San Francisco, Day 1

To recap: this was a trip to see a guy I met at a conference in New York last spring. We corresponded for months through email then spend 3 amazing days together in my home town while he did research where I work. Those days were amazing and my walls all crumbled instantly. That was the honeymoon... It was a few days later that I learned things were far from simple. He was in an open relationship that suddenly became serious after we were together. He belonged to someone else and yet we still had feelings for each other. I decided that until he was single I would gladly be a part of his life (since I couldn't imagine a life without him) but we would not do anything together that we wouldn't want our mothers to see. Awkward and complicated is my life. *sigh*

I landed in San Francisco about 30 minutes later than my original arrival time in spite of all the drama getting there since I got onto a direct flight rather than having a layover. As soon as I had my cell phone back on I made a couple calls and a stream of text messages came in. My Canadian was delayed two hours and took off just slightly before I landed which meant I had about two hours to kill. Most of the shops in the airport closed just as I got there but one stayed open all night so I got a sandwich and settled in with a book. I chatted with a friendly ticket agent and she told me what gate my Canadian would be landing at and we joked back and forth a bit. She was super nice and for some reason told me I was a door bell. Yes, a door bell… not “adorable” but a door bell. Somehow, at the time it was a compliment. "My Canadian" will now be referred to as “J” for simplicity sake. I watched his plane land and taxi up to the gate and I positioned myself to meet him at the gate. It was a combination of luck and good planning that I had the rare privilege of meeting someone right in the terminal. People started coming out and I started to mentally steel myself… “don’t kiss him on the lips, don’t kiss him on the lips…” And then there he was. Somehow I was so distracted with psyching myself up that I didn’t see him until he was practically in my arms. Not kissing him was about as difficult as I imagined it would be but we managed. He gave me a peck on the neck just under my ear and my resolve melted ever so slightly. He took my hand and we made our way out of the airport. We stood on line for a cab, made our way to the hotel, and the entire cab ride is a blur now. I don’t know what we talked about. I don’t know if we held hands. I just remember thinking “I’m here.” The hotel was kind of small and old but still charming and clean. I’ve stayed in FAR worse places and paid far more for them. We rode the scary old elevator to the 6th floor to our room. As we walked into the room I was stricken with a sudden case of awkward. I followed him to the bed and I probably looked uncomfortable. What was going to happen now? It was probably 1 in the morning, we were both tired, most of my resolve had returned to me… I remember wonder how I was going to survive being with him for an entire weekend without doing anything sexual. Since we share a brain and a heart he saw how uncomfortable I was and told me there was a second room with a second bed. Sure enough, there it was… I hated it but put my bag on it and went back out to the main room with the chairs, table, and tv. I continued to be awkward, he went in to the bathroom and changed into some comfy looking pajamas which somehow made me feel a lot better about things. Then he said; “you aren’t really sleeping in there are you?” and indicated the other room. *sigh* No, I wasn’t. I changed and we snuggled into the same bed together knowing that we couldn’t do anything other than cuddle. It just wouldn’t be right if I didn’t make an already tricky situation even more difficult by putting myself in temptation. We cuddled and chatted until after 3 in the morning. We were both just so happy to be there that we couldn’t sleep in spite of the fact that we were both exhausted. And by “there” I don’t mean just SF, we were in each others company and that was a good albeit complicated place to be.