A Smart and Rational Resolution

So tonight, we talked about it, and we called it off.

Which is the smartest, most rational thing I knew to do when embroiled in a prolonged, engaging, lust-soaked conversation with the Young Scientist. 

Who 10 days ago told me he had begun dating a woman he wanted to be his girlfriend. So that he and I would probably not go out again. Which I, admitting disappointment, accepted.

Yet, neither of us quit the conversation. 

We're both runners....and we're both running a lot these days. So we compared war stories of repetitions up Summit Ave in Brookline.  Of 19-mile long runs and ice baths and his gimp knee and my orthotics and who was the tougher.

We agreed that we had had a rather fine date a couple Sundays ago, both conversationally and situationally. So we kept reliving the highlights of that date. Which grew, as the week went on, into what we would most like to do again if we were to go out again. 

(Both conversationally and situationally. If you get my drift.)

Today, as the workday wound down and his lab cleared out, we ramped up the volume on the lust via e-mail. To a serious level.  Tonight, after I got home, we ramped it up some more. 

Which right then I realized--as if I'd never thought about it the 10 days prior--is not something a man who wants to be in a relationship with another woman should be doing with me.

As much as I wanted him to.

So like a splash of cold water, I asked him to talk to me about exactly why he was talking to me.

To his credit, he said he would.  (Men before him have not.)  Even if he didn't know it, I think he was waiting for me to ask, because this is how replied:

He wanted to be with the other woman, to try at a relationship.  But he did not want to give me up.  I was a wrench.  If we had met 3 weeks earlier, he wouldn't have started dating the other woman. No question.  Yet now he couldn't decide.

He asked, then, if there was the hypothetical of "no consequences," could we still swing it? Either talking about being together, or actually being together?

There are never "no consequences." 

So I said:

K:  ....here's what I'm thinking. 

Maybe you and I just chill it.

And you give your situation a chance.

YS:  ok....

maybe that is what I need

ok i'm fine with that

K:  Then you can let me know how it goes.

If in, whatever time, that changes, you can check in with me.

And see where I'm at.

YS:  ok, sounds good

i think that is the smart and rational thing to do.

sadly, the rest of me doesn't think it is.

So I told him I wouldn't run him over on this blog; he said it was OK if I did.  He lives near Mile 24 of the marathon course....so I asked if he'd say hi, 5 weeks from now, when I ran by.  He said he would. 

And just like that, that was that.

I've been contemplating this discussion, now, for a few hours. Resenting having to have had it. I've been here before, and it's a dull exercise.  To realize I am nearly enough for this man, but not quite enough.....so that it makes more sense for me to step aside. 

To benefit a woman I've never met, who has certainly not heard about me like I've heard about her, who likes the man I also like, except that he likes her more.  

Smart and rational, indeed.  To give them peace.  To free me to find someone else for whom I will be enough.

Still, again, I ask:  when does the other woman have to take the hurt and step aside, to be the one to start over?

I've had enough of it.