Life Goes On

As happily wrapped up as I have been in all the newness and the fun of my romance with Joe Montana, I’m not allowing it to take over my life. I think that I did that with PC, I dropped my focus off of myself and what I should have been doing at that point and put all my energy into seeing him and talking to him as much as was humanly possible. Obviously, that didn’t turn into a good situation; I’ve been determined not to repeat those mistakes (even if I am crazy enough to repeat the long-distance experiment).

Kickball has started back up for the fall season, so I’m forced to thrust myself back out into the social world. I took a week to cocoon when I got back from Montana and then I had a week with The Mother in town. Now I’m back to my sleepless Thursday night routine and back in weekly contact with the friends that I’ve made down here. I’m also… drum roll please… buying a house, a townhouse to be more specific, and it’s actually a done deal. I’m just waiting for the 15^th of September for my closing date and I will be an honest-to-goodness grown-up homeowner. It has been my life goal to be a property owner of some sort before my 30^th birthday and I’m actually going to achieve that goal. I’m pretty damn excited. The Mother also bought a house in the area to have as an income property, so I’ll be seeing a lot more of her over the fall and winter. I’m back to normal at work and received a favorable six month review. Life is chugging along.

Of course I am still talking to Joe Montana through all of this. The more that I get to know him and know about him, the more I like him. We talk so easily that an hour can pass before I even know it. I find myself wanting to tell him about anything interesting or funny that happens during my days, and share with him first when something good happens. I had a nightmare one night (not a usual occurrence for me) and he was the first person that I wanted to call to make me feel better. Of course, it was four a.m. and the feeling passed before I actually did wake him up in the middle of the night. But it was a comfort to know that he was out there somewhere. Nothing has yet happened (sense my cautious optimism) that raises any red flags. He’s also coming down to Florida to visit me for Labor Day weekend. I’ve been counting down the weeks and days and I’m thrilled at the idea of getting to see him again.

As well as things are going, I can’t bank on it working out. I can’t get so fixated on the idea of being with Joe that I think I need to move back to Montana immediately and start planning a wedding and naming my unborn children. I’ve got a lot going on here in Florida and I’m going to keep working on it all and enjoying myself. If things happen to work out with Joe Montana too, it’ll just be icing on the cake.

Lyrics of the Day

"All I know is I gotta be where my heart says I outta be. It often makes no sense, in fact, I never understand these things I feel. Don't change your plans for me." Ben Folds Five Don't Change Your Plans

Across the Universe

I’m going to skip ahead a bit here. Long-story-short, Joe Montana and I maximized the rest of the time that I was in Bozeman. I felt so completely comfortable, at ease and able to be myself around him that it just felt natural to see as much of him as I could. When I last saw him on the Saturday that I was leaving town, we hugged goodbye and agreed to keep talking. We didn’t discuss anything further than that, which was perfect. I didn’t know what I wanted, but I did know that there was one road that I definitely did not want to be traveling again so soon and so irrationally.

Since I’ve been back in Florida – over three weeks now – Joe and I have talked every day. We talk at night and exchange text messages semi-regularly throughout each day. Again, I’m feeling like a teenager here. This infatuation, these long phone conversations, the Romeo & Juliet feeling of a romance complicated by outside influences. I really don’t think that I have any clue what I’m getting myself into here, but I can’t help but fall head-long into whatever it will or won’t be.

Joe Montana is extremely open with how he feels about me. And he’s crazy about me. Every so often, his adoration has given me a pang of worry – my brain remembers the disaster that was PC and how frighteningly clingy and suffocating he got. It only takes me a few moments though, to remind myself of the many significant differences between Joe Montana and PC (shared first name aside…).

• Joe Montana has an established job in a career that he loves
• He has his own friends and maintains the relationships
• He is completely presentable in public and is in no way embarrassing
• He is older than me (which I still consider to be a minor miracle, with my track record)
• He’s never had a significant brain injury (I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned this other bizarre pattern of mine, but it’s been one)
• He hasn’t done any of the creepy, manipulative, passive-aggressive crap that PC pulled when we were first long-distance dating

The part of all of this that is truly scary and very frustrating is that Joe Montana could just be perfect for me. By perfect for me, I don’t mean perfect in every way, but we just seem to match up really well. The catch is, there is no way that I can leave Florida in the next year and a half, and I have no desire to drag Joe Montana down here (away from all his friends and family and his job) to live with me. So if something is to continue between us, it’s going to be a long, slow road.

I talked to River about what has been going on, because I felt like I needed to really get her blessing. I asked her how she felt about Joe and I talking and she said she’s so excited that she’s really trying not to get her hopes up too high. She told me that she loves us both and couldn’t think of two people she’d rather see together.

I’m prepared for you all to admonish me and tell me that I shouldn’t jump into something crazy when I’m still so newly single; that I’m nuts for trying to have something with a guy that is three thousand miles away and is going to stay that way for a while. But the part of me that harbors general optimism thinks that there is something here and that something would be a shame to rule out before I even get to see what it is. Besides, it could just make a great story someday.

Lyrics of the Day

"Well, hot and heavy, pumpkin pie, chocolate candy, Jesus Christ. Ain't nothing please me more than you. Oh, home, let me come home. Home is wherever I'm with you." Home Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros

On Heartbreak and Breaking Hearts

For as long as I can remember, The Sister has had the worst taste in men. She’s been with neglectors, abusers (emotional, not physical – though I suspect it could have gotten there had it been given the time), charming players. I could be wrong, but suddenly it seems like she may have found a Keeper. We were discussing the timing of the new man in her life and she floated the following theory: that a person needs to experience at least one great broken heart and break at least one heart before she is ready to settle down for good. The Sister has done both in her dating history and I realized, with the end of my relationship with PC, I have too.

I’m not seriously getting insanely ahead of myself here; I just like this theory.


Once The Mother, The Sister and I were finally able to say farewell to the last of the family and friends that were in town for my dad’s memorial, the time started to fly. We spent a good amount of time together, just the 3 of us; my new nuclear family. But I also managed to see quite a lot of Joe Montana.

The Wednesday after the memorial, Joe and I went on an actual date-type-thing. We went to dinner, made a stop at Target to find a birthday card for his youngest sister (For those of you who don’t know me personally, Target is my version of shopping paradise. I can get anything I want there and it’s easy and pretty and it makes me happy. I even have a Target credit card. It’s all red with bull’s-eyes - it’s adorable.), then stopped at my new favorite Bozeman bar for a drink. It was a really great night, and the first real quality solo time that we had spent together. He opened the car door for me. I haven’t had a man open a car door for me since I dated The Ex. In 2005. Joe Montana held my hand and refused to let me pay for drinks and laughed at my witticisms and made me laugh right back. If I had any doubts about our compatibility before, I was able to cast them aside that night.

Did I mention how much I love it when a man opens the car door for me? I should also mention that Joe Montana has the most arresting eyes. I don’t know if it’s that they’re light, or that they’re big or that they’re framed in those lovely long eyelashes that evolution gave only to men – but I’m taken aback every time I see him.

I mean, I have had my heart broken (more than once). And I have broken a heart. I’m just saying.

Lyrics of the Day

“And all I want is your eyes, in the morning as we wake, for a short while.” Bowerbirds Northern Lights

Comfort

Joe Montana managed to do the impossible over the days surrounding my dad’s memorial gathering. He was somehow one of the very few presences that was able to calm and comfort me without demanding anything additional from me. I was still surprised and baffled at both his kindness and my willingness to accept it and lean on him, but the whole situation felt so natural that there was nothing I could do (or wanted to do) but go with it.

Joe came to my father’s memorial, with River and her husband. Being able to have Joe there and to have his arms around me was almost essential to my sanity. He was just able to let me be. He wasn’t the only one there that I had to lean on: my cousins came from California; My Husband flew in from LA (we had been estranged for months, due to the horrible complication with PC, but MH spent a lot of time with my parents during their various visits to CA and his coming to MT re-formed our friendship), my godmother made it up from the Florida Keys. It was just that Joe Montana was the easiest to be with; he allowed me to breathe.

After an interminable day of family, friends, and way too many tears, Joe and I eventually ended up alone. He drove me back to my parents’ house and we ended up in the back yard. There, beneath a version of the Milky Way that you can’t even imagine outside of Montana, we were teenagers again. We tangled together in the cool grass, fitting length to length and kissing – just… kissing.

It was perfect.

The view from my the back porch at my parents' house.
You'll have to imagine the stars.

Lyrics of the Day

"You told me victory is sweet, even deep in the cheap seats. And you don't judge me, that's not your style. But I won't see you for a little while." Conor Oberst Cape Canaveral