Shadowridge Press titles in detail...

HERE'S A PREVIEW FROM FINDING ZEN IN REBOUND DOGS

​

Accidentally Falling: November 1, 2011

 

In the last few weeks I’ve only written a handful of blogs because I met someone who has changed the way I think about relationships and has chiseled away at some—okay all—of the cynicism I’d built up over the years. That’s a very good thing of course, but I’ve had a hard time coming up with witty inspirational blogs about the agony of dating, since…well, it became…nice.

The insights we’ve given each other, both of us starting off utterly resistant to relationships, and steadfastly committed to not committing, and then suddenly finding ourselves in love, well I think they will make for good reading and smiles all around.

I could pop in now and fast forward to where we’ve landed ourselves, but since there were so many great email conversations back and forth that led to this, it’s worth writing a few blogs about those, to reveal our story in the time it deserves.

I’m not sure when we met, and let me throw out these important facts. One, he lives 3000 miles away in Southern California. Two, we’ve never actually met. Not in real life. Not yet. I know, this has impulsive Carly written all over it. But here’s the thing, it’s different.

At some point he asked to be my Facebook friend. We’re not sure when but I had been adding scads of people back then to build up my networking numbers. We had some mutual friends so I accepted. Last July, right after I broke up with my latest mistake, I began deleting Facebook friends in droves. Everyone I didn’t actually know, went. This man, let’s call him…Ryan,  sent me a message asking if he could stay, even if we didn’t know each other. Apparently he’d been reading my posts for some time, as a friend, and liked hearing about my trials and tribulations. He also quite liked my Rebound Dogs blog.  I was touched so kept him.

After that, I started checking his page more often, commenting here and there. As timing would have it, he was struggling with some heartbreak then. I reached out, asked if he was all right. And hence we began our correspondence as break up buddies.

Ryan hadn’t posted any pictures of himself and I knew he lived far away so it seemed safe to just tell him everything about how I felt about relationships and pain and happiness. He did the same with me. When you’re courting someone, you’re less likely to blurt out everything you hate about men, lest you accidentally touch upon a quality they have. But he was “safe,” totally unattainable, and so we could share everything without worrying that it could turn into something that, in my eyes, could mess up my perfect little life and make me have to change anything.  It was win-win.

We were sending messages with some regularity, the emails getting longer, delving into our past relationships and childhoods, and one day he wrote, “I hope this is not getting old for you. It’s been a good exchange for me, hearing your story and venting mine as well. You really are a good soul.” When I read it the next day—as the time zone difference had us perpetually not connecting, like in Lake House when they were so close but unable to connect—I got nervous.

Of course it wasn’t getting old for me! And the way I felt at the possibility that this was just a random email exchange with a stranger, and not…(cringing) a possible relationship, panicked me.  I don’t panic easily, not when it comes to stuff like this. I replied that NO, I really enjoyed our exchanges, looked forward to them.

After that, knowing how important he’d become to me as a confidant, something changed. I have a lot of guy friends and he has, in his remote corner of the world, a lot of girl friends. But there was something else afoot here, something that snuck up on me when I wasn’t paying attention.

…and I think that is plenty to start with today.

Please follow me as I tell our story, as it unfolds in real life. Today I made a cinnamon heart in my espresso cup which demonstrates my paradigm shift. And it is a very good thing.