“How many times does he have to tell you…

…for you to realize and accept that he truly, sincerely and definitely likes you?” asked Femme-Fatale. No, I was not on another one of my emotional spirals, concerning Mr. Mahn; however, I was also over-self-protecting. There is a very fine balance between keeping my emotions in check, as well as enjoying and trusting Mr. Mahn to actually make an effort to keep seeing me in the future. Despite his reassurances, my friends’ reassurances, and even his own friends’ reassurances (his best friend, nonetheless), I still caught myself emotionally guarded. Maybe it is because I am actually wonderfully overwhelmed by the enormous potential we have together, and the overall comfortable feeling that we already have.

Surprisingly, this level of comfort is something I would have only associated with a couple that is defined as an actual, steady relationship – you know, if he was my boyfriend. Of course, that is just my normative senses clicking in, which is not necessarily helpful when dating. Perhaps the level of comfort we have is a result of simply enjoying the time we spend together while not getting caught up with what lies ahead for us. Live in the Present. Live in the Now, my wise friend, Silver Sage, would say. Alas, she is right. It truly is unnerving for me to be so comfortable, happy and glowing with Mr. Mahn, despite knowing that within a week, I will be going back to school. Consequently, our weekly (hell, sometimes bi-daily) meetings will definitely be reduced, but we still plan to keep seeing each other after September – either he visits me in London or I meet with him in Toronto, but I digress.

Last Sunday, I had the chance to spend a day in the Toronto Islands with him and his friends for brunch and the beach. Of course, there was the initial bout of nervousness that comes with meeting the friends of the man you are currently dating, especially if we have not explicitly labeled ourselves as each other’s boyfriend. In retrospect, any anxiety was unfounded because we have been at a good place, simply enjoying our time together, and liking each other at our current place. If I have not said it enough, we are comfortable, and our disposition is evident to everybody else around us. Meeting his friends went with so much ease that one would think that this was not the first time I had met them. Might I add that by the time we had actually stripped down to do some swimming, I had been playfully tackled and tickled to the ground by his friends. I feel a new idiom coming up: Comfort begets comfort. (Oh God, with ”Pocket Full of Sunshine” as the movie montage). Consequently, a simple friendly brunch extended into the customary conjugation at his place, which then extended into dinner and leather-fetish festival on Church Street with his friends.


I think this is the first ‘relationship’ (and I say ‘relationship’ without defining ourselves as boyfriend, and merely alluding to the fact that we have been dating, but I digress) wherein I have been so comfortable and glowing that it has actually been unnerving sometimes. One should never bring in baggage from relationships past, but letting go of pseudo-fabulous baggage is much easier said than done and usually requires a third-party to say, “Sweetie, the luggage has got to go. It ruins the otherwise fabulous look.” Thanks, Femme-Fatale for always helping me swing back into lucidity.

There is that old saying, “When it rains, it pours”…

…but it is also my belief that embracing the rain and simply letting it soak through and through is also the only way to live fully. Acknowledge the coldness and wetness, and accept the futility of avoiding the inevitable. I know that I said that I would soak in the romantics and passion; however, as a result, I have inevitably grown increasingly attached to Mr. Mahn. With this increased emotional attachment comes the desire for more with him, despite hearing, “I like you, but I cannot give any more because I don’t want to hurt you.” This past weekend, I was most certainly a living embodiment of a pathetic fallacy, as I fell into a brooding state only perpetuated by the downpour of rain that lasted all weekend.

More. Do I want more because I am hopeful for a relationship where there is none to be had just yet? Am I masochistic? Am I unreasonable? Am I so incessantly hopeful for a future that may or may not be with him? Am I chasing shadows along the pavement? It has been about a month and a half now, since we first physically met at the Lofty Ex's party during Pride Weekend. Obviously, a lot has happened since then, and I may have allowed myself to get too lost in the moment. We have talked about our situation before, and I had been accepting of it. Yet, I still jumped in heart-first despite knowing that all we have is now, and in doing so, my heart is slightly splattered at the bottom of the waterless pool.

Inevitably, of course, sunshine and clarity comes at the heels of every storm. The truth is that I lost touch of staying and keeping with the moment; thus, internally, I was becoming more possessive and speculative of so many things. I became so hopeful for our potential together, such that I began to over-compensate because I began to think that our time was running out. Clearly, that is a ridiculous way to approach matters of the heart, because even if time was running out, there is no way of knowing that until it is actually T-minus-zero. I was misinterpreting our increasing level of comfortableness with withdrawal, which only fed my speculation that we were dissipating. YES! I fell into that dark place of my mind and rolled around in the emotional muck. It truly is interesting to finally see my behavioural pattern, which usually consists of over-analysis, followed by self-loathing, and finally self-sabotaging.

Just like the sun that comes after a storm, lucidity follows self-destructive behaviour, because even I despise myself when I am self-loathing and self-involved. However, this lucid state could have only been reached with the assistance and patience of my girlfriends (Femme-Fatale and Paris-Bijou) and of course, Mr. Mahn. To my girlfriends I vented, and they listened and reminded me of my tendency to become as overly analytical as Carrie Bradshaw and as pessimistic as Miranda Hobbs. And with that, I was finally able to pull myself out of my emotional not-so-hot-mess, realize the causes/catalysts of my previous state, and at last talk to Mr. Mahn to share with him my struggle and the emotional strides that I had made.

Academically speaking, I understood and agreed with Mr. Mahn when we discussed the limitations of our ‘relationship’, but emotionally, I was in a whole ‘nother ball game. Now that I am finally playing in the same field as him, and not just watching inquisitively, I am actually able to relax and enjoy our moments together. Moreover, I am able to trust him more because I can finally accept that our attraction is mutual, and more importantly, deep. In the meantime, I am finally able to enjoy us, just as we are, without worrying about the future, because even our future (romantic or platonic) looks bright and lucid… just like today, the day after the big storm.

You know that you have become cynical…

…when you immediately go for the worst-case scenario the moment there is a change in routine. As you have been following lately, I had perceived a change in Mr. Mahn’s footing, largely based on the change in the semi-routine/frequency of correspondences and contact that we have had since we met. The inconsistency in the frequency of our conversations was driving me to the wall, and not in the sexy-pin-me-up-against-the-wall-foreplay kind of way, but I digress. Anyway, my crazed state is largely a result of my trust issues with whomever I date, which is caused by past affairs that have repeatedly left me broken-hearted. However, I think that Femme- Fatale said it best, “Well, [Lofty Ex] was consistent – hell, we could say calculated – while you were together, and look at how that went. Maybe it’s good that [Mr. Mahn] is inconsistent. Humans, in general, ARE inconsistent.”

In all honesty, there really is no firm evidentiary support, only speculative, for me to think that Mr. Mahn was growing disinterested in me, or even seeing someone else – especially if he has already said that he is dating no one else. As much as I may say that I will not make him suffer for the mistakea of past men, I guess that I still do so, albeit subconsciously. Even the speculative ‘evidence’ is based solely on the stories that my head decides to fashion; ironically, these fashioned stories/assumptions are inconsistent with Mr. Mahn’s character. In the time that I have gotten to know him, he has been nothing but honest and open about his feelings and thoughts about our relationship thus far. Perhaps that is what is so unnerving about him: I have every reason to trust and feel secure with him. He is actually a good-natured man at heart and even in his deeds. The way he surprises me with a text in the middle of the day, or sometimes even a phone call before bed instead of our usual MSN correspondences, feel far from calculated. I can truly say that it feels spontaneous, sweet and thoughtful, and it does not feel like it is something we do because it was something we read in Dating-101.

Consequently, with this newfound sense of trust, I am able to finally stop being so neurotic and needy for his attention, which he gives me every day anyway. In reality, I should not have been neurotic at all about where-are-we-now and what-lies-ahead-for-us because right now we are still enjoying each other (in every sense of the word) and our future still looks bright with plans that Mr. Mahn has already suggested. There is the crux of it all, he is already making plans “for us to spend time together” as far as a month from now, without my instigation or even suggestion. Of course, it would be easy to say that maybe they are just pieces of ear-candy. However, in the time I have known him, Mr. Mahn has yet to go back on his word and the plans are not grand plans either; rather, they are simple yet extremely - nay, undoubtedly - thoughtful. The level of simplicity makes me appreciate how both honest and sweet as candy he is.

So I say, bring on the romantics and passion, and I will promise to soak it all in. Besides, when each and every one of our dates has been a combination of passionate, steamy writhing bodies and classic romantics the likes of cooking together and canoodling to a movie, really, what have I got to lose in acknowledging and embracing the mutual sprungness? Just like this yummy video here…

Like it or not, I instinctively up the ante…

…when I find someone who can break through my emotional barriers, without breaking down my very core – especially when every other man before him/her left me broken-hearted. This is a very dangerous predicament because: a) I could start to become possessive and needy, and/or b) I could be setting myself up for yet another heartbreak. The problem with finding a great guy through such serendipitous occurrences, like the ones that Mr. Mahn and I have had, is that there is a perpetual feeling that maybe it really is too good to be true, or worse, that no matter what I do, everything between us is still up to chance. At times like these, I cannot help but open up The Ex-Files to try to figure out what I kept doing wrong in my previous affairs.

Retelling my story, in its full context, does not usually bode well. I end up either bawling my eyes out, or worse brooding in a corner blasting Death Cab’s Transatlanticism and/or Athlete’s Tourist. It is vile, it is trite, it is melodramatic, and yet I go down that road every so often. Incidentally, one song in particular came into light this weekend, and until then I had not actually listened to the lyrics. The song is called Tiny Vessels and basically tells the story of meaningless, ‘romantic’ encounters. The chorus is what truly resonated with me, Yeah, you are beautiful, but you don’t mean a thing to me. Moreover, this weekend, this song also deeply resonated with Femme-Fatale, and left her thinking about relationships past. Listening to her fear of having lost the drive to actually pursue a relationship, or even how to have a date that does not necessarily mean sex, I found myself helpless in the advice department. I could no longer be simply sympathizing, because it was full on empathy.


The truth is that my greatest fear with Mr. Mahn is that he will actually end up being yet another anecdote, in my already long list. Is it possible that even after all of the time and emotions invested, can he still end up being yet another one of the men that have simply come and gone? Nearly every other man that has come and gone comes back to tell me that I was a great guy and so on. Yet, such proclamations are bitter-sweet because despite how ‘great’ I may have been, I cannot help but feel that I still was not enough. It would be more emotionally satisfying to say that all the guys were jerks, or it was the wrong time; however, I am still the common denominator underneath ALL of it. Yes, they were great affairs and even meaningful at one point (at least, for me they were), but finding that exclamations of love and appreciation were likely empty has only left me as empty as a tiny vessel. (And no, this is no time to say that the hollower you are now, the more happiness you will be able to carry later.)

I cannot help but think that even if Mr. Mahn is simply an exciting summer fling, as had been assumed from the very beginning, he has upped the ante by consistently tearing down my guards and making me feel that it may be worth it to just let him in – even if it is not what he is trying to do. Is it really fair of me to expect more from him? More importantly, at this very moment, am I perhaps self-sabotaging by over-thinking this? Am I so desperate for a relationship that I fail to see how good it is right now with Mr. Mahn? Am I missing a great time with him now because I am chasing after the possibility of a future? Lastly, am I letting the mistakes of past men apply to him? When it comes to matters of my own heart, I am utterly clueless and unable to stand back.