I'd admit it if I was

2005-05-16 - 8:52 p.m.

I was going to come here and write all about what I've been up to for the past week, but suddenly something else has happened which I'd like to talk about instead. I wish I had written in here this afternoon and layed out what I was feeling and thinking just so I could compare a before and after.

Duke and I had the talk today. It's about time, isn't it? The talk where we discussed the status of our relationship. I had actually really been wanting to have this talk about four months ago, but never got up the nerve to do it. I was sort of thinking we were a bit past having this talk now just because after six months of nothing more than hugs I was fairly confidently assuming we were pretty safely into just-friends territory. But anyway, we had the talk.

Duke instigated it, of course. The day I get up the gumption to actually start a talk like that will be a major miracle. So first we went out to dinner and afterwards we went for a walk around Green Lake. Somehow we got onto the subject of his ex-girlfriend and how he's been feeling about her. Apparently I'm a whole lot more dense and blind about all that than I thought. I don't know. Anyway, so we were talking about stuff that was on a significantly more personal level than our usual. And then he brought it up.

He certainly wasn't straight-forward about it. I hope he ended up saying what he wanted to say and not getting too nervous and saying something else. He was nervous. I think mostly he was afraid of hurting me. He's afraid that he's been leading me on. He wanted to know what I was looking for in this relationship. I told him that I like where our relationship is now. I like being friends. I told him that he's my best friend here in Seattle and he's the reason I survived moving here. I've thought about there being more between us, but I just don't think it would work. I think he was happy with this answer. I hope he was.

It started to really rain as we were having this conversation and by the time we got back to my car we were both dripping wet. I drove him back to his place where he gave me a couple of books that belonged to his grandmother who died a week ago. I was touched by that.

So now my biggest questions are did he say what he wanted to say (and did I understand him correctly) and what compelled him to talk to me about it now? I'm glad he did though. I think we're both at the same place.