Ditched

When a relationship isn't going to work out, can we all agree its dissolution provides lessons of some sort?  About oneself, perhaps, or about how the other sex operates.

Today I believe I've nailed down this era's telltale sign for getting ditched:  the unanswered e-mail. 

Audacious Man last wrote Monday night, to which I replied, he but didn't respond again. He had been a ridiculously attentive communicator up to then, so I suspected something was off. At first I chalked it up to his lingering illness.  Then figured work was stressful. Or maybe that it had something to do with his social schedule (thusly outlined in his last message):

AM:  "Week ahead is all full of catch up ... perhaps later in the week a drink is in order on Sunday? I have plans tonight, tomorrow night, Thursday, Friday and Saturday."

Free Wednesday, it seemed. So I wrote him Wednesday.  No answer. At that point I knew I knew--but still, I wondered if he was in the hospital, perhaps.  (Guilt, really, since I had ostensibly passed him this virus on Date #3). So yesterday after work I wrote again, just a hello, to see how he was doing. 

To no surprise, soon after I got up this morning I checked my e-mail to find this:

AM:  "I have had a great time these past few dates but something says we aren't as compatible as we should be. I think you are amazing and beautiful but something says you have a little more to get out of your system before you are ready for the "one". Maybe after some more fun you'll be ready but for me, I need a different level of commitment to a relationship. I hope you understand. I think you need to rock the Boston summer and enjoy the courting as much as one can."

I have been ditched via e-mail enough to know it is not cool to write him right back. Unfortunately, I had taken Tylenol PM last night, had just woke up, and was still groggy.  And after 6 days of frustration, I also lacked restraint ... and wrote him right back.

(It was fairly unformed and I'm not going to quote myself.  Although I suggested he might have written earlier in the week. I suggested he help me out by telling me what made him feel I had more to get out of my system.  I suggested I had not changed my modus operandi or attitude in the 2 months we had known each other.)

Of course he might respond, but I don't expect him to.  He at one time (to quote him from a previous e-mail) was a "professional dater," so I'm sure he appreciates the beauty of the e-mail brush-off: he doesn't have to discuss it.  He doesn't have to explain why on Monday night he felt one way and how, perhaps as early as later on Monday night, he felt another.  He doesn't have to explain how, despite his schedule constraints, I was the party not illustrating a sufficient "commitment" vibe. 

Any questions I have are already beside the point.

Of course,  he's being polite.  The last time a man told me I was beautiful and amazing but he didn't want to date me anymore, he was already dating someone else.  So it very well could be that. Or perhaps he just didn't feel the love and didn't want to hurt my feelings and say so.

In any case, it is good to be disappointed rather than frustrated. I'm giving myself today to be pissed off.

Tomorrow, onward.