Zeneurotica (11/21/08 Friday)

I'm sitting here grinning. I didn't even taste the canary on the way down. Julie made no idle jest. First thing this morning she began soliciting other noon-lunchers for a switch. Maddox obliged her--and me.

(Now I'm staring. My hand cups a snifter of Ardbeg, which I bought before I got home. I couldn't order my thoughts if they were my own children. I haven't a clue what I'm feeling about today.)

I couldn't tell you about the next three hours, or much about the one after that. I had an hour on the desk with Hinckley just before lunch. He may have may have been as elated as I was, but cautioned both of us against reading too much into the development. At noon I felt like a balloon untethered and floated to the back door. I could hear the rythmic susurrus of Julie's jeans cuffs close behind. Angie was waiting, but Julie forgot her bag and had to return to her desk for it. Angie went out to start the car; I waited for Julie. "You can have shotgun, I told her as we approached the car. "Why, thank you, "she said, and I added, to temper my gallantry (to my regret then but no longer), "It's safer in the back." She laughed and countered, "But I have the airbag." On the way there, being in the back, I felt cut off from the conversation, but when we got there we were three abreast walking in, Julie in the middle. I had planned to say something like, "This is my first time here. I may need someone to hold my hand," but balled up the script and back-kicked it into the trash. Julie all but took me in hand, anyway, as Angie beelined for the seafood buffet. "Let's go this way," Julie said to me, "unless you want seafood." "I don't," I said, meaning, "not if it means losing you." She pointed down each aisle we passed and with a word or two described their contents. My eyes were huge, overwhelmed like a hick staring up at skyscrapers. I looked at Julie when we reached our destination, the main lunch area, and she was smiling in amusement. I felt as open as a child; I let her introduce me to the buffet stations. I panicked slightly each time I lost sight of her; I was still a bit intimidated by the place and didn't want to be left too much to my own devices, lest I should violate some unwritten point of Whole Foods etiquette and make a naive fool of myself. After eating we left as we came and drove back to work as we'd driven there, and with four minutes to spare.

When I got a chance, I tried to explain to Hinckley about the trip, but I couldn't find meaning enough in the details to warrant telling. All I had was feelings. "I am so in!" was about all I could say, wich only puzzled him. My attempt on the way home was no better. Then, I was trying to analyse Julie's motives in switching her lunch hour, but even now I can't untangle it and line it up in words. (And I get the suspicion all of a sudden that I should leave the tangle--call it a weave and wear it as a sweater.) Eventually, all I could say was, "She's more fascinating than ever. Just when I thought I'd made it up out of whole cloth, this happens."

What happened I'm not sure, and only the compulsion to break it down into logical pieces keeps me from simply accepting the excitement I feel over this challenge. Hinckley thinks Julie is testing me, and though I sense it, believing it builds an artifice of logic that I just don't want any part of. All I want to believe or know is that Julie is a complex creature. I don't want to know if she's playing a game; I just want to follow her lead.

This is such an ironic complication, though. How can I not get my hopes up now? By accepting what I'm given and taking no more. (Didn't I claim in the letter to do just that?) Be happy with it. I know, also, that I must avoid picking apart an event to find faults and regrets. I was not a sparkling wit at lunch. I did not make good eye contact. But I was accepted. As yet, that's good enough. My goals are small and simple now, easy to focus on. I don't need analysis (perhaps I should phrase that differently)--analyses. I don't even need to make sense of things. I only need to be aware. Just aware--not of anything--just aware.