn't originally think I was going to keep seeing him. But then I did. And it's been about a month and a half. In some ways, I feel like that is ample time to figure out if I'm worth seeing exclusively. Am I wrong in thinking that? am I crazy?

            What it all really comes down to for me is this: am I enough? Am I enough for someone? Am I worth comitting to? I suppose this is why I am so upset and so angry and jarred right now. I have the distinct impression that I am not enough right now. And that is what hurts the most.

             These are the moments where I want to curl up into a corner and cry my heart out because for so long I have felt like I am not enough. I have not been enough for someone to decide that I should be their FIRST, not second, not third, not fourth, choice.

             The root of this feeling of not being "enough" goes much, much deeper than Monsieur Lawyer, or even dating...I guess you could say the core root of it goes to my own personality and my perfectionnism: to be enough, I have to be perfect. And my perfectionnism surely will kill me one of these days. It also goes back to my own childhood and my own relationship with my father, but that's a touchy subject for me and one I will not adress here.
         
              It's been a few hours and he has still not responded. Part of me wants to text and apologize for looking at his messages, but that would be to admit in some respect that I am wrong. Maybe I am. I shouldn't have looked at his Facebook. I rather regret it a bit now. But I'd rather know than not know that I am one of four women. It will quite possibly spare me some deeper heartache.

            Monsieur Lawyer, am I enough for you? Am I smart enough, athletic enough, cultured enough, pretty enough, classy enough? Am I funny enough?  Sexy enough?

             Today I put my foot down and say to myself that I am enough and if I am not enough for you, you are certainly not enough for me.

            

And just when I'm down and out and mopey...

....The Universe opens up wide and says "let not Lindsay be down and out and mopey" and...

The French Wine Baron, whom I thought had once again disappeared for all Eternity, messages me on Facebook to see if I still want to come down to his village in the South the weekend I don't work in November.

I think I might just be crazy enough to say yes.

This. Is. Pure. Madness.

Trompe l'Oeil

        On Friday night, Monsieur Lawyer finally kissed me. He was late meeting me at my place because he had first gone to a nearby librairie to buy me a present: he handed me, upon meeting, what I knew could only be a book because of it's dimensions, and before I tore open the beautiful paper it was dressed in, I looked at him coyly.

         ¨Guess what it is!¨ he smirked. ¨It's something I mentioned on Tuesday.¨

         ¨Uhm...Sade?¨ We'd been discussing the Marquis de Sade's Justine over tapas.

         ¨No!¨ he laughed. ¨It's something contemporary.¨

         I eventually gave up and opened it. it was a copy of l'Écume des jours by Boris Vian. I, red Dior lipstick and all, kissed him on the cheek to say thank you. It was such a thoughtful gesture that I was taken aback by it and made all the more smitten. I'm not used to being on the receiving end of thoughtfulness, so this was a nice change. We ended up chatting on my coverta-couch-bed because it was cold out and were talking news and politics and history as usual. He wanted to show me some of his American friends on Facebook, so I handed him my Macbook air and signed out of my account. Sinatra was humming in the background and I was smiling and happy.

            ¨I tried finding you on Facebook,¨ he said. ¨I couldn't find you. Are you hidden?¨
 
           ¨Yeah. Why don't you let me find you and add you?¨ I replied.

            Afterwards we decided to grab pizza at one of my favorite little Italian places in the neighborhood, he closed the computer, and we headed out the door.

            He forgot to log out of his Facebook account.

*  *  * 

           On the way to Au Soleil de Naples, we shivered in the cold...autumn in all its brutal freeze has finally descended upon Paris, and I have horrible circulation in my extremities. I grabbed his hand and entwined my fingers in his.

            With the way things have been going between us, I had decided to stop seeing anyone else. No discussion of exclusivity has been had, but I just don't feel right seeing more than one person, and it's really not my personality anyway. I'm naturally a one-guy-kinda-girl and don't know how to navigate the world of the pluribataire well, nor do I emotionally handle it well. And all I really want is one good one anyway. With Monsieur Lawyer, I was beginning to think I'd found a genuine, sincere, good one.

             Once at the restaurant, he grabbed my hand under the table and stroked my knee with his palm. We held hands on the way back to my place, and he kissed me goodbye at the front door.

              I texted him thank you and goodnight, put on my pajamas, and went to bed smiling.

*  *  * 

              The next morning, I woke up early to go running with my marathon training group, whom I love and adore and wish I could see more often...my nanny job makes it extremely hard. I figured I should check the weather to figure out how to suit up.

               I grabbed my Macbook air and opened it. Monsieur Lawyer's Facebook was open to where he'd left it: his messages. On the lefthand side were all his chats.

                It was not my business to look at them. I should have never touched them. If I had been a good, honest person, I would've logged out of his account immediately and left him to his own devices. But I didn't. When I saw strands and strands of chats with girls, I started clicking.

                 There were at least three recent chats with girls he was ¨longing to see¨, like he so often told me. He asked her ¨when will we see one another again?¨ like he did with me. There was one he was planning to meet up with on Sunday. There was another one he told ¨must be showered in compliments¨ all the time.

                   I should have never looked. It was none of my business. But I was angry and hurt and wanted to text him and call him out right then and there. I wanted to write on his FB wall ¨THE NEXT TIME YOU USE MY COMPUTER YOU HAD BETTER REMEMBER TO LOG OFF YOUR FB SO I DONT SEE ALL YOUR MESSAGES TO ALL THE OTHER GIRLS YOU'RE LONGING TO SEE.¨ I was livid but not sure I had the right to be livid. Was I being a hypocrite? When I had started seeing him about a month ago, I was seeing other people too. And again, we had had no talk of exclusivity...but at the same time, I couldn't help but feel that I'd been played, and that hurt.

                    Instead, I asked my best friend what I should do.  She was nearly just as unsure as I was, but put it this way: I have the choice, either I keep seeing him or I don't, because we aren't exclusive and have not had that conversation. BUT YOU DONT HAVE THOSE CONVERSATIONS IN FRANCE! IT is just NOT part of dating culture here.

                     All I knew is that I wanted to cry. I liked this one and WANTED him to be a good one so badly. Instead, I suited up to go run ten miles and beat myself up over the asphalt, resisting the urge to text rip Monsieur Lawyer a new one.

*  *  * 

                     It took immense effort to keep myself from sending a vicious text message on Saturday. Instead, I wanted to see what Monsieur Lawyer would do after I FB friended him. I texted him ¨hey, I added you on Facebook...have fun at your party tonight.¨

                     He was supposedly on the way to a friend's birthday party. I can't be sure anymore, because I'm not of the mindset I can trust him, and if I can't trust someone, I can no longer date them. Before I had no reason to distrust him, and it's my own damn fault I distrust him now. But would it be better if I had never looked? Should I have just not looked? I'm not sure what is worse: the fact I looked or the fact I found out that he's playing other women.

                     A while later, Monsieur Lawyer responded ¨I will! See you Sunday night?¨

                     Oh buddy if you only knew that I know. I played the game and said sure. I figured if he was really going to see the other chick on Sunday, he'd eventually text me some excuse or come up with a pretense. 

                     This morning he Facebook chatted me: ¨Hey, I'm not so sure about tonight anymore, I'll let you know in a little bit?¨

                     Ok. You're not going to see me tonight because you're going to see Camille. 

                    14h29: text message: ¨Tonight's going to be complicated...can I see you tomorrow at 17h30?¨

                    14h32: the text message I didn't send: ¨Why is it going to be complicated tonight? Because you're seeing Stéphanie or Camille or Ophélia? Monsieur, the next time you use my computer to check your Facebook, you should make sure you log out so I don't see all the messages you've sent to all the other girls you're longing to see.¨

                    I erased it, restrained myself, didn't send it. 

                    I have not responded. I will not respond. I refused to be someone's second choice, I refuse even further to be someone's third or fourth choice. I will not see him anymore. 

                   This one is officially a Peter Pan, one of those squirrelly mid-20 something year old boys who just want to play the field and do not care about being sincere. And oh lord, are they good at making you think they're sincere and honest and what you've been looking for. They are like a trompe l'oeil painting, giving off the illusion that they are real and three dimensional...but when you get close enough, you figure out that it's all fake. 

                    I have been tromp l'oeil'd. Back to square one. 

Peter Pan to Grown-up Man

        One evening at Café Mabillon in the Saint-Germain dès Pres district of Paris, I was drowning the sorrows with my adopted overseas expat uncle, The Diplomat. I was venting my frustration about yet another failed attempt with a French love interest and after a few expertly mixed absinthe and grape juice cocktails, was just buzzed enough to start my ranting.

          ¨Like REALLY, when the HELL do they grow up!?¨  I vituperated.

          ¨Who?¨ the Diplomat asked.

           ¨Boys! When the HELL do they just finally GROW UP!? I'm tired of boys. I want a man.¨

           What girl hasn't been through this? What girl hasn't thought she's finally found a man and not a boy parading around as a man?

            The Diplomat paused to think for a second, looked back at me, and offered this response:

            ¨Well...I'd say 25. But if he's not a man by 25, then the time curve for him to become one is going to be exponentially longer.¨

             Ever since The Diplomat repatriated to America, I have kept this in mind. Alright, I thought. I am finally hitting the age where the guys MY OWN AGE should no longer be boys. Admittedly, I don't tolerate immaturity well. I generally tend to date older, because older guys tend to be men and not boys. 

              The Diplomat's hypothesis in mind, I've been out to test it. Here are some results and findings:

              By and large, I find that guys my own age are squirrelly, inconstant, and indecisive. For instance, take Monsieur Engineer, with whom I had a few great dates. I thought we could've gone somewhere. We hit it off. I really liked him. But I was hesitant: he is also, like me, 24. But Golden Rule of Lindsay Dating No. 1: express your interest but leave, ABSOLUTELY LEAVE, the ball in his court afterwards. It is beyond telling what he does, so let him sit back and DO, or in some cases, NOT DO. Monsieur Engineer completely dropped me and went off the radar until last night when he sent me this text message:

               ¨Hey!! What's up? Are you really busy? You haven't updated me at all! Not too hard school and work? Bisous LYNDSAY.¨

                1) I'm sorry. I'm an English and French literature girl. I value grammar and spelling and you have known my name, and seen it many times, in text messages and emails. IT IS L-I-N-D-S-A-Y. Blame it on the French alphabet (the French Y is pronounced like an English I when it is followed by a N). Blame it on him being an Engineer. Blame it on me being a stringent spelling biotch. I'm sorry. I was not impressed.

                2) Last time you texted me like a week ago, I had responded with ¨I thought you didn't want to see me anymore because I hadn't heard from you in so long.¨

                3) I haven't felt the need to update you because the amount of effort you put in to our whatever-you-want-to-call-this is the amount of effort I put out.

                 Needless to say, I'm beginning to think Monsieur Engineer is just another twenty something year old male on the borderline between boy and man. I was at coffee this afternoon with another expat running friend and we were discussing. Miss Tortillas (you know who you are, hello!) is of Mexican and German heritage and involved with a Spaniard here and was sharing her own ¨overgrown boy¨ horror stories, particularly one involving her best friend and the cousin of her current boyfriend. The cousin in question is well over 25 and unfortunately, played the ¨je t'aime...moi non plus¨ game with Miss Tortillas' best friend. It ended poorly. He has a lot of growing up to do.

                  E is another example, and he is what my own mother is dubbing a ¨Peter Pan¨: it seems he doesn't want to grow up. He is so entrenched in his Ex and the drama that she entails that he can't see the forest for the trees. He's off in Birma for another two weeks and I'm sure still worried about her and her insane Twitter antics...granted she is younger than he is. I don't know her. All I can tell you is she brings out this insanely immature side of him.

                  All E does is whine about how he was with her for four years when he broke up with her after two years and got back together. Where is the adult that steps up and claims responsibility for his decisions and takes control of his choices? Um, no idea. Because I'm sorry, she took advantage of him, but he let her. He didn't have to get back with her, even if he felt compelled by his compassion or pity or whatever. He didn't have to ¨sacrifice¨ as much as he did for her. He had the choice and he needs to stop playing the martyr card. Boys blame others. Men are accountable for their mistakes and take ownership of them.

                  Why do men get stuck in this place? What is it that keeps them forever Peter Pans, or what is it that sets them free to grow up into amazing and fabulous gentlemen? The hard part of dating though ladies, that I think we can all agree upon, is this: sometimes you just don't know if you're dating a man or a Peter Pan until you're a ways in. The Peter Pan can present well and fool you with his boyish charm, but sooner or later he'll be off and up in the air. And the harder part is this: age is not necessarily an indicator of Peter Pan status. For the most part, I think The Diplomat is right about 25 being a good indicator, but I'll consider it more a rule of thumb than a hard and fast line of thinking.

                   On a brighter note, Monsieur Lawyer is only a year older than me. He's 25 and an only child, but in many ways, he is much more advanced and evolved than many of the guys I have dated. Only time will tell me if he is a man or a Peter Pan.

                     Let's hope that tonight he FINALLY kisses me and doesn't take off flying in green tights....

Monsieur Lawyer, round 4.

             My clock officially reads 5:20 am. The past week has been insane enough, but thankfully I have one week of scholastic vacation starting this coming Monday and my two girl charges are headed down south to their grandparents for about four days, which means I (oh my sweet baby Jesus!) will actually have a weekend truly "off".

             ¨I WILL ACTUALLY have some LIBERTY!¨ I exclaimed to Monsieur Lawyer over dinner Tuesday night. It had been over a week since I'd seen him (and only for five minutes at that) since he was in Belgium to see a dissertation defense. We were in the Marais at a Basque tapas restaurant where the menu was almost entirely in Spanish.

            Monsieur Lawyer has a dark handsomeness to him that stems from his Spanish origins...his paternal grandparents were both Spanish and fled in the 30s under Franco to come to France. I have a thing for dark and handsome and he wore a black blazer and black sweater that only made his eyes seem a deeper shade of onyx.

             I could've kissed him right then and there. Date number four and I still haven't been kissed. Granted, I know I could just make the move, but I get the sense he wants to do it (France is still very patriarchal) given he pulls out chairs and refuses to let me pitch in for dinner. He still greets me with a bise on the cheek when we meet up, but this evening he cupped one cheek with his hand and pulled me tight to plant a solid bise on the other cheek. Just kiss me tonight dammit! 

            ¨What are you going to do with your liberty?¨ he joked. His is rightfully and fully in the know about my Insane Nannying Job.

             ¨I don't know!¨ I exclaimed.

            ¨ Nothing planned?¨

            ¨Nothing. I don't know what to do with myself.¨

            He paused, said I should reserve my Saturday so we could do something, and then got onto the subject of my work schedule. He coyly asked ¨So even if say I proposed to you that we go away for a weekend on one of your off weekends you don't know if you could go?¨

           Oh boy you do not say things like that to me and not expect my head to start churning.

           ¨ If I gave enough advance notice I'd just tell my boss I'm going away and not available that weekend.¨

            He nodded. I added that I have my work schedule through March. And thank Jesus I only have eight more months of this nanny nonsense, but then I have to find another way to fund my time here...not to mention a visa. Give me a job somebody please?

            Job hunting stress is even more stressful here given my job has to come with a visa attached. And getting a visa means that a business is willing to essentially pay what amount to ¨import taxes¨ on me and that business has to justify to the French government that here is no Frenchy who can do my job. What this boils down to are jobs that need native English speakers. I recently interviewed for a job with a digital communications agency looking for an American native English speaker with a visa sponsored by the French American Chamber of Commerce of New York (FACCNY). THIS IS NOT AN EFFING SMALL DEAL.  I was so excited to interview! THIS IS MY TICKET! I told myself.

            Onllllly I found out this past Friday that I didn't get the job not due to my CV or interview but because they reformulated the position and are now looking for an anglophone freelance journalist. Guess that's what the economic crisis will do to you, right?

            So Monsieur Lawyer has been trying to come up with ways to keep me here, and his latest proposition is to pass the national teaching credential examination for university level (l'agrégation). Eighty percent of French people who pass the agrég come from brutally difficult grandes écoles and even after I asked my Masters thesis adviser, whom I love dearly, about passing the agrég, she was frank in telling me I probably wouldn't pass it not due to a lack of intelligence ( I have my Master 1 summa cum laude from la Sorbonne and intended to graduate summa cum laude again this year...) but lack of training in the French system. I explained this to Monsieur Lawyer.

           ¨ NO, don't pass the agrég in French! PASS IT IN ENGLISH!¨ he laughed. Passing the agreg is huge. It means I could get doctoral funding from the state. I hadn't thought about passing it in English.

           ¨Are you serious?¨
 
           ¨Why not!?¨

           ¨I'm not the product of the French system! I can't pass the agrég!¨

           ¨You might not know all the material for the English program this year....but your English is spotless,¨ he chuckled. ¨I wager you would pass the agrég in English.¨

            Then for the second time that night he made my head churn.  If I can get into ENS and pass the agrég in English then I could...

*  *  *

            After dinner we walked down the rue de Rivoli. It was a beautiful, if warmer than usual, October evening in Paris and the night sky was crystal clear. Paris is stunning lit up at night and we made our way past the Hôtel de Ville, across the Seine to the Left Bank, toward the Académie Française. Kiss me dammit kiss me. 

           We wound our way through the 6th to my studio in the 7th and he escorted me to my front door. It was near 22H45 and as always, we chatted. People walked down my street to the café on the corner and I wished sincerely that it was deserted so he would make a move.

           So we chatted and chatted. Just kiss me. 

          ¨Bon, ma belle Lindsay,¨ he said. It was time he got going and he moved in...And firmly cupped my face in his two hands and planted two lovely bises on my cheeks.

           Either he is dragging this out to torture me and it's working or we are both just timid. But what I can tell you is he's smart as hell, culture, and very sincere. And I really like him a lot.

          Next time, if he doesn't kiss me, I'll just have to do it myself.

 

         

     

           

Of Canceled Dinners, Cafes, and Comediens.

      On Monday at 15h30, I finished a seminar and received a text message from Monsieur Lawyer. He was around the corner at the nearby Bibliotheque Saint-Genevieve pulling documents for this dissertation and his course load.

       "Where are you?" he asked. I told him I was at la Sorbonne.
       " Come give me a bisou?"
       "Do you want me to?"
       " Yes!" he replied.

       I, backpack and all, traipsed around the corner and waited for him outside the library and gave him a kiss on the check upon seeing him. We still haven't actually kissed yet. I rather like that he's taking his time...or maybe it's just that I'm slightly shy and haven't been bold enough to give him the go ahead. Nonetheless, we had dinner scheduled for that evening and I was excited about the possibility of him actually walking me home and planting one on me.

        We parted ways after a brief rendez-vous and he left me at metro Maubert-Mutalite. I looked like hell and, in desperate need of doing laundry, the perpetual plight of the ever-insane-near-full time-nanny and grad student, looked at my watch. Between going home and meeting up with my friend R at Bastille for our weekly apero, I had one hour to buy an outfit to look presentable.

         So, I did what any girl in need of a date outfit does: she goes shopping. After busting my ass non-stop nannying for eight weeks this summer, it was about high time I treated myself. Boots, black tights, a belt, and a killer tunic dress. I felt like a million bucks. SHAZAAM.

         You, Monsieur Lawyer, I thought to myself, are not going to be able to resist. There is something about a good date outfit that can send your confidence through the roof. This was certainly one of them.

          That was, until I was heading out the door to meet R for our 6pm apero when my boss called and told me she needed me at 9 pm. I made a point of telling her I had a scheduled dinner at 9 pm and that I would have to cancel. I am sick and tired of working for people who believe my life belongs to them. I am not cancelling next time.

           I had to have a bitch-vent fest with R. Can the company I interviewed with three weeks ago for a full time position JUST LET ME KNOW ALREADY if they want me or not? So I could kiss this nanny gig goodbye and go on with my life? I'm ready to be a normal near-25 year old. With no more caregiving to kids until those kids are my own. I want my freedom back. I'm tired of being a modern day servant at someone's disposition all the time. Enough of that.

           Long story short, I didn't go to dinner with Monsieur Lawyer on Monday and am currently rescheduling for this week....he spent the last half of his week in Belgium to watch a dissertation defense.

           It would all just be so much easier if I didn't want to have a life, or didn't want to date, or didn't want to stay in France, and didn't want to do a PhD.

           Shoot me now.

*  *  * 

In the pouring Thursday rain, I found myself at a cafe in the sixth reading for class while I waited to grab farewell coffee with E, who leaves for Birma for 3 weeks tonight. I'm working on an expose for a seminar called "Vivre en acteur" and want to work on theatrum mundi and Corneille's Illusion Comique. I LOVE the 17th century. Maybe it's because my French ancestors left France in the middle of the century, or because it's the age classique in France, or because I love all things baroque. Whatever it is, the 17th century is mine.

There is something to love about a Parisian cafe in the rain, reading calmly with a cafe creme. This was what I was doing when two Frenchmen, also there, happened to see that I was reading Corneille.

"Sorry to disturb you, but why are you reading Corneille? We're actors and hardly anyone we know read Corneille!"

"I'm a Masters student in French Lit at the Sorbonne," I explained. I'm used to having to explain why I read works written by long dead, old Frenchmen. " I study the 17th century."

"Genial!" They exclaimed. "17th century French is pure French."

"I know," I nodded. "The Academie Francaise, Richelieu and all..."

We then got to talking. They were Actor C and Actor E and I also elaborated that I'm a foreigner. I corrected their historical inaccuracies about the 17th (non, Anne d'Autriche, Louis XIV's mother, was not Austrian, but a Spaniard...) and laughed that sometimes I know French history better than the French do.

Actor C ended up asking for my number, so we exchanged digits. Then E showed up, drenched and fresh from grabbing his Birmanian visa near the Place d'Italie. He bise'd me and Actor C had to take a phone call and our conversation was cut off awkwardly and abruptly.

E and I got to chatting. Actor C, after a while, left with Actor E, but not before waving and saying "See you soon!"

On the metro back that night, I texted Actor C apologizing for not saying goodbye properly.

"Not to worry, see you next week? Keep in touch, bise."

You never know who you'll meet and when you'll meet them in Paris.

Sharp Shooter

On July 4th, 2011, I could be found in San Ramon, California, sweating over the molten racks of fireworks I was nimbly lowing and wiring with quick fingers. I am a fan of explosions, you see. As an undergraduate, I became involved with a rag-tag bunch of pyrotechnic enthusiasts known as UC Cannoneers who loved nothing more than to blow shit up--pyrotechnics is not so much about target precision as it is about making things go BOOM--in the name of our national holiday, and I was happy to be amongst their company. I was in transition, home for one month to change my visa status at the French Consulate of San Francisco, and spending time with people I loved. Some of my best friends are among these pyro junkies, and I was eagerly recounting my foreign adventures to them as sweat precipitated from our brows. 

They were, however, surprised I had not brought a Frenchman home with me, nor that I had no real speakable French liaison of which to discuss.  I was not. I had deliberately avoided Frenchies given their reputations. 

It was then that my friend Pat blurted out: 

¨ It's ok, you'll meet a Frenchie, it'll be your first real serious relationship, and that'll be it for you. Done and packaged. You'll marry him.¨

Oh how you knew and know me Pat, I must admit. But he was damn spot on. I am a sharp shooter. 

I have never been one to conceive of myself as needing to take lots of shots at the proverbial target. I don't need to drag myself through the endless strains of long term relationships, feel no need to chain together one three year relationship by another three year relationship. I am a woman who knows herself inside and out, and consequently knows what she wants. The result is that, as I have said before, I have not run myself through the gauntlet nor the crucible of these long, drawn out affairs. I have tended to date casually looking to see if something could turn in to something serious, and when I or the other party has figured out that what we have cannot, we have parted amicably. 

There is one exception to this rule, but even he knew that I was, and still am, a sharp shooter.  On the death bed of our relationship, one night in his truck, pouring my eyes and my heart out on his leather seats, I exclaimed to him:

 ¨Look, I know if we start something, i won't end us. You won't either,¨ and while gasping for air I detailed to him how I could see myself with him for good, with two boys and a backyard. 

¨I know,¨ his voice was grave. ¨I know.¨

The only thing was he wasn't ready for a sharp shooter, didn't want one, and it all ended with a bullet to my metaphoric heart.  I pulled the trigger on him, on us, on myself and my illusions. I shot myself. 

*  *  * 

E has not seemed to grasp yet that I am a sharp shooter. Why would he? He is my opposite, a seemingly lost serial monogamist who has admittedly, in his words, let more than one woman get away, calling one in particular, with a ponderous epithet, ¨the woman I loved.¨

We grabbed coffee on Thursday afternoon under a bipolar sky whose mania left us under  pristine grey light one minute and depression left us sopping the next.  He was ambivalent about going to the pool and lackadaisically sipped an espresso at one of those tiny tables you find in cafés nearly only in Paris. 

We were on the subject of his Ex…again, because as I put it, he needs to suck out the venom. And venom he is sucking. But then he paused and poignantly elaborated that usually, it takes him at least three weeks to figure out if he really is interested in a woman. And that this is his problem: by the time he's figured it out, she thinks he's not and she moves on. Oh, indecision. He then paused to ask me how and why it was that I had become interested in him in the first place. 

¨You see,¨ he said, ¨when we got drinks the first time in June, I thought it was nice and all, we walked around, but I hadn't originally thought of it as anything romantic.¨

¨Me neither,¨ I said. ¨ I wasn't sure what it was, simply that I had fun.¨ This is true. I did not think we'd become involved, things were very unclear, I thought simply that I was going to get drinks with him and have a pleasant evening. But then he walked me to the metro and invited me to his place the Wednesday after and that, ladies and gentleman, was all his own initiative. How was a girl to think anything else but that he was interested? 

¨Why then?¨ he posed the question then, looking across at me with the neon lights of the shops just beside us glimmering in his pupils. ¨I was surprised you opened up to me so quickly.¨ This is a complete oxymoron given the fact that he still does not know many crucial things about me. 

¨ You see, E,¨ I started.  ¨ I don't throw myself into a lot of relationships or at a lot of people. I chose wisely. I am loyal to the death,¨ and then elaborated on my father's infidelity, my parent's subsequent divorce, and my lack of ease with the long term girlfriend for whom he had left my mother. I had decided mid-conversation to be very, very frank. ¨But I know who I am. I know what I want, what I need.  I have solid instincts.¨

¨Ok,¨ he nodded.

¨ I had an impression of and an instinct about you,¨…that apparently was all wrong…¨ and I so I leapt. You were someone I thought  I could have really worked with.¨ Of this I am still partially convinced, but I don't do emotionally unavailability and you've pushed my trust. 

He went silent. 

¨Ok.¨

We left it at that. 

 The more I know about his history--past and present--the more I come to sense that I am what he knows he should want, but cannot bring himself to want. 

I have had my own ¨shoulds.¨ I have been other people's ¨should¨ before. This is why I am careful. This is why I'm a sharp shooter. I have been looking for that one person,  and am still looking, to the extent that when they eventually come around I sense I will want to latch on and never let go. I am afraid I have been, and will perhaps be, The One That Got Away. I'm at a point in my life where I'm starting to tire of that. I no longer want to be any one's ¨should.¨

Give  me my target. I'm ready to shoot. 

A Hundred Indecisions, a Hundred Visions and Revisions

        At approximately 19h50 this evening, after a long day of nannying, wearing a pair of black wedges and a turquoise, gauzy skirt, I sauntered down the boulevard Saint-Germain to meet Monsieur Lawyer near the Saint-Germain-des-Pres church. My long strolls down these boulevards remind me how much I am in love with this city. Neon lights burn overhead like the beacons of light houses and ripple over damp streets and the city swishes and sways to the rhythms of fog and night. On nights like these, nights where the intersections of boulevards blossom wide like a peony, I never want to leave. 

        Maybe I will leave, maybe I wont. 

        Yesterday I met up with the head of the French department at the University of Chicago at the U of C's Center in Paris, conveniently located near the BNF. These are the repercussions of doing my job and my homework these past for years, launched into full steam ahead mode by the barrage of e-mailing I did this past spring before I was ever in doubt about doing  my PhD: suddenly I have professors, like all these Frenchmen, pursuing me. And likewise, I am equally unprepared. 

         After discussing with this particular professor, I could feel my love for my studies surging within my breast. After I had worked up the courage these past few months to leap into the unknown, so certain and so self assured that I would not mind stepping away from academia. Like an Ex after a bad breakup, I had convinced myself of all that was so negative about academia and that I would be better off without it. 

          Now the indecision comes again. 

          Following my meeting with U of C prof, I had a meeting with my thesis adviser here in France, whom I LOVE to death. She knows I'm in a moment of hesitation and we spent a long time discussing things. I asked her about pursuing my PhD in France. But one thing, especially after talking to many of my professors on both sides of the Atlantic, has become painfully clear: if I want a serious career in academia, I need to repatriate. Not only for funding, but for quality of education. 

           I was hoping I would avoid having to chose between the two loves of my life: France and school.

          This is almost just as hard, if not harder, as choosing between suitors. 

*  *  * 

          I was supposed to see Monsieur Lawyer this past weekend. We had tentatively planned to meet up for Nuit Blanche, but things got messy because I had to work. We were going to meet up after I got off, but then my boss was out and it was late and didn't want to keep him waiting.

          " I can't wait to see you!" he had reiterated all week.

          I was indecisive and not sure of what our chemistry was like. I hadn't been so sure after meeting him for coffee. I asked to reschedule and we did for this evening.

         When I arrived at the metro station, I wasn't entirely enthused. I've been in a broody, pensive mood thinking this whole double country conundrum, stressing about how damn preoccupied about what I'm going to do with my whole life, and then E's shit.

          Then Monsieur Lawyer showed up in a beautiful trench with his briefcase and a smile. We went to Coffee Parisien in the 6th to get dinner and I admit, I was pleasantly surprised. Really surprised. I had a lot of fun, in fact. Seeing as he studies the American government and law, he kicks my assssss when it comes to knowledge of American politics and we talked elections. He also can talk literature, as he's very cultured, and I find this to be a plus.

          "You know, we jurists really like you literary people," he flirted.

          " I know, " I smiled. "My thesis director, her husband, he's a professor of law."

          "And you said you were very similar to her, yes?"

          "Yes. Yes, I am."

         We then discussed everything from my PhD conundrum (Monsieur Lawyer is still all for me doing my PhD here and we discussed complications with that, mainly that I cannot and have not passed the agrégation, the brutal national exam one has to pass to teach at the university level here, even if merely as a graduate student instructor) to my potential naturalization dossier (he insists that I'm doing one and if so, he's going to help me do it because it's complicated enough) to potentially going to the Louvre in the evening on the nights the museum is open late, or, seeing as his father is a clarinetist for the Opera National, an opera. I jumped at the idea.

         "Well, Mademoiselle, I'll take you to the Louvre or the Opera...but only if you're sage!" He offered once he'd walked me home to my blue front doors.

         "What do you define as sage?" I smirked.

         " That we see each other again BEFORE next Wednesday!"

         It had been about a week and a half since I'd met him first for coffee. A week and a half in which I wasn't so sure we'd clicked and doubted our potential chemistry and a week and a half in which I hesitated.

         " Ok," I nodded as we bise'd goodbye and he placed his hand gently on my back. " I think I can do that."

         In ten days, there is time for a hundred indecisions, a hundred revisions. A week and a half ago FWB was the potential front runner, but he has seemingly dropped off the planet again much to my dismay. Monsieur Engineer has gone radio silent again. E is still E.

        After Monsieur Lawyer left, I texted him to thank him again. His reponse?

        "It was my pleasure. I'm already excited to see you again even though I just left!"

        I can honestly say now that I'm excited too.


        
        

         

       

Battle Studies

         Dating is a war. A messy battle field strewn sloppy with the mess of half-stitched hearts and pockmarked egos and bruised souls. I learned this on Friday, when I was suddenly juggling more men than I could handle. I am still uncomfortable with this juggling business. My sense of loyalty makes it hard for me not to feel like a Benedict Arnold to these gentleman, because juggling is not my modus operandi, and yet here I am, doing it. I do not belong to any one of them, and they do not belong to me. There are technically no rules of engagement here, which is perhaps why I feel l so out of control. Maybe my difficulty lies in feeling like I am betraying myself by doing this. Maybe not. I don't know.

        On Friday I traipsed down the rue de Rivoli with my newly adopted study abroad student, C. She's adorable and a junior and here for a semester and we'd grabbed hot chocolate at Angelina's and had a great afternoon. I like her and am looking forward to doing other fun things with her in Paris.

         We were sauntering down the boulevard past the Louvre when Monsieur Engineer, still disappointed that we hadn't been able to see each other Thursday, let me know he--in fact--would not be leaving Paris that night to spend the weekend up in his hometown in the north, but would be staying to look at apartments.

         At the same time, Monsieur Bob, a more recent prospect, let me know that his friends from Portugal had in fact canceled last minute and he was now free for dinner plans. He'd called a few times in the week with date options and was carefully planning a marathon date for Sunday, but could also do Friday, or both. I was a bit overwhelmed.

         Honest to sweet baby Jesus, this was the first time in my life I have had two men vying for my time simultaneously, let alone pitted against one another unknowingly.

         I then turned to C and explained the Sexpat project. We kept walking down the street and popping into shoe shops to admire leather boots while I figured out who to contact first. Since I already had Sunday planned with Monsieur Bob, I went with Monsieur Engineer.  I left C near Saint-Paul and hopped line one back towards my place on the Left Bank.

*  *  * 

         In the meanwhile, E has been dealing with his own battle field. He's unraveled a lot about his Ex this past week and I've gotten an earful. I do not mind listening for the sake of a friend, but I am uncomfortable and frankly, quite angry when he compares me to her. He often jokingly quips:

        ¨ I can't help you with letters of motivation, you'll end up like Her and then we'll all be cursed!¨

        Hey buddy, LISTEN UP. First off, I don't need or want your help. If I did I would've asked for it and thanks but no thanks, I don't. Second, I AM NOT YOUR EX. Do you understand how downright INSULTING it is for you to compare me to her given your new opinion of her? Third, I HAVE NOTHING IN COMMON WITH HER AND AM AS FAR FROM BEING HER AS COULD BE.

        Get it? Got it? Good.

        I just about blew my gasket yesterday when he texted to let me know yet again another thing about this damn Ex of his. It was late at night and he was moping about how it had been such a beautiful day but he hadn't bothered to go outside because he was too busy figuring out relationship fallout. This week has been all about him.

          Given that yesterday was the 8th anniversary of my dad's passing, I hinted that I was in no fantastic mood either. I have slightly hinted all week that I was not particularly looking forward to this weekend. He didn't catch on. I finally texted back:

        ¨ I couldn't really appreciate the weather today either. Today is the 8th anniversary of my dad's death.¨

        He did not know previously that my dad died. How could he? He had been so self absorbed all week he couldn't catch a hint. He replied with. ¨ You should have called me, we could've gotten a drink to boost your morale, why didn't you?¨

        Because this week has been about you you and more you and you are so emotionally unavailable it isn't even funny. 

      ¨ It's not something I share with a lot of people,¨ adding that ¨I'm gifted enough to hide my sadness behind a smile,¨ and ¨You were so preoccupied with your histoire de merde I didn't want to bother you.¨

       He offered to keep me company. I replied that was nice but not necessary.

       I have not heard from him since.

*  *  * 

      So instead of worrying myself about E and his need to completely douse himself in his own relationship fallout narcissicism, I went on a date on Sunday with Monsieur Bob. Bob is 27 and a huge sweet heart, a chef de projet for a communications company. He's buying his first apartment next week. He is mature and responsible and kind.  He had called several times last week to set up the perfect marathon date: we met at 12h30 at the Luxembourg then grabbed a glass of wine, followed by sushi for lunch (we both like ethnic cuisine of all sorts) and ending with mint tea at the Mosquée de Paris, which I love.

     On paper, Bob is one of those people I should like and should have chemistry with. But that is just it: he is a should. I truly enjoyed our conversation--I geeked out like nobody's business talking the Higgs-Boson particle with him and a whole lot of other existential stuff. We both have disabled siblings. We'e both athletes. We both like learning. We have a lot in common. But there is just nothing there for me. God, how I wish there was. I really, honestly do.

     There is something to be said about meeting people randomly online and THEN going on a date with them. It's an entirely different experience than meeting people in person....when you encounter people in real life at a party, through a mutual friend,  at work, or under heaven knows what circumstances, there's the hazard of collision and the chemistry of attraction that fuels a phone call and anticipation. There is already a basis of interest there. A mystery to pursue.

      I find this missing in my online-to-real-life encounters. I have not locked eyes with these gentlemen across a room and nervously wished they would come and talk to me and then ask for my number. I am flying blind and while, when I meet them, I enjoy their company, with more than half of them I can tell within the first ten minutes if there could be anything there.

       Call it rash. Call it judgmental. Call me a twenty something. But I know what I want when I see it and when I sense it in my gut and all this dating business is just sharpening my ability to figure these things out. Lately, it has given me the impression that I am a lonely fonctionnaire sitting behind a desk at some bureau or prefecture with a huge queue in front of me, lined up with their papers and their qualifications and their numbers, and I am sitting there going:

       ¨Next. Next. Next. Next,¨ just waiting and hoping for a good one to arrive and not to slip through my fingers.

       Dating is a battle field. I am not afraid of scars. What I am afraid of is not having anything to fight for, because for now, the ones I would fight for do not want me to fight for them. And I have learned the hard way not to fight myself over this matter.

       I must pick my battles.

A Girl's First Love

           When I was seventeen and a junior in high school, I fell in love for the first time. He was a year older than me, a senior, and on the swim team. A string bean with a wiry, long body and lean legs. Dirty blonde hair washed crisp by endless hours of chlorine. A young man with a quirky sense of humor who enjoyed science fiction novels and scuba diving. He lived on his mother's ranch where she boarded horses and kept cows and he was renovating a 60 something mustang that one day I dreamed I would ride shotgun in. He took me to the prom and he was just adorkable (yes, a-DORK-able) enough that I fell hard.  I wrote him a list of reasons I loved him that ranged from ¨the way you smile¨ to ¨the way you play with your four year old brother¨ to ¨the way you bake lemon tarts.¨ When we did the dishes at his mom's house in the kitchen together, I felt so at ease and at home with him I imagined us, like many an innocent teenager girl, growing old together. I fell harder and harder. 

             I fell so hard I worried about what would become of us with his graduating and going off to college and asked him about this. He told me that we'd see what would happen. He boxed his things and took me out one last night before he left for school two hours away. We gazed under the stars and there was something so final and sad in the air it was nearly tangible. We said goodnight and his kiss was so tentative I could feel his recoil, if not physically. emotionally.

              I gave him a week to settle in and go to orientation. I called him after that week to see how he was, and finally, when he didn't answer, I emailed him. Then, as do most if not all high school relationships, we ended. He did not have the courage to end it, only to tell me electronically that his sentiments had changed, and so I did what I had to do: I broke up with him. 

            I spent most of that week crying at night in my bed and working out my sadness by beating myself through hard, six mile treadmill runs. I threw myself into my volunteer work. I was bitter and crushed. My world seemed to spin out of control, hyperbolically blown out of proportion by my adolescent perspective. 

                But I survived. 

*  *  * 

               It is said a girl's first real love is her father. That women seek to marry men who resemble their fathers, that we all in some ways pass through the Electra complex and want to bring home a man who reminds us of dear old dad. But if this is the case, I do not know who my first real love is: my biological dad, or my stepdad? 

                My bio dad and my mom divorced when I was six. He left my mom for another, older woman whose kids were grown, who did not like me, and whom I never felt comfortable around. I greeted her with stiff, horrible hugs and I hated the scent of her overly strong perfume. On weekends, I made the trek from my hometown to the SF bay area where I stayed with my dad and tip-toed nervously around the house to avoid the Dreaded GF as much as possible. Wrenching a smile from her was like tightening the screws on an already over tight hubcap. I did not enjoy her company. 

                   As I grew older and became busier and busier with school activities, I went less and less to my father's house. Partially because of increasing extra-curricular activities, partially because I felt out of place there.

                 Then, one day, my dad was stolen from me. I was sixteen and I was out to a lecture on the American Constitution one October evening--it was for a scholarship competition in which I was taking part--and I returned home that evening ready to start my essay. I had just entered the house when the Dreaded GF called. 

                 It was not good. My dad had a heart attack. He'd been rushed to the hospital. 

           I do not remember much because the rest of that night is a blur. I think my memory has attempted to block it, or at least smear the images I have in my head like a wet watercolor painting in order to protect me. But I do remember this: getting into the car with my mom and brother. Wanting to puke the whole way to the bay area. Worried as all hell. Listening to this song to try and keep calm. Looking out the necklace of car lights winding along the altamont that would lead us to the edges of the  Pacific Ocean and a deep of night where I prayed I would find my father recuperating in a hospital gown. 

                   That night never came. 

*  *  * 

                 My father died of a heart attack the night of October 7th, 2004. I was sixteen. I had a short ten years with him. I remember few things, and my memories are fading quicker than sepia photographs kept in stale, cold attics. I remember his love of food and NASCAR and rock and roll and the way he made me hot chocolate on rainy winter weekends. I remember his curly hair and his sense of humor and his easy going temperament, which I have inherited along with his curls and his smile. He was not particularly intellectual, though he was not dumb. The best word I have for him is this: simple. He loved to cook and make me laugh and play the drums on the steering wheel in the car and call me ¨Mouse¨, which was his nick name for me. 

                   Then again, I admit I did not get the chance to know my father on a deeper level. I never had, and never will, understand who he was the way adult children come to an eventual understanding of their parents as real, flawed human beings.

                   On the 8th anniversary of his death, I ask myself: will I end up marrying someone like my father? Will I gravitate towards people who remind me of him in temperament and in appearance? And while I loved my bio father, I have to admit truthfully that he was my father and not my dad. There is a big difference. Any man can father a child. It takes a real man to raise one. And the man who raised me was not my Gerald, but Michael, my stepdad.

*  *  * 

                    Several weeks before my father died, my mother and he had gotten into an argument over how to split costs of my driver's license and car and insurance. I was angry with him and I remember furiously announcing in the kitchen to my mother that I didn't feel like my father was my father and that when I envisioned who would walk me down the aisle when the big day comes, I pictured my stepdad and not my bio dad.

                     Now I won't ever have to choose between these two men, or, as I had originally envisioned, ask them both to walk me, which in some ways saddens me deeply, and in others does not. The night my dad died, I was a bloody train wreck and my eyes were puffier than the Michelin man. But my stepdad knocked on my bedroom door--it was around 7 am in the morning on October 8th, we'd returned from the bay area a few hours prior, and I'd slept like hell--took me in his arms, stroked my head, let a cascade of tears soak his work shirt, and told me that everything would be alright. When he said it, I felt like it was true. He has always known how to anchor me through the storms.

                      When it comes to stepdads, I have been beyond blessed. My stepfather Michael means the world to me. I would not be half the woman I am today had he not been by my side for all these years. He has taught me so much of what I know about the world. He has jokingly said since I was little that we are both the ¨140¨s of the family (regarding our minimum level of IQ), has watched countless civil war documentaries and films with me, taken me grocery shopping on Saturdays with him, bought me my first car, seen me off to two proms, shipped me to college, moved me into my first apartment, and put me on more than one plane flight to France. Recently, these plane flight departures have left us both teary eyed.

                      If I had to pick what man in my life to model my future husband off of, I would pick my stepdad in a heartbeat. I would pick him because I--for better or worse--knew and know him better, and because he has been a steady rock, alongside my mother, in my life. My stepdad is my real dad, and I want someone like him by my side for the long run.

*  *  * 

                    Eight years my dad has been gone, and my memories are withering like dying flowers in a too-warm room. I knew they would with time, but to see them go saddens me. Eight years ago I was a teenager and a different person and innocent. Now I am nearly twenty-five and my love life isn't so simple anymore. I cannot deny that should I meet the right person, I could get serious. That I could and will eventually get married, and more within probably the next five to ten years than--oh, say--the next 15 to 20 years of my life. My youth and the expanse of time before me used to protect me from these matters, but they cannot any longer.

                    In all honesty, I am scared of being serious. I do and do not want it at the same time. I am terribly afraid of picking the wrong person, and more afraid of having  ¨daddy issues¨. I would rather be overly, than underly, cautious. This is probably one of the real reasons I hesitate so much to get involved with anyone. I cannot help but ask myself, with each passing date, if the gentleman in question is more like my bio dad or my step dad? I do not always have the answer, nor is an answer always necessary.

                     But I know this much is true:  both are proud of me. And that neither my dad, nor my stepdad, would want me to spend my life alone out of fear of what is in my past. And both, I am certain, are watching over me.

                     So dad, I hope you've got my back from up there in heaven. For the first love, but most of all,  for the last love, of my life. Make sure he's a good one, ok?

                      I love you.

Modern Love

         Last night, I finished editing a piece I wrote about a month ago and polished it for submission to The New York Time's Modern Love column in the style's section. Remuneration for the column is modest--about 500 US dollars--but the payoff to land publication in such a prestigious column is huge. Agents regularly track down contributors to offer them contracts and publishing houses book deals. No less than nine book deals have sprung from the column. 

        The piece I wrote, I wrote for me, and it is a simple piece. Regardless of whatever may come of it (editors claim to respond within 4-6 weeks, so perhaps I'll know in a while the fate of my lone ship out on the brooding editorial sea) I am proud and happy just to have submitted it. 

         Then I got to thinking about what the editors mean by modern love. For me it is nearly an oxymoron. Love, real love,  is as old time. What they mean by modern is simply our changing attitudes and comportment about how we go about finding that love. The actions we find acceptable, reasonable, normal in its pursuit, and those we do not. 

        I admit that in this case I do not find it NORMAL that my Blackberry is ringing off the hook and yesterday I was juggling FWB, Monsieur Lawyer, Monsieur Engineer, and a new gentleman, who for blog purposes I'll call Monsieur Bob. 

          When it rains, it mother freaking tempestuously pours. Modern Love is also a victim to global warning, it seems.

*  *  * 

            A hundred years ago, if a man wanted to court a woman, he'd stop by the house to call on her. He'd come at set hours, sit in the parlor, and under the gaze of "adult" supervision, they'd chat. If she wasn't at home when he called, he'd leave his calling card.

           Fifty years ago, if a man wanted to date a woman, he'd get her home phone number and call her telephone at home and they'd go to the movies or on a walk.

          Today, apparently, it is sufficient enough to put yourself on a dating website for the first time in your life, watch your "taux de popularite" rise rapidly, and not know what the hell to do with yourself when a select few you pick then all come barreling after you at once.

          I have said before I am not used to this.

         What I am really not used to is having them all assault my Blackberry on the same day and sometimes, within minutes of one another. How, HONESTLY, did I go from being the dateless girl in high school to THIS? I think another Modern Love column contributor might have the answer to that question.

         But I digress.

        I have previously mentioned that it's a test of mine to drop contact with a guy who I'm interested in after the first date. It's, I'll repeat, very telling how he handles himself after and it lets me know just how much he's interested. If he takes pains to get back to me, then I know he's for real. If he doesn't seem to care,  then he really doesn't. End of story and no heartbreak on my end.

*  *  *

         French Wine Baron started his internship Wednesday and we've texted since. I wasn't sure whether he could--or could not--come to Paris again this weekend, but he called last night to let me know his grandparents who have not seen him in a year since he left for his world trip Master, will be in town and so he can't come up. He also said the weekend I'm free to come down at the end of the month won't work because he'll be hosting the new promotion of his Master's program while they do their unit on southern France. 

          "When will you be free in November?" he asked as I proceeded to give him my availability through January. I have my work schedule six months in advance. 

          I tried to avoid the sinking feeling that maybe I won't see him again for a long time. I've lost him once and I don't know if I want to "lose" him again. But it's not looking any easier, and I'm trying my best and hardest not to play the "signs" game with him. I'll direct you to this Modern Love column for clarification.

           I don't want to wait around forever. I've played the waiting game before. I know FWB does not expect me to wait for him, but waiting and WANTING to wait are two completely different things. I don't know anymore. I am uncertain. But I miss him.

*  *  * 

           Monsieur Engineer, whom I was beginning to think had dropped off the planet, called me last night and wanted to see me. I unfortunately couldn't because I had to babysit. He was disappointed because I told him I might be free, but alas, my job demands that I be at the disposition of my employer, which makes it hard to schedule myself. I apologized and we rescheduled for Tuesday.

*  *  * 

            Monsieur Lawyer text flirted with me all evening and wanted to know what I'm doing for Nuit Blanche. In French, a "nuit blanche" is an "all nighter", but in the Parisian case, an all night urban artistic party. I've missed in in previous years due to work, but this year I'll be free. I've been admittedly hard to get a hold of all week because I started class again, but I also am reaching my upper limits of being able to handle multiple people.

            " Did the FARC come and snatch you?" He joked.
            " The FARC?"
            " The Forces Armees Revolutionnaires de Colombie." ( The Armed Revolutionary Forces of Columbia).
            " Haha, no."
            " Good," he responded. "Otherwise I'd come have to lawyer you out of prison! We're useful, we jurists, you see ;) "

            I am not used to persistence on the part of these gentlemen.

*  *  * 

         Monsieur Bob is someone I've been interested in, and he's tried all week to get a hold of me. We chatted last night on the phone for about 30 minutes and I'm excited to meet him on Sunday. We're going to get lunch and then just enjoy the gardens and parks of Paris. But I think he's someone I'll click with, at the very least on a platonic level. 

            We'll see.

*  *  * 

           Then there is E, who is dealing with his own karmic fallout, just as I predicted he would. I genuinely empathize and am sorry for what he is going through. Compassion is one of the many languages I speak. At the same time, I feel--after being told much of the story, and not just surface details--that he has brought it upon himself.

           We all have choices. We can all cut ties. We chose how we react to the cards we are dealt.

           He chose. For years and years and years he chose.

*  *   *

           Does embracing Modern Love mean I become a Butterfly when I am really an Arrow? I feel like I'm masquerading here, because all I want is one. Does Modern Love mean all those with a romantic streak, a hard core romantic streak, such as me, have to suffer under the weight of the cynics who think that love is a farce?

            I do not know. I'm crouching under the table waiting for the Cosmic HAHA to reappear. I am waiting for my bubble to be burst. I am wondering when I will get the Carrie Bradshaw style Post-it Note breakup.

             This is, after all, Modern Love. 

Of Butterflies, Arrows, and Fugitives

         My French Wine Baron left for the south on Tuesday mid-day after meeting with his Master's thesis director here in Paris. I was sad to see him go, but he said if I was "sage" he'd be back to see me on Friday afternoon. I suppose this is not yet goodbye...I am not sure what it is. 

         Monsieur Engineer has since called to see when I'm free, as has Monsieur Lawyer, as have several other prospects. But I admit I am tiring a bit of playing the part of the Butterfly when I know I am not one.  

*  *  * 

         It seems to me there are two broad categories of twenty somethings....the Butterflies and the Arrows. Butterflies flit from experience to experience, young and full of running. They seek happiness in the ephemeral and temporary existence of sensations and excitations, hunting for the next high, whether it be with a job, or travel, or with romantic possibilities. They do not stop to think about what effect their flitting and fleeting might have on other people, experimenting with several versions of their life and their identity all at once.They paint the town red only to paint it red or blue or yellow a few minutes or hours later, swiping their paintbrush broad across the scope of life, afraid that if they settle for any one color or commit to any one hue, they will forever be locked in to the bland and monotonous prison of familiarity. 

          The Butterflies intend no ill will to anyone. They are simply--and without conscience--so bewitched in their flitting they cannot stop to think of any possible consequences. They do not know what it is they want and, bewildered by the possibilities, try a bit of everything only to figure out they still may not know what they want.

          Then there are the Arrows. Perhaps a bit timid, or reserved, but not necessarily. Certainly  more cautious and highly self-aware. The Arrow knows what it wants and concentrates its efforts to attain what it wants. The Arrow aims his or her targets well, knows it is about the journey and not the destination, and wants genuine interaction--in quality and not quantity--to enrich his or her life. The Arrow does not need to bounce from person to person, but recognizes someone with whom it could be compatible upon meeting and is eager to give that person an honest chance. The Arrow, unlike the Butterfly, just wants to hit the center of the target, and world-weary, rest itself upon something solid and concrete. 

*  *  * 

            Life revolves on an axis of patterns, and currently my life is playing out great arcs of pattern between my FWB and E. I met them both a year ago, and within the space of two weeks, and they are currently both affecting my present. After FWB left, and I was admittedly sad, I ended up seeing E. I am beginning to pity him. 

            He's living out the  remains of heartbreak warfare with his Ex, and in the solid throes of the death grip of dying illusions about her character, he stated to me that she was a "papilloneuse," or a butterfly. And like so many other twenty something women (the Ex in question is in her late twenties), he is tired of butterflies who use men for their own selfish purposes.

             I then thought about how I am not a papilloneuse, how strange it is to me to be parading around as one. I do not want to use these men I am seeing. I want to meet one good, honest one. I have been repeating this on end. How can I ever convey my genuine heart if I am seen as a papillonneuse? I just want One.

             E then mentioned that not all women are Butterflies. There are some who, even at a very young age, are ready to commit for the long term. Who are genuine and real. The Arrows. 

             " I fall more into that category," I nodded. 

             " I know," he said back. " I know you do." He had barely slept, looked like hell, and his eyes were watering, covered with a film of repressed anguish.

             Life also has a funny way of reversing roles, and I have always been convinced that when the proverbial student is ready, the teacher appears. I feel like right now, I am the teacher. It is becoming clearer and clearer to me that despite me being younger than he, I am more sure and more certain of the world around me, see with more analytical clarity than he does. I am afraid that perhaps my youth is rendering me judgemental, that of course I can only see things from one side, but I know enough and I've seen enough to know that his story can--and never will--end well. He refuses to withdraw from the war, however. I have told him to lache prise on his Ex, it is futile, not because I want to  be with him. I am realizing how good it is that I am NOT, and now I do NOT want to be at all. 

             He is shocked that the person he thought his Ex was is not the person she is now. I have been through this. I have tried to hunt down a Fugitive. 

*  *  * 

            In Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time, Marcel falls in love with a young woman named Albertine. Albertine is a Butterfly, and Marcel her prisoner. He is held captive by the way she entrances him, and his love for her. But Albertine is also attracted to women, and she plays with boundaries and barriers in such a way that Marcel is tortured by her. He gives her everything and she nearly destroys him. She escapes him and she is a Fugitive..

                We all have our Fugitives. Those people who snare us and capture us and we chase after them until we are nearly rendered into oblivion. Those for whom we would risk going to the edge of desire and destruction. I have met my "Albertine," and I have survived. 

                  I am twenty-four and I have learned this lesson. It is time E learned it too.

*  *  *

                 I refuse to hunt Fugitives. I refuse to be an eternal Butterfly. One day my youth will leave me and I will be left with her evanescence and shadow and scent. I will feel the air for the silk of her memory and the palpable sensation that she was there. And in her absence, I just want One.

                 For now I am wondering if FWB is One. I shared with my Mom, who is undeniably one of my best friends, how scared and sad I was for him to leave.

                " Just enjoy for now," she said. "You will know if FWB is the right one for you."

               Will I?

               I texted him to make sure he got back safe to Avignon last night, told him not to stay so far away for eleven months again. He responded that he had, and to keep him posted about my availability. I told him I'd be free for a weekend at the end of October, that I could finally come south if he wanted. 

               For me, the One is as much about compatibility as it is a choice. You chose to be with someone and you chose to say "you are the one I want. I commit to you." I am ready to chose the FWB. I am simply afraid that he will turn into a Butterfly, or that he already is one and I do not know it.

               I will always be an Arrow.