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2005-01-13 - 5:55 p.m. Eric said I was secretive the other night. �Secretive?� I answered. �No, I just don�t volunteer a whole lot of information� I added. �But feelings are not information� my friend who wants to add boy to the front of that replied. Sometimes the French can make sense of anything; they can twist and turn the words and phrases until they get the answer they want. �Eric, I am certainly not leaving Paris just to avoid starting a relationship with you if that is what you are driving at� I stated. �Driving? We are in a car now?� he asks. �Alluding to, pointing to, you know� I reply. �Do I think you leave Paris to keep away a commitment to me, is this what you ask?� Eric says. Exasperated I start to get short with my answers. �No.� I say. �But what it is you are trying to say?� he asks. I look at his face, his sweet innocent face and herein lay the dilemma or is it really one? Am I just letting it be a dilemma? Taking one giant leap towards growth I say. �Eric, my leaving Paris has nothing to do with you at all. It is ALL about my goals and my dreams, my ambitions, me. I am putting myself ahead of everyone right now, ahead of their opinions, their thoughts, and their ideas about what is good for me. It is my life, and I am going to keep living it any damn way I want.� I say firmly and then continue. �If you want to know the answer to the question �Would we start dating if I stayed in Paris� the only answer I can give you is I don�t know and since I am not staying in Paris it doesn�t seem like a question you should ask� I finish. Looking back on the conversation I don�t feel much. I am happy I was truly honest with him. I feel bad that my lack of interest in pursuing something romantic with him hurt his feelings, but I also know he will bounce back�probably by next week, he�s French!! Standing amidst boxes, all carefully labeled with the ship to address, and the customs forms clearly filled out I can�t help but remember when Mike was shipping my stuff TO Paris and he had remarked on how much I was taking. I had tossed his comment aside, thinking I would need all of this stuff and yet, here I was boxing it up again and I hadn�t used half of it at all. Then I starting thinking about the medical insurance; how he had said to make sure to get travelers insurance. I did get the insurance, and I did end up using it all those trips to the Dr. for my illness in Oct. Hmm. 2 for 2. But was he right about what he had said the last time we spoke on the phone? That was not one of the best phone conversations I have ever had. In fact, it might be my all-time worst. He said �You are crazy�.. accent on the are�as though I had asked him to really think about it and then get back to me with an answer. As if he had spent days researching my file, interviewing parents and friends, co-workers, landlords, waiters who had served me. As if he were a detective on Law & Order. The answer finally found he delivered it with a triumphant �ah hah� like he�d known all along. �You ARE crazy!� Then he had added. �And stop calling me.� Strange, the heights to which someone who once cared for you can, in time, dislike you so. But still, Mike is a smart man, so I phoned the movers and asked what would happen if there were less boxes to pick-up then originally planned, their response; nothing. I would be credited the money because my total move weight would be less. So I decided to unpack some boxes and get rid of stuff that had come all the way to Paris and never been used. You know, I am not crazy. I am passionate. I am different. I am quirky. I probably care too much about the wrong things and wrong people. Too sensitive and yet sometimes not sensitive at all. I had a connection with him I had never felt before. I suppose I might�ve had the tendency to always look for that same connection were it not for a conversation I had here in Paris with someone. It dawned on me that that connection takes many forms, it provides a variety of butterflies, and it provokes many different dreams. You. I feel a version of that connection with you. It�s a feeling I get when I see your name in my inbox. When I hear the phone ring and I hope it�s you. But you know, I am holding back. I learned (maybe the hard way, maybe not) to keep my hand closer to my chest. So someday I might be willing to tell you everything I feel. But for now, I am keeping it this way. It�s not secretive, like Eric says, it is different. Although I do miss Mike, especially the easy laughs and the feeling of a close, close friend, he taught me more than what not to pack to move to Paris, or to get health insurance �just in case�, in his own way he taught me how to protect myself. I'd tell him, but I doubt he'd take the call. � � 
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