I came across this check yesterday when rifling through a couple shoe boxes I've been keeping photos, cards, and letters in. With the Internet, the boxes have mostly stabilized in the past few years with only a very few additions. I've been looking for things from my father and pre-digital photos of him.

I think I kept this check because I found it amusing at the time, given who it was from and what she said it was for. In truth it was probably an attempt to repay a loan to help cover her rent at the time. Even though she made more money than I did, she was carrying a lot of debt that she had to service, so she would come up short sometimes. I was happy to help out. I don't recall if she ever made good on this one, but she probably did.

I'm still friends with Cynthia today, although we are not particularly close. She tends to be more 'interactive' when she's not in a relationship, which is probably the way most of us are. Although we were in an emotionally-intimate relationship until early 1997, she had already started sleeping with other people a full year before; physical intimacy between us was pretty much dead by the middle of 1995. She didn't do it on the sly, mind you. She let me know she was opening things up in a very unpleasant phone call (for me, at least, at the time). And we probably only made love twice after that happened, made all the more sad by the fact that she was having sex with other people. I can't blame her for that; it was my decision to remain open to her emotionally, and we continued to be very close during that time--although I wonder if it was a simple matter that I didn't feel worthy of something better at the time?

I've almost always "played it safe" in romantic relationships, only going for people who express an interest in me first--with the exception of Cynthia. Our getting together was a rare thing for me as I actively pursued her, fear of rejection be damned. It all started a couple years before we even met. I don't quite recall exactly the first time we sort of "recognized" each other, but I remember seeing this beautiful, exotic-looking woman at different public spaces around the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle, where I was living at the time. The first time was on 15th Avenue when I was out for a run. She was walking a dog and was so beautiful with her harem pants, almost black hair, Italian face, and a tiny stud in her nostril. I think I might have said something as I ran past--something I didn't usually do unless I was really inspired. Something nice, like "Beautiful!" (I was never one for catcalls and "nice tits!" just to be clear!!)

Sometimes it would be walking down the street, sometimes it would be at an outdoor table of a restaurant on Broadway or 15th Avenue. And usually in these dining circumstances she was with the same guy, a bald fellow who seemed a bit older than she was, probably a good friend or her lover. We'd never say anything, but just sort of smile at each other, at least at first. It was a sort of "recognition," as if we knew each other from someplace. Eventually these smiles would turn into waves, but we never spoke to one another.

This happened a lot for about a year or so. Then she seemed to 'disappear.' It may well have been that I did the disappearing as I was in massage school and when I wasn't working I was in class, busy doing trades, or busy with school work. I almost forgot about her, thinking she moved away or something. A few years later, however, I saw her again and I decided I would introduce myself if I had the chance. One time after I had noticed her again, I was on my way home from work on a #7 bus to Broadway, and noticed the hair of a woman near the front. As I got off, I turned to see who it was, and it was The Mystery Woman! At that moment I made a plan. I bought a nice card and wrote a letter to an unknown person in form of an introduction. I was intent upon giving it to her the next time I saw her. (Yeah--actually talking to her would have been a bit too BOLD for me at that point. I've never been too good with the rejection thing--I'm still not. Which may be why I'm single.)

So for the next month or two I was carrying this card in my backpack everywhere I went, practically. But I didn't see her anymore and was starting to lose my resolve, even to the point of forgetting to bring the card with me sometimes. One day I was journaling in Espresso Roma on Broadway (later called Habitat; I don't know what it's called today) and noticed her fast-pace walking by. Oh shit! Did I have the card? Did I??!!

I did.

So I ran out of there, leaving my stuff in the cafe, and I had to run down the street to catch up with her as she was more than a block away at that point. I caught her at a light, actually. I gave her the card, for which she said "Thank you!" Twice. About a week or so later I got a note in the mail saying she would like to meet me, etc. and the rest is, as they say, history. She turned out to be a rather amazing person, intelligent, thoughtful, creative, and kind. She was an excellent photographer and made her own jewelry. She wasn't quite on the more deliberate spiritual path that she is on today. In some ways I may have helped her in that dimension as I was already a sannyasin at the time. Not that I was a particularly exemplary 'spiritual' person, exactly. She wasn't interested in meditation particularly, but she was very open to learning about Terence McKenna, whom I had recently discovered. In fact, she's the only lover I've had who was as enthusiastic about exploring the 'imaginal realms' as I was. She was always a bit closed or guarded emotionally--she still is (at least with me). I've never learned why, but maybe there's no ready explanation for that in any of us. There was always some deep part of herself that she didn't want to show or share, and it was like you could almost feel it, the glow of it, like like shining underneath a closed door. I wanted that light, but never found it. The one time she sort of opened up to me was the couple times we did MDMA together. That was amazing! She's still pretty guarded with me all these years later. And maybe there's something in me that inspires or provokes that?

Things were really good between us for about a year. Then we both hit a kind of "wall of complacency" and each started taking the other for granted, which stimulated resentment in both of us. I finally got online at the time, and she, being much less interested in that whole scene, became a sort of 'Internet Widow.' I will admit that her guardedness was very frustrating for me, and sometimes I would get together with her more out of "duty" than desire. I really should have sat down and tried to talk with her about it --but she had a hard time talking about things. I would often learn that she was upset with me about something because she would be irritated or cold with me for a week, or sometimes two, before finally opening up and telling me, usually after a lot of questioning on my part--because I KNEW something was up by her behavior. But I enabled that stuff. I am responsible for never calling her on it. I was afraid if I did that she'd leave me. At heart, I was a bit of a coward in such things. This became even more dramatically apparent in a later relationship with a woman I call 'La Malinche.' But that story is for another time. ;-)

We had an explicitly monogamous relationship--and I never 'cheated' on her. But I was frustrated enough that I would have left her for the 'right' person, and she figured that out. And I believe my frequent tardiness when we were supposed to get together at her place, often because I was doing something online and just needed a few more minutes, which stretched out to hours, all led to her decision that she wanted to see other people. Plus, she wasn't attracted to me sexually any more. She never explicitly said this at the time, but I could tell--and got confirmation years later. We were really into kissing during the first year of our relationship--and it is rare to meet someone who is a really sensuous kisser and as into that as I had been. But, that was probably the first thing to go. There were other things too, but they are too personal to write here. I doubt that she'll ever read this, but she knows I'm here and it's a possibility. Anyhow, when she told me that she wanted to have sex with other people, I was devastated. All the more because she told me on the phone instead of to my face. And it wouldn't have been so bad if she continued being intimate physically with me, but that had pretty much stopped six months or more previously. So it was all the more painful because, even though her being closed was a frustration, we still had some really sweet times together in that way.

A year after she started seeing other people, she moved out of town, a ferry ride and then some. So things pretty much fizzled after that. We never had what you might call 'explicit closure' until a few years later, after she was already with someone else. And I pined for her for years afterwards. I behave like a fucking idiot sometimes. Longing for what I cannot have, and not being present for what is right in front of me. We lost touch with each other. I had no idea if she was living in Washington state or Thailand. Several years later I got an email from her. She had moved to Long Beach, California with her lover, and they had been together for about 5 years or so at that point--more than twice the length of time that we were really together. It was nice to hear from her. I had already been through the La Malinche debacle, or at least the first part of it. And she was with someone too, so there was no tension about what "we" were supposed to mean for each other. So we became friends. And it was nice. It is still (mostly) nice.

Oh yeah...we've had our 'ups and downs,' usually because I'm demanding more of her as a friend (when I'm emotionally vulnerable) than she's comfortable giving. She likes me when I'm strong, or if I'm asking her counsel about something that doesn't directly involve her. Like she was really good with me during 'La Malinche: Phase II.' But if I have any expressed 'need' for her to be available for emotional support, she shuts down. And I guess given our history, I cannot blame her. She had never been very good at being 'in my corner' when I was going through stuff with other people. She would often take the other person's side, probably because she was also irked by whatever character defect on my part that contributed to the conflict. And that's cool in the sense that if I'm being a jerk, I would want a friend to be honest with me about it. But still, I wished she would have, or could have, 'had my back' sometimes. You know?

This recent thing with my father is a case in point. While I (falsely?) told her I wasn't expecting any kind of explicit emotional support from her, I was hoping she'd at least be interested in what I was going through. I got the impression from her that she didn't want to deal with it. After leaving her a message on a phone she is usually in close contact with--her job depends on it, I hadn't heard from her in over 24 hours, and this surprised me. I thought there might be some other explanation, like she lost her phone, or was out of the country. I left a second message trying to make light of the situation, suggesting that maybe she had been kidnapped or that her phone was stolen--but that backfired, no doubt due to the fact that a real disappointment I was feeling that I hadn't heard from her was coming through. She reacted pretty negatively to that message--she felt I had 'attacked' her and that was certainly not my intent. But I was disappointed that I hadn't heard from her, and said so. She briefly mentioned my father, whom she had met, and then launched into a 2 minute lecture about how she wouldn't stand for such treatment, etc. Good for her! Maybe it was baggage from our past, but it was another difficult circumstance for me where I wasn't maintaining a 'stiff upper lip' and she never seemed to like me when I seemed 'weak' or 'vulnerable.' And of course, I am probably projecting more shit onto this than there needs to be.

I get the impression that she likes me to be available when she's having "man trouble" as she did about a year ago when she was in a story with two different men who both wanted to be with her, but the one she really wanted wasn't confident enough to believed he 'deserved' someone like her (which sounds really familiar to me...note to self for later exposition: CHIARA), and the other was a bit of a control freak whom she liked, but didn't feel much in the way of "passion." Oh yes...one other thing. A somewhat benign STD was involved in this little triangle, and all the stress one might imagine around communicating with different lovers trying to make sure everyone was informed and did what they needed to stay healthy. I was there through all of that, and she was calling me a lot. But now that she's in a really good relationship with a beautiful guy (not one of the two from last year), she only calls when she needs help staying awake during an occasional long drive she needs to do at night for her work. I enjoy talking with her--don't get me wrong. But I guess I would like to be able to talk to her at other times as well, on occasion. But she rarely calls me back if it's not a part of her late-night driving special. Not for a long time anyway.

These things don't 'rock my world' particularly. But they are enough for me to question how much energy I've put into our friendship over the years as it seems a bit uneven. Yes, she's doing the best she can. I accept that. I'm really trying to look into the mirror and examine my own expectations. If I were in a 'let go' about it, none of this would matter. But I'm not quite there yet.

The thing I don't want to do is shut the door on our friendship, especially out of 'ego' and the thought, the mind construct that she is not 'respecting' me or whatever. I'm trying to get past all that petty shit. And the other thing that has become painfully obvious for me over the past year or so, and even more starkly in focus as I peruse cards and letters from people I have loved and now have no idea where they are, or if they are alive or dead, is that I suck at being a friend! Not completely...but I'm not as "steadfast" as I imagine would be good. You know? There are some people who stay friends through "thick and thin" and I thought La Malinche and I would be that for each other, no matter what. And certainly Cynthia as well. I think the odds are good for Cynthia. But La Malinche, definitely not! But nothing is forever, and even that story might come back to haunt me someday.

I'll close this by saying that Cynthia is a really beautiful person, but perhaps not the best friend (for me). Clearly, the issue here has more to do with where my head and heart are at (particularly at this moment) than who she is, or more to the point, who I THINK she is. Because to be honest, I haven't a clue...about most people.