caffeinated and weary

It was a beautiful weekend in San Francisco, filled with friends, surprise guests, and gazing into the loving eyes of Marido. I have been drinking a ton of booze and coffee in true SF form, and now all I really want is to sleep for three days. But at the same time, I just want to be constantly talking to the people who know me best, and to ask them:

What should I do?

I have been pitching back and forth between Back With a Vengeance and This Place Will Kill Me. Sometimes I look around me and think I'd have to be fucking insane to not want to settle in here for a bit, be with this Man I met, and some of the people who are most important to me in this world. And then there is this part of me this is thrashing around in my gut, kicking wildly against this proposition and whispering in my ear that the Beautiful Unknown awaits for me far away from the Bay.

When I was back in the midwest last week, I hung out with the family dog, the happiest little girl on earth. Seven years old now, she is still smiles and licks and excitement, but she doesn't like to go on walks in the neighborhood anymore, and when visitors leave she gets depressed. My mother told me that she seems bored going on walks now, and the only time she gets really excited is when the sound of jangling keys promises a car ride somewhere.

I have been thinking a lot about her this week, and how I would like to kidnap her and take her places, just to see that crazy spark in her that I always adored and envied, that joy she had that was infectious and and exhausting that I thought would never die. I never thought I'd say this, but I think life is too short to just be content. Maybe I have too much; maybe I'm addicted to suffering; maybe I thrive on extremes; maybe I am afraid of the responsibility of this new acquisition--Marido's heart. But in my clearest moments, I can't explain why I just want to be far away from everything I know and love. I am willing to suffer for six months to have two months of bliss.

I have a very bad feeling that I am going to break this man's heart.

falling in love and letting go

I am in San Francisco. It has been an intense week. Aside from a terrible attack of the giggles at the altar during a supremely Catholic ceremony, the wedding was enjoyable, beautiful. I reunited with Marido and he was the Best Date Ever. He chauffered me and the bride around town, entertained himself while I attended to maid of honor duties, and looked absolutely handsome in his suit. He even endured dim sum the following day with 15 members of my family.

Following the wedding, I plunged myself into his life, his apartment, his neighborhood, which is in Nob Hill, an area of San Francisco that is so foreign to me that it is like I am in a different city. It is the same buildings, the same street names, the same fog and coffee and sidewalks and gait--but it is different enough to feel entirely surreal. There's little chance of me running into anyone I know here. The people dress a little differently, the views are different, the streets are steeper, and there are tourists hanging off the cable car that passes in front of his building. I am also carrying around this feeling in my body, this feeling of love that makes everything feel so new and different, almost frightening. I feel like a stranger in my own body, in my own town.

Several times a day I pass by a place so full of memories that I feel as though I am in a dream. Marido lives two blocks away from the bar where I spent my 21st birthday, two months after I first moved to California. I had my wallet stolen that night. It was sad, lonely. We ate hamburgers across the street from the place where Ex bought his last motorcycle, a motorcycle he pointedly purchased with footpegs so he could carry me around town. And last night we went to the bar we used to go to every week, a shitty, homey place where we used the floor as an ashtray, picked up sleazy lovers, blew coke in the bathroom. It now has wood-paneled walls, burn-free furniture, and it is the same owner and bartender pouring me cocktails--only he's wearing a black satin vest and telling me, "We're not kids in tee-shirts and sneakers anymore. We needed a grown-up bar." And grown-ups smoke outside.

Marido told me yesterday that he loves me. You know what I said back? I said, "Thank you."

I love him too; it is obvious in everything I think and say and do. But I opened my mouth to reciprocate and was filled with panic that voicing my love meant committing myself to things I didn't know that I could handle. I tell my friends I love them constantly, and this is because I know that I can and will always be there for them. I didn't know if I could commit myself to what he wants from me. But I am going to try. I have never been with a man like him before, simultaneously a quirky, solitary, wise old man and a wide-eyed, innocent boy.

When I returned *home* to his arms last night, he told me he was nervous about me seeing Joe today. I am nervous, too. I didn't want to talk about it, but Marido has a slight jealousy that I think is easily tempered with kisses. I probably shouldn't have told him about Joe in the first place, but we are in this strange tell-all mode, and I thought he would be happy to hear that I'm relinquishing my favorite lover for our fidelity.

But he was still nervous. He thought that Joe would try and seduce me. I told him he didn't know Joe. Joe respects me, and would never try to coerce me into something I didn't fully want. "When I tell him I've met someone," I said. "I know exactly what he will say. He'll say, 'That's great. I'm really happy for you.'" And when I said this, I unexpectedly started to cry, which alarmed Marido and myself. I have been so emotional lately. I feel weak. I never used to be like this, so prone to have my emotions completely overwhelm me so suddenly.

He asked me why I was crying, if I was so sad to give up my lover if I still knew he would remain my friend. I suppose I know that he'll be disappointed, and you know I hate disappointing people. And yes, although I value our friendship tremendously, I am sad to lose my lover. I suppose a childish part of me wants to have them both.

I am going to see him in a few hours. I am so nervous. I know it will be fine, but that isn't going to stop me from smoking an entire pack of cigarettes.

double re-entry

It has been an uneventful week at my parents' house. In-between napping and eating, I occasionally reflected upon this seemingly hapless string of wanderings that I currently call my life. Buenos Aires seems like a dream to me, although every time it starts to rain I have a compulsion to run to the terrace to take down my laundry.

If someone had told me fifteen years ago, when I was learning to drive, that in another fifteen years time I would be unemployed, unmarried, and spending large segments of time in the same bedroom I was in then, I probably would have killed myself. But I think I failed to see the possibilities in this arrangement. It just takes a lot more self-motivation to get things done. Or to get dressed in the morning.

Tomorrow I am going to San Francisco, and of course I couldn't be happier. I am excited to see my friends, to hug them and hear their voices and to walk with them on the sidewalks, sit with them in the parks, to have the long silences of observation and nothingness that aren't so doable over our dozen forms of digital communication. I want to shower them with endless love and hear their stories and thoughts on what has changed since I last saw them. I'm excited to tell them what I have learned about time and people and to learn from them about how they are balancing their lives and growing and changing within San Francisco, something I never quite learned how to do.

I also know that this trip will different than other returns, because on Friday I will be reunited with Marido, a long-awaited reunion after almost three weeks apart since our honeymoon in Spain. With all of the intense (yet measured) emails, video talks, and even (*gasp!*) phone calls, we have a lot of hopes riding on the next few weeks--not just in terms of fun, but also in deciding our next steps in remaining in each others' lives beyond this second honeymoon.

It is a lot of pressure, but it is also very exciting.

final compulsive post from the greatest place on earth

Don't you love it when your mp3 player is on shuffle and it seems to pick the perfect songs for your mood--songs you didn't even know you had? I sure do.

I'm bidding Buenos Aires good-bye in just a few hours. It is sad and stressful and I am terribly anxious about re-entering the English-speaking world. For the past nine months, I have largely been answering to nobody but myself. There have been few questions for me to deal with here, only what I want to do each day. Many days I did nothing. And many days I did exactly what I wanted to do. It has been such an amazing and refreshing experience that I just want to keep doing it again and again and again.

I am ready to leave, though. I am ready for something new. Maybe Marido is part of this something new. Today we were wondering for a bit if we are more in love with the romance of us than us in reality. Of course, this is one of the billion thoughts that has crossed my mind, and one of the thousand that has lingered and returned. But what I have to keep reminding myself is that, like leaving Buenos Aires itself, some situations may seem unreal...but they are just as real as anything, whether we planned for them or not.

Hasta luego, Buenos Aires. Thank you for being so good to me. Thank you for depositing me in this wonderful house with these beautiful people. Thank you for challenging me, and thank you for your patience, your time, and your comforts. I hope we'll meet again.

love and boringness and moving

It is a cold and drizzly Sunday in Buenos Aires, and I actually left the house to go about my day, and retreated home after about 100 meters, where I have spent the day eating popcorn and day-old facturas filled with dulce de leche.

I am in love, and part of me hates it. I hate the fact that last night my roommate had to practically beg me to go to a party with her because I kind of didn't see the point of going out if I wasn't going to pick up boys. I hate the fact that I was sniffly today and didn't want to tell Marido that it was because I did a bunch of coke last night. I hate the fact that I am perfectly sated to lie in bed and just think of him, or to spend an hour cooing with him over video chat. I hate the fact that I feel stupid and boring but I don't care because I am in love. I hate that I cannot work, cannot write, because the only thing going through my mind is: Aww! He's so sweet! Twelve more days until I see him again!

It has been a rather intense week apart since we parted ways at the Madrid Airport. Somehow we became absorbed into an email exchange this week that involved the words "sex" and "marriage" and "long-distance" and "non-exclusive," all terribly heavy things to be floated through Gmail with a person you met about oh, six weeks ago. But as intense and sort of unwanted as the emails were, I'm glad they happened. I feel as though we are on the same page, and this is a new feeling for me. We are in love and trying to be responsible and respectful with ourselves and the other. Even though we feel like breathless teenagers, we also feel very wise. It is exciting but also boring. I like you? You like me? Great! Great! Okay, great. Now what?

Well, the 'now what' part is actually a big deal in this case, seeing as I currently live about 6500 miles away from him. 'Currently' being the operative word, of course. That status is going to change in three short days. Then, I don't know. He's formally invited me to crash with him for the entire month of August that I'm in SF, and that sounds both lovely and crazy. Not crazier than going to Spain with him, but close. I know I've joked that he's my Marido since the day we met, but...I can't help but feel like I'm just getting caught up in this delirium. He's already booked a flight to come to see me in Chicago the following weekend. And instead of feeling overwhelmed by all of this, I am fanatically thrilled. Great! Great! Great! Snooze.

I find myself constantly thinking, "Is this really happening? I need a nap."

what to say

The day of my last post, Marido and I left Navarra and went to the coast. I think all the togetherness was wearing on me, because as soon as we got there, I left him in the pensión and went to work on my article, which was sort of a pointless thing to do on a Sunday afternoon in Spain, because everything was closed. I took a breather in the plaza and tried to soothe my nerves and to coax myself into the loving place where Marido seemed to be, mentally, and that I seemed to be dancing around like a scared bird.

When Marido showed up to meet me, he had some bad news. He'd gotten word--through Facebook, of all things--that his mother was in a coma.

We had a less-than-pleasant evening, where I tried to take care of him the best I could. But when you don't know someone very well, you don't know how they react to stress and what helps them. We talked it through a bit, but it was a rough night where we sort of hated each other and felt helpless. While we didn't fight, there was a moment where I sat on a street corner and cried because I didn't know what to do but I was sure that I wasn't making things better and was actually adding to his stress just by being there. When you are exhausted and stressed out, the last thing you want to do is worry about how your date is doing. His mother died the next day.

I suppose many people would define this as when the honeymoon ended, but with the uncertainty gone and the finality of death, we were able to mourn for a while and carry on. He wasn´t expected to return to Argentina for the cremation, and he was at peace with things, so we moved on. This would seem callous to a lot of people, but maybe this is just another reason why Marido and I get on so well. We have similar attitudes toward a lot of things in life, and death is one of them.

The rest of the honeymoon progressed without incident, so much so that there is little to report. We motored around and observed each other as closely as we observed the countryside and the people. But while Marido poured his heart out to me about how he felt, I kept my cards very close to my chest, so close that he kept asking me what I was thinking and why I wouldn´t tell him. The truth is that I spent a significant amount of time thinking about Ex and Joe, and during almost every night I dreamed of Ex. That is not something you want to tell your new boyfriend on your faux-honeymoon in Spain. Whenever he asked me what I was thinking, I didn't really know what to say.

Something amazing about Marido is that he is extremely open. He would explain everything--from why he likes me so much to why he was changing lanes. This could be tiresome to some, but for someone like me it is kind of perfect, because I never have to wonder what he´s thinking. It´s too bad that I can´t really return the favor at the moment, but I am doing the best I can. At times I felt pressured to echo some of the sentiments he was expressing, but it is a little fast for me. I am surprised I even let him hold my hand.

I adore this man and I miss him, but I am glad we have this time apart now to slow it down a little. I actually think that my heart is full and I have to let go of some people before I can be in love with him. Surprisingly, the person I have to let go of is Joe. When I go to see Joe in San Francisco, I can't have sex with him, and this makes me sad, because that is something we do very well together. The thought of seeing him and telling him I can´t or won´t sleep with him any more makes me terribly sad. I thought of this on the honeymoon, that this is not something I could do with a clear conscience, even though I slept around when I was with Joe. And it's not just the sex. I was always waiting for the moment to be in love with Joe, to admit that I was in love with him.

Timing is funny like that. It´s not just timing, of course. There are other aspects of Marido that have landed us together in a way that never worked out for me and Joe. And while I spend nights gflirting with Marido, I feel ready to give up others to be with him, but it is still sad. I know that Joe will be sad, too. And this whole time, I thought the reason we weren´t committed to each other was so we could avoid being sad. And here it is. Again.

Any advice on ending things with your favorite sex partner?

honeymooning

It's been a week of honeymooning with Marido, and things have been so luscious and perfect that I am not quite sure where to begin. He met me at the airport in Madrid and has been driving me around Spain, France, the Basque Country, stopping in at cute town after cute town, lying on crowded beaches, winding our way through sunny fields and tree-filled mountains. He is doing all the driving because I don't know how to drive manual transmission cars.

We figured out that I met him on Madrid exactly a month after our first date, but with our schedules this is probably one of the longest fifth dates in history. It is completely overwhelming and I am often silent on our long drives, in awe of it all, disbelief. I think I would have an easier time understanding if something was wrong---if he was giving me creepy vibes or if he were a terrible lover or if we were constantly having communication breakdowns. But everything seems so natural and easy that instead I feel confused and vaguely panicky, like I must be missing something. Because what?the?fuck?is?going?on? How did I end up on this French beach with this impossibly charming man who somehow always knows the right thing to say? Has he been cyber-stalking me all of my life, preparing for this trip together, anticipating exactly what I love, what I want, what is important to me, and what will make me fall completely in love with him? It sure as hell seems like it.

Sometimes I look over at him and am filled with an incredible sensation of being completely safe and protected yet terrified like never before. The day before I left, I told my buddy B that I was sure I would fall in love this week, and here it is, happening. He said to me, "Falling in love isn't the hard part." And he's right, of course. We can love most anyone, but it's making it work that is hard. And when we begin to talk about the future, which we dabble in at times during our long drives, it fills me with fear. It's not as though I have any specific plans at all, but I was happy before I met Marido. I have plans to go to Mexico, and plans to go to Budapest, to take photos and write books and fall in love. And I'm scared that I will wander off with this man and forget all of these plans. Because I feel like he could ask me to go anywhere with him, and I would go. I mean, he did talk me into crossing the ocean to run with the bulls with him. On our second date.