I’m here!

I’m in Montreal!!

But I’m about to go to Ottawa for the weekend.

I can’t believe this, any of it …

—

When I finally got to a computer last night, I checked to see if there were messages from Mr. Arbitrage.  There were two.  Short ones, but basically he had been checking in to say that he hoped I was having fun wherever I was.

I am actually waffling.

There came a point when a few things added up and I thought, "This is not going to work."  Miss J and I had a huge yak about it the night before I left.  And as for right now?  Perhaps I’m just responding to being in the Mango’s and the Chou’s environment, looking around the walls at the pictures of them so happy together in spite of some of their differences, and … Well, I’m trying to sort out if my gut instinct is really my gut instinct, and not fear of how some people I really care about would react to my being with Mr. Arbitrage.  What if I always had been capable of this kind of relationship but just didn’t know it till the opportunity arose?  And does being "capable" of it mean anything at all? – I mean, just because I can doesn’t mean I should.  I do think in "shoulds" and "oughts."

Anyway, I will be patient, and more importantly, I will watch to see if he can be patient.  Because there’s more than one issue floating around here.  There’s the "given that we both really like each other, would it be RIGHT to be with him" thing, and then there’s the "do I really like him that much?" thing.

Arrrrrgh.

—

On Tuesday, U looked at me as if from a great distance of resignation.  He knows a bit about the weekend I had … and I felt terrible.  Shouldn’t that tell me something?

—

On the second flight (I had a stopover in Calgary), I was by the window, and a very cute guy (who looked like a short Mr. Arbitrage) was in the aisle seat.  A family bustled into the seats behind us, but the young girl had to sit alone in the middle seat in my row.  She had dark hair and glasses and a backpack full of books.  Her hair had that little girl smell – hard to describe, natural and not offensive.  She saw me pulling a book out of my backpack and her tongue loosened.  "What book are you reading?"  I showed her: "The Girl’s Guide to Hunting and Fishing, by Melissa Banks.  I’m just starting it so I can’t really describe it to you, except that I read a bit near the end because I was curious, and I think it’s for grownups, and a bit sad."  She nodded: "Oh.  Well, I’m reading this book by Kit Pearson … " and off she went, plot synopses and relative virtues of different genres and so forth.  Every now and then the cute guy and I would smile at each other over her head.  And he seemed to smile a lot at the fact that I was taking her quite seriously, not trying to shut her up.  At one point I reached into my bag, pulled out my agenda and wrote down some authors’ names that she had mentioned.  "Oh, why are you doing that?" she asked.  I said, "These sound look good stories.  I think some of my students might want to check them out."  She beamed and said, "Oh, you’re a teacher?"  "Not a schoolteacher – a music teacher."  Cute guy’s ears perked up and he began to listen more obviously intently.  Bookworm and I yakked music and more reading, and then finally the plane coasted over to the runway and I said, "Oh, oh, oh, don’t worry if I ignore you for a minute, I just LOVE this part … " so we both wahooed in delight as we got pinned to the backs of our seats during take-off.  Cute guy was obviously very amused.

After playing around with our little TVs for a bit, and after she showed me how to play cat’s cradle with some string she had, Bookworm got sleepy.  It was a red-eye flight after all.  After a while,  I noticed that her neck was at a 90 degree angle.  It looked like it would hurt a lot later.  I wadded up my jacket and put it next to her head. When the presence of the jacket registered, she automatically lifted her head and without opening her eyes or making any sound, allowed me to wedge the jacket between her head and shoulder (with my shoulder on the other side to keep it up).  Cute guy was watching with a tender expression.  The three of us slept.

I woke up later when cute guy did, and we smiled at each other over Bookworm’s sleeping head.  And I thought, I have family everywhere.  It was odd; I wasn’t merely wistful for a family scene like this in some vague future (with Mr. Arbitrage or whoever), I was also so content with the current moment.

—

When L and the Mango came to pick me up at the airport, Bookworm and her family were also waiting outside, and we waved goodbye earnestly.  I never learned her real name.

—

L and the Mango plied me with breakfast but to no avail, leaving me to sleep at the Mango’s place while they went back to work and school.

More stories will have to wait as right now I have to get ready for the roadtrip!!!