90 minute lunch

Rob asked me what I was doing for lunch, I told him I had no plans. So we ordered burritos from a little hole-in-the-wall place that makes amazing carne asada burritos and sat outside under some flowering cherries, and talked. He told me I looked stressed. I teased him and told him he shouldn't tell a woman that she looks stressed, because it means she looks old. He laughed. He looked like he needed a laugh. He's lost a lot of weight the past couple of weeks, and I took the opportunity to ask him about it. He said he is having issues with his ex-lover, and, along with sundry family problems, he'd had a mini-breakdown the week after my birthday...which explains why I hadn't seen him. I asked him why he didn't call me. He said he'd picked up the phone a couple of times but he knew I was stressed enough already, and he was too good a friend to 1) add to my stress and 2) allow himself to be a distraction from my 'deep work'.

We had a conversation about what we want in our next long-term partners. He said that sex isn't as important as it once was, that companionship, that mental and emotional compatability were most important to him. He said that when a relationship is built mostly on sex, and the strong sexual attraction dies, which is almost always doomed to happen, then there isn't anything to sustain the relationship.

I asked him what if he came across a Great Love that was fulfilling on the mental and emotional and spiritual levels, but not sexually, would he walk away. And he leaned back in the grass and laid his head on crossed arms and his expression became very pensive. And he said: "I don't know...sex is very important..." and then he watched the sky a little longer, and he said, "Sex is very important... in the beginning..." He turned on his side and leaned his head in his palm, and played with the grass with his other hand. And into the silence that grew between us, I told him quietly of Chris, and described what had been there between us.

I put one hand on my solar plexus, and told him what it felt like there, the connection, the depth of it, the flow, and he looked so solemn, and his eyes widened and closed. And he said that if he felt that for someone one, and they felt it too, he could never walk away from it. I felt tears in my eyes, and I asked him, what if one felt sexually attracted, and not the other? And said, "Oh Kelly...that would be hell."

We sat in silence for a while longer, and he asked. "Were you the one who was not attracted?", and when I nodded, he asked, "You didn't even let him try to make love to you, did you?" I told him no. I told him I'd deliberately ignored all of Chris' overtures, pretending to be oblivious, and succeeding, until one night, I just couldn't ignore it. Chris was reading Twain to me, and it was late, and I fell asleep with my head in his lap, and when I woke up, he was touching me, and his hand trembled, and when I opened my eyes he looked at me with those clear grey-green eyes, and I knew. And knowing, I couldn't deceive myself anymore. I thought of Mark and the arguments we'd been having over Chris. I loved them both, but Mark and I were fanastic together physically and there was no way I was willing to give that up for the tepidness I felt for Chris sexually, despite the link we had. And so I pushed him out of my life.

Rob is an amazing listener, very focussed. He was quiet for a while, and he said "Its a funny thing about chemistry--sometimes its there and sometimes its not." And he said to me that I have considerable more experience than he does, so he knows that I know that sex is about chemistry and pheromones, but did I know that love-making is about emotional and psychological cues? I asked for clarification. He asked me if I'd had a lover want sex when I didn't. And I smiled and said of course. He asked if I pushed them away, or let that person make love to me, to which I answered that I usually let them make love to me, because it almost always felt good enough that arousal usually followed, like a slow burn. And then he said, "Knowing that, why didn't you let Chris try?" My answer was that I didn't know it then.

He told me that if I was ever lucky enough to come across something like that again in my life, I would be a fool to walk away. I nodded.

He said, "You are lucky."
I said, "I know."
He said, "No, I don't think you do."
So, of course, I said, "Explain."

He sat up and crossed his legs, sitting directly opposite me, his knees almost, but not quite touching mine, his back straight, as if he was sitting zazen. He said something like, "You are lucky, because what draws people to you is not just the surface. You are lucky, because no matter how hard you sometimes try to be unattractive, who you are still shines through. And you are lucky, because if you come across something like this again, with someone who is not initially attracted to you, you will succeed where Chris failed, because you have the ability to make people feel that they are very loved and special, and that itself is very attractive."

I had no response to that. I still don't.