Girl After My Own Heart

My beautiful young cousin Annie has decided to leave the country and go to China to teach English for (at least) a year since she's got the travel bug bad and she just graduated college and job offers aren't abundant over here. She's the younger sister of two brothers in that family and I would venture to say the favorite child (sorry Mike and Danny, I calls it like I sees it.)

She made a stop in California last weekend on her way out of the country so our family's representatives on the west coast got to see her for a couple days. I especially got to get some quality time in before she left and only teared up a little after dropping her off with our other aunt. (This is not being overemotional as I did practically raise her, after all.)

While everyone is proud of and excited for her, there was also some sadness to see her go and a little nervousness at the remoteness and mystery of her destination. (The city she is assigned has reportedly almost 5 million residents, yet no listing in the Lonely Planet. A few lines on Wikipedia. This seems odd.)

Needless to say I was happy and relieved to see her online the other day and we chatted for a bit and she was safe and sound in the city she was going to be in for about a week before she went on to the mystery city. She had spent the night in a South Korean airport, was sleeping on a bed with no mattress, and still hadn't heard much about her final destination but was all in all excited and comfortable.

A small portion of our conversation:

Annie: im actually trying to decide between staying in xian and going to the mystery city right now
Caitlin: how's that going?
Caitlin: any more on the mystery city?
Annie: just that its "very traditional"
Annie: "NOT modern"
Caitlin: huh
Caitlin: i mean, they've seen whities, right
Annie: i dont know, as compared with shanghai or beijing it sounds like a relatively reasonable alternative
Annie: but xian is small enough that its not terribly polluted but there are a ton of fun options
Caitlin: hmmmmmm
Annie: apaprently jian, despite the size, has a pretty good chance of just having nothing there
Annie: which would be interesting
Caitlin: totally
Caitlin: i don't know annie, you've got a good amount of mountain goat in you
Caitlin: if anyone could dig that it'd be you
Annie: but i really want to learn mandarin, and being a female in such a "traditional" place could mean that i am not allowed to have a social life
Annie: haha, true story
Caitlin: i mean, they've seen whitie before, right?
Annie: apparently at least one
Caitlin: and?
Caitlin: was it male or female
Annie: but i dont get the feeling they are used to them or that they would be ready for a white woman like me
Caitlin: ha
Annie: i feel like in rural, traditional china drunk american girls are frowned upon
Caitlin: LOL
Caitlin: i love you
Caitlin: girl after my own heart

This Game

One of the themes of my summer has been dating. I couldn't explain why or why now. One of my friends is on a dating website and has multiple dates a week ("shopping for men"), another started a hilarious first-date-story blog, and I find myself actually open to dating again.

And, since I've felt open again, things have sort of been happening. I think for a long time I have said I don't want to be set up and I am not interested because in reality, I have been terrified of letting anyone in to my crazy little mind enough that I could trust them. Dating is after all "scoping out potential for relationships"(thank you Laundry Girl).

I have not done enough scoping - I have a history of taking things too seriously too quickly. Hey, we like each other, we're attracted to each other, let's get together and call it love and you can meet my whole family and maybe we should move across the country for each other and maybe in the same house and maybe let's just crush each others souls while we're at it.
(On a side note - DO NOT bring someone to your family reunion in the first six months of a relationship, or even a year. I will be more specific at a later date but for now just take my word for it and Don't Do It.)

So I'm trying it a little different these days. Yes, I am letting myself be set up with people - what's the worst that can happen? Yes, I might give someone my number at a bar if they ask politely. Yes, I may be trading texts and calls with more than one person at a time. Yes, I am toying with the idea of joining a dating website myself. No, I am not sleeping with anyone. Yet. (This is not my favorite part.)

Inevitably I find myself drawn to the ones that my social work sister can diagnose in an instant as something I'll need to think about ('have similair traumatic experiences' is one example) but, since I'm walking through this, I'm ok with that. My sister has given me one piece of advice more than anything and that is "please don't make any big life-altering decisions based on a 20 hour conversation/good sex/intense connection/etc." She can say that because, as I've mentioned, she's seen me do it. And guess what - the first time is a love story, the second is questioned, and the third is just a sad pattern.

So dating here we go. I'll learn to love you, but I'm not going to rush into it.

I Just Want You With Me

That is what it all boils down to, isn't it?

I'm planning a little weekend and coordinating some schedules and I wrote that in the middle of an email to a friend about various activities happening in one day. My friend wrote back, "All you have to do is say 'I just want you with me'..."

It may be regardless of our intentions the sweetest harmless little love letter I have ever received.

Delightful

Cheers to doing lovely things with lovely people...

I went to the city a couple nights ago to see some wonderful fellow tall woman, and we drank wine (that was a gift from a beautiful short woman) and chatted about our and the worlds problems, and may have even managed to solve a few...



















The next morning I got the treat of accompanying Heidi on her very first trip to Cafe Tartine. She has lived in the city almost four years and never been - this should be a crime. If you've not been you must go. It is ridiculous. Always crowded and always worth it, whether you get a tiny little cookie or a veritable smorgasbord of delicious things, like we did. We waited in the line, drooled on the cases, considered getting one of everything but instead ended up ordering to share a ham croque monsieur (ham, cheese, tomato baked on open french bread) and a bowl of brioche bread pudding with peaches and raspberries. We each got big lattes they serve in bowl cups (and so you have to use both hands and I love that) and then a coconut cream tart to go, for later, because after all that we wouldn't possibly get through it.
After about six minutes this is what our table looked like:


















That is the coconut cream tart that we had just put on a plate because we needed to eat it. We finished it. It was all so good.

We finished off the morning by stopping into all the bookstores we could find in my old Mission/Valencia neighborhood that's right down the street. A delightful 18 hours.

Secret IV

I cheated.

I saw where the line was, surrounded by gray area, and I bounced across it happily. I don't feel guilty about any of it.