I wrote this on Valentine’s and meant to post it

Today happens to be Forgiveness Sunday in the Orthodox church calendar.  I have overused the joke about how perfect it was that Forgiveness Sunday coincided with Valentine’s Day.  Assured forgiveness for couples who had forgotten to give each other gifts!

This is the third Forgiveness Sunday I have gone to.  Every year I come closer to crying, because every year adds its layers of actual things to forgive and be forgiven for.  Two years ago I just tried not to laugh awkwardly while figuring out the steps – do I bow simultaneously with the other person? or do I wait a moment? do we ask each other for forgiveness in unison? do we kiss each other’s cheeks three times, alternating cheeks, or do we simply hug, or just shake hands? when we bow, do we cross ourselves first? … Last year I was just hoping I wouldn’t blush when it came time to look the Ridiculously Unnameable Orthodox Guy in the eye (we had just had the first DTR talk in which I did all the talking).  This year I felt burdened by the awareness of all the ways I had hurt/annoyed/inconvenienced people.

Funny.  When I first came to this church, there was a fellow (11 years younger than me) who was almost exactly to this church what the Friar was to *his* church when I went there.  This meant nothing other than the rousing of the occasional, inward, nostalgic sigh.  But after a while the fellow at this church began to be drawn to me.  Not romantically.  I’m sure that’s the furthest thing from his mind.  I could be his maiden aunt.  In fact, because his mother’s family is so huge with such a big age difference between all her siblings, I happen to be older than this guy’s youngest aunt.  But in any case, I became aware, after a while, of our inclination towards each other.  We just like to talk about the same sorts of things.  It was almost Friar-ish.  When this first struck me as a possible problem, I immediately brought it up with my priest.  He laughed it off and said something about how crazy ideas do occur to the best of us.  I assured him that as far as I was concerned, I was like a cousin to this guy’s family, an older relative upon whom he could practice his chivalry and good breeding.  His attentions didn’t have to *mean* anything.  He would pay the same courtesies to any woman.

Off and on, this funny friendship has bugged me a little because it has reminded me of my age.  Today, this fellow was among the people sitting with me at church during our lunch, and that stupid voice piped up in my head: "If you were a teenager, this would be who you love right now."  I told it to sod off.  Poor fellow.  It’s not his fault I am this way.  If I was stronger, healthier, I would be able to admire him unabashedly and enjoy his company without feeling bitter.  I aim for this.

Anyway.  This is all needing to be vented because:

1. The very last person I bowed to and asked forgiveness from was this fellow.  We were at the end of the line that formed a big circle in the church.  So, at the end of the process, it was silent in the church, except for him and I asking each other for forgiveness.  He did the three-times-"kissing"-cheeks hug, and didn’t let go for a bit.  And from my heart I was asking him wordlessly to forgive me for anything awkward I had put him through.  (There are some stories I could get into here, but I don’t feel like it.)  This rather innocent, sheltered, straight-and-tall-as-a-tree young man.

2. … What the Friar may have been if his father hadn’t been so obsessed with sex and relationships and how unfair his divorce was.  And perhaps the introduction of Music Shivers into the Friar’s life at the age of 17 was one of the trials of his life.  When I look back I think how obligated and polite and sad he felt around me, during the years we both were at the same university.  He must have wished I had gone somewhere else.  I am periodically still stung by the memory of the glorious certainty of my love for the Friar.  I believe this is the year he is getting married to the girl he met – just after that one tortured-hope-filled summer day when we actually kissed each other goodbye because he was moving away.  I don’t actually know the exact date of the Friar’s marriage because he has stopped contacting me altogether, since he stayed at my apartment for one evening last September.  Now THAT is a stupid story.  I saw on Facebook that the Friar’s father, the Archangel as I used to call him, was on a cross-Canada trip, and would be passing by my place in a few days.  I messaged him that he was welcome to break his journey at my apartment.  I figured enough time had passed for me to be hospitable and pay my respects.  He certainly was very generous with me during a troubled time in my life.  It would be nice to see him again, and feed him in my very own place.  The Archangel wrote back asking if "they" could crash at my place.  I assumed he meant him and the Benevolent Mad Genius? or whatever I used to call the Friar’s brother.  But it turned out he meant himself and the Friar.  I hadn’t even known the Friar was on this trip with him.  I said yes.  Then, it turned out the Archangel had some other place to crash that night, and was it okay if just the Friar came over?  – What could I do?  I said yes.  We were civil.  I slept on the couch and gave him my room.  We rather pointedly did our evening prayers separately (which pained me).  In the morning I made him apple pancakes while he showered, and as soon as it was even reasonably polite to do so, I pointed him to the bus-stops outside, and left early for work.  As soon as I came home from work I stripped and remade my bed without giving myself a second to sniff the sheets.  One whiff of the smell of the Friar and my heart would somehow swell and fill my whole body with pain.  And not a peep have I heard from him since then.  Perhaps he could tell that for all my coolness, the very sight of him in my home, admiring the things I had on the walls and the way I had arranged the furniture, gave me pain.  I had wanted to make a home with him for so many years.

3. A Curious Mango, being single again, is doing the synchro-pasta-and-movie night thing with me tonight.  Because she got home from work later than I got home from church, it actually hasn’t turned out to be very synchronized.  I watched Serendipity.  It’s a fun flick, but completely unrealistic and unhelpful … At the end, when Jonathan sits down in the middle of the skating rink, holding the black glove that is his physical link to Sarah, I rather unexpectedly began to cry.  Today was actually a very nice Valentine’s Day.  After church, I walked in the bright early-spring breeze, past happily bubbling creeks, and ducks pairing up, to go get some of the things I needed for dinner, and I felt all of fifteen years old – life all ahead of me, possibilities abounding.  I even felt excited about who might be out there that I just don’t know about yet.  Who knows?&nbs

p; How can I be arrogant and pessimistic?  But even after this nice and thoughtful day, something about that scene, and the way Jonathan holds on to that glove – all the Frair stuff assailed me.  I think there may even be Friar talismans lurking about my apartment that I may need to let go of.

Because this diary was so much about the Friar, I felt like I needed to come back and purge here.  Maybe this very diary is something I need to let go of.  Not that I come back here and fondle old feelings by going back to old entries.  But I might!  I spent so much time in futile speculation.  Maybe one reason I don’t come back to OD that much is because I am afraid of what I might re-awaken.  It is all so precious to me, but ultimately poisonous, because it doesn’t fit the reality of my life.  The reality is: This man is not even my good friend anymore.  I just gasped as I typed that.  But it is the truth.

Do I forgive him?  And myself?  Do I hold on and cling to the unfairness of it?  What sort of justice can I demand?  Nothing.  I deserve nothing.  He is free and doesn’t need me to let go.  I need me to let go.  I keep thinking I have, but maybe this goes in waves.  Maybe this is a combination of Valentine’s, time of my month, and being 30 and finding that the person at church I like to talk to the most is 19!  Maybe tomorrow I’ll grimace when I remember writing this entry.  Oh well.  Apparently I needed to say all this.