I Wonder How My Mother Felt

Let me preface this by saying that I adore my mother. She is beautiful, outspoken, intelligent, and practical to a fault. We've always gotten along well. However, as my mother's oldest daughter, I was always a bit, well, different from what I believe she had envisioned.

As a newborn baby, I could be comforted only by my father. Being wrapped tightly in a blanket and snuggled on his chest -- not Mom's -- was the only way I would sleep. As a toddler and a young child, I followed him around like a puppy, always wanting to play with Daddy's wrench set or help string the Christmas lights. As far as sweeping the floor or cooking like Mommy, though... forget it. (I still can't cook!)

Mom has never wanted to travel. She likes quiet, predictability, routine. I, on the other hand, have been to half the 50 states, spent a year and a half living in Europe, and consider traveling and learning about other languages and cultures one of the great passions of my life. To this day, I often hear my mother saying aloud to her friends, "Where did I get this kid?"

While my kindergarten friends were playing House and drawing hopscotch grids with sidewalk chalk, I climbed to the very top of the climbing structure, higher than the boys could go, all the way up to the topmost intersection of wooden beams, the part that wasn't really meant for climbing. I never fell, never even slipped (though some child must have, because the structure was removed when I hit third grade).

(Aside: I once broke my mother's nose by accident, by jumping up off the floor while she was standing next to me. I was about eight, and didn't know she was bending over me.)

My mother is a tiny and petite A cup -- she didn't even top 100 pounds until she went to college -- and has never exercised beyond her daily morning walks. I am a muscular 5'6", a 36DD, and have eagerly tried practically every sport there is, from horseback riding to skydiving.

My mother has dark brown eyes and nearly black hair, which she has always worn longish. I am a carbon copy of my dad -- hazel eyes and light brown hair -- and have always kept my locks trimmed as short as I could get away with. As a teenager, I recall her telling the hairdresser not to cut it as short as I had asked for, whispering that she didn't want me to "look like a dyke."

My mother's school performance was always on the good side of average, As and Bs and the occasional C. Somehow, I learned to spell my name with alphabet blocks before I could walk, began reading at age two and a half, was accepted into the Gifted program at age seven, attended magnet schools, completed the International Baccalaureate program, became a National Merit scholar, and got a full scholarship to college.

My ninth-grade female friends only went to gym for the purpose of checking out the guys -- all the ones I was beating at basketball. When they tried on each other's makeup, I wrote stories at my desk. And during lunch period, while everyone else was sitting in the courtyard gossiping, I joined the boys on the football field for knock-down drag-out games of Ultimate Frisbee, and returned to class dripping sweat.

My mother got her period at age twelve, and was overjoyed to have finally 'matured'. A box of maxipads mysteriously appeared in my closet when I was eleven -- and stayed there as I passed twelve, thirteen, fourteen. At fourteen and a half, I finally got my period... and sobbed for an hour, dismayed at the incontrovertible evidence of growing up.

I remember a seventh-grade classmate, part of a group who spent their free time tormenting me, slipping a note into my locker that said, among other things, "WE KNOW YOUR [sic] GAY!!!" I didn't even know what the word meant.

I wonder if my mother knew about me? She was the only one of my family and friends who was surprised when I told her -- but did she really not ask herself that question even once throughout all my years of growing up? My room was literally plastered with Shania Twain, I drew cartoons of my camp counselor in the margins of my notebooks, my Spanish teacher's name came up in literally every other sentence at the dinner table when I was 17... How can you live with a child for 18 years and not know on some level? I always felt like I was keeping a secret from her, for all those years when I wasn't sure... but did she really not have her suspicions?

I wonder how she felt, as I was growing up and following a path so different from her own? Proud, I'm sure -- I know I've accomplished a lot in my life, and I'm grateful for all my gifts -- but did she ever feel resentful, dismayed, jealous, disappointed, confused? My gut says that she did, maybe does to this day... and that makes me wonder if I'm another disappointment to her even now?

As much as I want to deny that... my gut kinda says yes to that one, too.

I Feel Your Pain

A four-year-old girl came into our practice a couple of weeks ago for her well-child checkup -- adorable, as most of them are, and a little fearful, which many of them also are. She didn't want to get on the scale without clinging to her mother, and nearly threw a tantrum over standing against the wall to have her height measured. I made sure to be gentle with her and fully explain each task we had to do, and she eventually began to loosen up, smile, and interact with me a little. As part of the standard physical exam, we start doing vision checks at three years old and hearing checks at four -- which, as you can imagine, aren't always easy with a child that young -- so her checkup took a little while.

One of the things many people don't realize about a pediatric practice is that the parents can sometimes be far more difficult than the children. Some of them are wonderful, but some are just horrendous, too, and they make the exam that much more difficult for their children. Luckily, Lila's* mother was friendly, tall with short salt-and-pepper hair. She was quite firm with the little girl, and when Lila was hesitant about something, her mom mentioned more than once 'remember how we talked about this?' in reference to a previous in-depth conversation about the doctor's office. That impressed me, that a mom would take the time to walk through each aspect of a trip to the pediatrician ahead of time, and struck me as a good idea.

At first, I was so focused on Lila that I wasn't paying much attention to her mom, except for the occasional glance, smile or, "Your mom's right, we're just going to..." Near the end of the exam, though, as I was getting my things together to leave the room and allow the doctor to come in, my eyes landed on the woman... and I suddenly got a familiar vibe off her. My 'gaydar' isn't always accurate, not by a long shot, but this time I was sure I was right. I smiled, said the doctor would be right in, and closed the door -- then checked Lila's last name: hyphenated. A clue, but not a certainty. Flipped open her paper chart, and saw the Post-It note from the doctor to herself, as a reminder before she entered the room: Both moms are PAs. Smiled to myself.

Desiree, another nurse, stuck her head over my shoulder. "She was a cutie."
"Yeah," I said with a smile, still absorbed in the chart.
"What does that say?" she asked, trying to read the scrawled handwriting on the Post-It.
"'Both moms are PAs.'"
"Huh? ... Maybe she didn't mean to say 'both moms'."
I tried to hide a smile. "...No, I really think she did."
"Why?"
"Oh, I dunno, just the vibe I got," I said casually.

* * *

"Lila needs her Hepatitis A and Varicella shots," the doctor said to me upon emerging from the room, "and then they'll be free to go."

I scurried to the fridge, grabbed the two vials, and prepared the shots. Grabbing the necessary paperwork, I entered the room. I'm still being observed when I perform immunizations, so Desiree was at my side.

"Okay, Lila, let's lie down on the table," her mom said calmly.

Immediately, Lila began to whine and cry. She clutched her mother as if I were the Antichrist, her eyes wide and fearful.

"Remember, we talked about this. You're going to lie here, and I'm going to hold you, and it's all going to be over in just a second." Lila began to struggle in earnest, her whines escalating to wails, her legs flailing. I had to hand it to the mom, though -- most moms would have continued to try to talk the child down, but the PA training kicked in and she grabbed Lila's hands (to keep them away from the needles) pressed her down into the table, and hung on grimly.

Without speaking, Desiree and I each grabbed a kicking leg and held it still. We uncapped our syringes, counted "One, two three," and injected simultaneously. Lila screamed at the top of her lungs as we withdrew our needles, slapped on Band-Aids, and stripped off our gloves. She continued to cry as her mom held her and soothed her -- "It's all over, they're all done."

Lila looked at me over her mom's shoulder, tears streaming down her tiny face, and what I saw there made my heart wince. I hate, hate, hate seeing that trust go out of their eyes.

My own tears threatened, prickling and hot. This woman was a PA. She had a daughter. And she had a life partner who was a woman. So many things about her matched up with the life plans I had for myself, the red carpet I saw stretching out in front of me. She had undoubtedly endured most of the same emotions and struggled with many of the same situations as I had, as many of you have, as many of us continue to. Getting taunted on the street for holding your partner's hand, not knowing what to write for 'relationship' on your emergency contact form, seeing the look on your parents' faces when you tell them your secret. This woman and I shared a bond, although she didn't know it. I felt a strong and unique kinship with her... and there wasn't a single thing I could say or do to reach out to her.

I watched them walk out the door, hand in hand. Wiped a tear. Smiled for what was. Sighed for what might have been... and went back to work.

*All names have been changed, as usual.

Par For The Course

10:00am - made the decision to skip my 11am class so I could devote sufficient time to my online chem quiz, then organize all my school stuff, clean the kitchen, and maybe even fold some laundry.

10:30am - sat down to take quiz.

11:15am - submitted quiz, and realized 20 seconds later that I made a stupid stupid stupid mistake that's going to knock my potential 100 down to an 80.

11:25am - tried to get some of the organizational stuff going, then remembered I had to complete the online chem lab for this week, since we didn't meet in person. Tried it, and encountered major technical difficulties ("that test tube is only a quarter of the way full, yet for some inexplicable reason, you may absolutely not add more than .387 mL of virtual water to it, ha ha. Nope, not that one either.") that meant I spent an hour on the stupid thing and had to make up about half the answers.

12:29 - and now that I am down to approximately negative four minutes before I needed to be out the door and on with my life... I have realized that in all my frantic studying for my genetics exam on Monday, I neglected to write up the prelab for tonight's lab in that class. Which I have done religiously every other week. Which has never been checked. Which will be checked tonight, because he hinted that it would be. Argh.

Not to mention that my hair is standing on end, my scrubs are wrinkled, and the only food I've got to sustain myself until I get home at 10pm tonight is a partial bag of M&Ms and a Nutri-Grain bar.

Anyway, I had a really great, poignant post to write, I promise, and it's coming -- I just had to throw this in as a frustration-venting mechanism for how much I HATE MY LIFE sometimes! Gaaahhh!

OK, off to work now.

Diary Excerpts

Looking back over my old diaries, it's painfully obvious to me how in denial I was. A few snippets from the old days (names have been changed):

10 years old

"Guess what? Cassie Harding is trying to steal Jilly away from me. She skips me in line, sleeps in the same tent with her at Girl Scout Camp, sits next to her at lunch, and more! But she's pretty much given up now, since I fight back."

14 years old

"Camp was so much better than last year! Unfortunately, I now have more evidence to support my sex theory of myself. That I'm a lesbian, I mean. I've always suspected it, because I hate boys and now I love Rachel. But then, it's not as if thinking about girls naked turns me on either. So... I dunno. Oh well, it's not important right now."

17 years old

"[My Spanish teacher, Juanita] was confiding in me, and that made me feel honored. She wasn’t seeing me as a student at that moment – I was being viewed as a friend. The fact that she could let down her defenses in front of me – to curse, to complain, to just talk uninhibitedly – is something that I treasure. Perhaps it was a moment of weakness, perhaps not. But I appreciated that, because I see her as much more of a friend than a teacher, and it was encouraging to think that maybe she was beginning to think of me as the same... I hope that I really was useful to her, and not just an annoyance... She also said that Mitch was the most lucid person in second period most of the time, although he 'has his moments'. I’ll confess that that made me feel a little jealous. I know this isn’t a Competition for Juanita’s Affection or anything – I think it's just that I just broke up with the guy, you know. ...I think I followed her as we left the parking lot... I had hopes of maybe catching up to her, but it never happened. I wonder where she lives? West side, I know, but where? I don’t know why I wonder that; I just do. Makes me feel kind of like a stalker. LOL! As if. No way. I think she’s near Sterling High, though."

18 years old

"I’m doing that thing that I always do, which is checking out the competition. I’m getting worried that [my Dutch teacher, Annemarie] likes Steve more than me, which is SO elementary and horrible of me. I’ve always been a couple of years behind everyone else emotionally, and now I’m worried that I’m WAY behind, because only six-year-olds say “You like her better than me.” It’s a baby thing.
But I made sure to tell her today that I’m going to Utrecht in the fall semester, so that she doesn’t use Steve's program as a reason to like him more.
Okay, this is getting really stupid."
...
"I feel really shitty and I don’t know why. It has something to do with Annemarie but I don’t know what. Is it because I didn’t sing for her when she asked? Or because she went off with Steve? Or a combination of both? I think that’s what it is – I think I’m jealous, and that makes me even madder because I'm supposed to be mature enough to not have these stupid fixations anymore. Sometimes I think I’m just as crazy as the next person but I’m smart enough to know what the hell's going on. Like, maybe I’d be stalking her right now if I were a average person, but I’m intelligent enough to be able to recognize that and tell myself not to do it. Maybe I’m just as fucked up as anyone in a mental hospital but I’m just more in tune with myself. Oh, I don't know. I just have to stop thinking about all this. I don’t know what my problem is."
...
"Annemarie admitted something that I’d suspected - she said, 'You can’t tell anyone - because I really like Steve.' And I could tell by the way she said it and how she looked at me that she meant as more than a friend. I'd suspected that before, but never called her on it... I'm jealous, I admit it. She pays more attention to him than to me. Like in Fat Tuesday’s when she said to him, 'It might sound stupid, but I wish that I could talk to you in Dutch [her native language], even just for ten minutes.' But now I know that a lot of it is because she’s attracted to him in spite of herself, and at the same time, I’m glad I’m a girl, because she’ll tell me things that she wouldn’t tell him, and we have less of a chance of our friendship being disrupted by sexual/romantic tension. Even though she did comment in Fat Tuesdays about having wondered 'what it would be like with a girl'. But I think all girls wonder that. Maybe guys don’t, but I think all girls do. It doesn't mean we’re gay, or even bisexual – we just think about things like that. I know what she means."

----------

I sort of stopped writing about things like that during my last three years of college -- I was dating Dutch guy after Dutch guy in an attempt to be 'fulfilled' by someone, anyone -- but now, at age 24, all I can say is OMG, how blind can a girl be?!

My only defense is that I think the idea of being sexually attracted to women scared me so much when I was starting to figure it out -- see above, age 14 -- that I ran as fast as I could in the opposite direction, and thus put myself through a lot of confusion and (unrecognized) heartache. It's like with the throat swab for a strep test when I was six -- it made me throw up, because I was sick, and so for ten years after that I was terrified of throat cultures for no good reason. Our minds can do some really wacky things.

Do any of you other RSGs have old diary entries, etc. like that, old thoughts and justifications that make you want to slap yourself in the forehead and go duuuuuuuh? I sure hope I'm not the only self-induced idiot here. :)

15 Months

Just wanted to post quickly to say that I'm not dead or anything, just super busy with school and work. (Not to mention the fact that I've got two new books -- The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory and Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult -- who has time for the Internet when your mind is dying to get back to sixteenth-century England?)

Aphrodite and I turned 15 months old on Monday, and celebrated by sneaking McDonald's double cheeseburgers into the discount theater to see Juno (which was really cute). It was a great date. We're pretty low-maintenance. :)

Thanks to everyone for the comments on the 'kid' post of two weeks ago. It sounds like the opinions are pretty evenly split as far as regrets. I have to admit, though, that as much as I love my new job, that if I end up working in pediatrics full-time, I might not want to come home to still more children. I see about 30 patients a day, sometimes more, and it's really making me appreciate 'grown-up conversation'. :) On the other hand, I was recently made aware of something that apparently happened last year (I'm always the last to find out about these things) -- bone marrow stem cells have been successfully turned into sperm cells. Not actual sperm, mind you, but the precursors -- and even Aphrodite has admitted that if she and I could have a biological child together, that that might raise the stakes.

Anyway -- anybody looking for a tasty piece of writing, head over to Jen's latest post -- it really struck a chord with me. As I posted there, I've never been with a woman other than Aphrodite and don't believe I ever will be, but I well remember this feeling of possibility in the beginning -- looking at women with a new level of consciousness, noticing the details about them in different ways, wondering what my life would have been like, what experiences I would have had, if I had known who I was years ago. I'm immeasurably grateful that Aphrodite was my first, and I never would have chosen to have it any other way, but my initial experiences with her 15 months ago did sort of open up this whole other world for me that I'd never considered with any seriousness, and Jen expresses that beautifully. Thanks to her for the beautiful writing.

Well, I'm off to school. Wednesday is my long day -- class, 4 hours at work, class again, then lab til 10pm. Ugh. I think I might have to throw my credit card debt to the winds and buy myself an iPhone as a reward when these prerequisites are finally over -- I cannot wait.

Little People

The new job is going great. Granted, I haven't done a whole lot yet -- heights, weights, head circumference, temperature, one throat culture -- but I absolutely love it. I got to help with measurements on a newborn Caesarian baby, take a history on a nine-year-old with abdominal pain, and even use my (admittedly now far less fluent) Spanish with one little boy who was afraid of his chickenpox shot. For the first time in, well, EVER, I'm actually looking forward to getting up and going to work every day.

It does beg the question, though -- what about children?

Well, what ABOUT children?

See, I have always wanted kids -- two, possibly three. Lately, I've been considering the possibility of just one. Aphrodite, though, has never really wanted children, for the (understandable, and quite possibly valid) reason that she wants her life to be her own. She wants to be able to set her schedule as she likes, travel when and where she wants to, and come home after the workday and spend all her free time with ME, not Junior. That makes total sense to me, and she's actually come perilously close to persuading me on several occasions -- after all, who would want to give up that freedom?

But for me, having children is almost an obligation. The idea of not doing it has flitted through my head now and then, and does so on an increasing basis these days, but I'm just not able to discount that 'someday' gut feeling. I've worked with kids of all ages for twelve years -- camps, daycares, babysitting -- ever since I first became a mother's helper to my favorite cousin, then a toddler, when I was eleven. (She's now 15 and a national swimming star -- my, how times fly.) I have always been drawn to children, and vice versa -- Aphrodite teases me that I just have to sit down in a room and they "flock" -- and more than that, I'm really, really good with them. I know with absolute certainty that I would be a fantastic mother, and I'm not overly concerned about the 'two moms' thing, either. But I do agree with Aphrodite to an extent -- I don't want my entire life to be taken over by a child. I want my adult life, too. She, having dated a man with a child, doesn't think that the two can coexist. I, knowing that her ex was a terrible, inconsistent parent who gave her a bad impression of the scenario, am clinging to the belief that one can have both.

It may happen that my 'work kids' -- the kids I'll treat as a PA -- may be enough for me. Lately, that feels more and more like a possibility. But what if that doesn't happen?

All you gay/lesbian couples out there -- and anyone else who wants to weigh in -- do you have any children? If so, what have you found -- do you totally lose your independence and 'couple time', or have you found ways to hang onto it? If you don't have kids, are you planning to have any? How many, and after how long? Natural (an option for the girls, I guess, anyway) or adopted? If adopted -- international or domestic? If natural -- how will you decide on a method/potential father?

This definitely isn't something Aphrodite and I can decide now, anyway -- neither of us is done with school, for a start, and our financial situation is far from secure. But I really want to hear others' thoughts on this topic, because the subject does come up from time to time, and we circle the same old barrels whenever it does. Can anyone inject some wisdom/advice/suggestions/humor into the fray?

Meme

OK, so Grumpy Granny tagged me in a meme -- I haven't done one of these in about five years, but it's a relatively short one, so here we go.

Rules: Link to the person that tagged you, post the rules on your blog, share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself, tag six more bloggers at the end, and then leave them comments so they know they've been tagged.

1) I despise apples, and especially apple juice. I'm not a picky eater, as a rule, but I just never could learn to like that taste.

2) Most of the time I feel more comfortable around children, especially those under the age of 12 or so, than I do around adults.

3) I was a 'spontaneous reader', just before age three. My very pregnant mother purposely skipped a sentence in a (brand new, from the library) book she was reading to me, and I calmly looked up and said, "That's not what it says." When she, incredulous, challenged me, I took the book from her hands and read her the rest of it -- and haven't stopped to this day. (When my sister was born and nobody wanted to listen to the three-year-old read anymore, I spent hours recording myself on blank cassettes in my kiddie tape player. :))

4) This has had to relax somewhat since living with Aphrodite, but when left to my own devices, I am obsessively neat -- clean up after myself after every meal, keep everything in the house organized, etc. That's my mother rubbing off on me. *wince*

5) It takes me forever to type a blog post or an email -- or anything, really -- because I read over everything dozens of times to make sure it sounds the best it possibly can.

6) Aside from Grey's Anatomy, Brothers and Sisters, NFL football, and the occasional episode of Extreme Makeover Home Edition, I genuinely hate TV. I never have it on when I'm home alone.

OK -- I'm tagging ~k at Inside Wants Out, but everyone else has already been tagged by someone else... so I'm going to be lame. :)

P.S. My birthday was yesterday -- I came home to a treasure hunt, tacos (my favorite meal), and a homemade cake -- so all the buildup to that is part of the reason I haven't been posting as frequently. There's another introspective-type post coming, don't worry.

Life Update

Just a bit of a Life Update... I know they're not as interesting to the general population as the posts everyone can relate to, but I post them anyway because my blog has always served as a bit of a personal journal to me -- I love going back years later and reading about what I was doing (often shaking my head and muttering, 'Wow, if I had only known how that was going to turn out...").

Anyway, so, major life areas:

WORK. My last day at my old job is Tuesday, my birthday is Wednesday, and I start my new job on Thursday. I am STOKED -- my old job is driving me nuts. I literally almost cried yesterday when they sent me on a call at 4:45pm (when I'm supposed to get off at 6).

SCHOOL. My second semester of prerequisite courses is going okay so far, though I loathe my anatomy professor (an annoyingly perky micromanager) and also hate the fact that my genetics lab is in the evenings, lasting until 10pm (I'd much rather be curled up on the couch watching TV with Aphrodite). On the flip side, I got perfect scores on my first two chemistry quizzes, which is a bone fide miracle (cue angel music). This is a complete and total switcheroo from last semester (when I struggled through chemistry, barely scraping a B, and breezed through anatomy with a 98 average and a fabulous professor), but I can handle it.

SPORTS. I'm training for a 15k (9.3mi) in March, one I've done for the past two years and really love. I'm still not exercising nearly as much as I was during my undergrad (when I was swimming 15 hours a week, plus biking and lifting weights), but then again, I'll probably never hit that peak again. I'm doing a lot better than last semester, anyway -- running 3-4 times a week, 3-5 miles each time. I'd love to finish the race in an hour and a half this year, but I won't hold my breath --an hour and 45 minutes is probably a more reasonable goal. Oh, and also, I've decided to enter the lottery for the New York City Marathon, which is held in November. According to the internet, the odds are about 30-40% of getting selected, which isn't that bad, but I'll keep my eye on a few other races held around the same time (don't want to train for six months and then never run the darn thing).

GIRLFRIEND. Aphrodite is doing okay, not great. She'll be teaching a course at her alma mater this summer, and after that (hopefully!) back at school herself for a master's in international studies, but she's working retail in the meantime and it's really wearing on her. She's the type of person who needs a community around her, familiar faces that care about her, and she sort of lost that when she left school in May and all her friends scattered to the four winds. Add to that her sensitive nature and the fact that she gets treated horribly by a good percentage of those who come into her store, and you've got one unhappy girlfriend. We're counting the days until June.

Thus concludes the Saturday Life Update... enjoy your weekend, everyone!

Continued...

Okay, so I have a bit of an addendum to that last post. (Thanks to Jen and LD for the comments; you guys really made me feel better, like maybe I don't sound that crazy!) See, I've been reading a little about Reiki, healing, and similar experiences on the Internet, and that made me remember some of the things that happened in the early weeks of Aphrodite's and my relationship. They've sort of tapered off lately (is that normal? anyone know?) but a lot of really weird things happened to us in the beginning.

1) Last December (2006), one month after we got together, Christmas break rolled around. Not only did I have to go home and leave Aphrodite (since my parents didn't know about us), but on the first day of my vacation, I had to go with my family to Alabama for a cousin's wedding. Aphrodite had a huge final that day for one of her accounting classes, and was spending the day studying in our apartment, alone.

I felt fine for most of the morning, as we started our journey, but around ten -- the time Aphrodite usually wakes up -- I started to feel sick, nauseous and headachy. That was unusual for me; I'm a competitive athlete and rarely get sick. The symptoms continued all day, during our travels and arrival at the hotel. I refused all food and went straight to bed -- but then couldn't sleep. I finally dropped off for about a half hour, then was awakened by my mother to get dressed for the ceremony. I was literally feeling too weak to move, and when my dad made me stand in front of him so he could pin up a fold of my dress, the room started to go black in front of me and I had to grab for a chair and sit down. This was completely out of character for me; I've never passed out in my life.

Mom put a cold washcloth on my face and neck, forced me to eat some crackers and put my feet up, and made me sit outside in the breeze. I took deep breaths, thought about Aphrodite's arms around me and how she'd hold me if she were there, and eventually started to feel just barely good enough to go to the ceremony. We got there just in time. I didn't feel well, but at least I wasn't passing out -- and I did gradually feel better and better as the evening rolled on.

Finally, at the reception, Aphrodite called, exhausted but relieved -- she'd just finished her three-hour final. That was when things started falling into place for me. I asked how her day had gone, and she launched into telling me about her hours of uncontrollable tears, panic attacks, fears about the exam, missing me, etc. "I knew it was going to be hard, but I still wouldn't normally get so upset over trying to study for an exam -- but I was literally on the floor bawling my eyes out," she said.

Ding ding ding! I have no idea whether her emotions caused my physical symptoms or the other way around, but it seems clear that they were related -- I never get sick, and she never panics to that degree over exams, and yet the time frames matched up. I got worse and worse until around the time she started taking her test, then felt gradually better as she progressed farther through it, and felt one hundred percent fine once it was over and she was on the phone with me -- and her emotions followed the same map. We were both a little awed by the strength of our connection -- and dismayed that we had two weeks to go before we'd be together again.

2) Here's a second example. Aphrodite's mother is an alcoholic, and although she's learned how to accept her and deal with her now that she's older, one of her old professors (I'll call her Gaia -- 'Mother Earth') has filled that 'Mom' role for her in a lot of ways. She treats Aphrodite like a third child, and the two of them go through the same mother-daughter ups and downs ("she doesn't understand me!") as any pair. Last January, about two months into our relationship, Aphrodite was vacillating over whether or not to tell Gaia about us. She was 'almost positive' she would be perfectly okay with it; she was just incredibly nervous to actually say the words. Aphrodite had dated the same man for four years while at college, even getting engaged to him, and she wasn't sure how Gaia would react to such an about-face.

So one day back then, Aphrodite was going to see Gaia, who lived 30 miles away from us at the time (we hadn't moved to our one-bedroom yet). She hadn't reached a decision on whether or not to try to broach The Subject, planning to just 'take it as it came' and see what kind of mood she was in. I was sitting at home, totally absorbed in my Mayan hieroglyph homework, my mind one hundred percent focused on the task at hand -- when I suddenly slapped my pencil down and sat straight up in my chair. It felt like someone had banged me on top of the head. "Oh my God," I said out loud, "she's telling her right now!"

Unable to concentrate, I got up and paced around the apartment, picking things up and putting them down, grabbing the phone and then making myself drop it, telling myself that I didn't want to interrupt such an important moment. I was in agony, but also absolute certainty. Nothing like this had ever happened to me before -- me, the so-called cynic, skeptic, atheist, what-have-you -- but I knew, absolutely knew that I was right.

Ten minutes later, I got a three-word text message, undoubtedly an opportunity snatched while Gaia's back was momentarily turned: 'she knows omg'.

Over the next 20-30 minutes (as the conversation progressed...) I felt the nervousness begin to ebb, but still couldn't focus -- until Aphrodite called me to give me all the details and say that Gaia had been absolutely wonderful, that she wanted to get to know me better, that it couldn't have gone more perfectly, etc.

These are just two of the larger experiences in a whole series of shared connections that happened over those first few months. But what I want to know is, why have they stopped? Is it because our lives have gotten so much busier (we're both working) and we don't have as much time to focus on each other? Or because the 'newness' has worn off somehow? Or is there another explanation?

Hey, another little tidbit just crossed my mind too, in light of my new job: for as long as I can remember, children have always been drawn to me (and I to them). I sit down somewhere and they just come to me. If I'm in a room with a child for any length of time, s/he almost always comes over to me and tries to make contact somehow (we often end up playing). Is there something special about kids? Are they more 'open' somehow, can sense energy more readily or something? Or is it just coincidence?

Thanks in advance for any ideas, suggestions, sympathies, shared experiences, or whatever you have to offer. This is all really new for me, and I'm eager to learn from anyone who's been there!

Feeling Different

Okay. I've been struggling with this post for almost two hours now, and I simply can't get it right. The images and analogies aren't flowing the way they usually do, and I think it's just because this topic is such a new area for me that I don't know how to express it as fully as I want to. So I'm just going to say it, as plainly as I can, and maybe some of your comments will help me to write a second post which follows up on this.

So I've read several accounts lately which mention that many gays and lesbians are more 'sensitive' than the general population (to the moods and thoughts of others, et cetera), and that this ability may contribute to the typical 'feeling different', especially when younger.

This is definitely true in Aphrodite's case. She is the most 'emotionally intelligent' person I've ever met. In everyday life, she genuinely cares about every single person she meets, can sense people's moods, and knows how to navigate a tricky conversation without raising hackles -- all wonderful life skills, and some of the things that draw people to her so readily. On another level, though, she also finds it almost instinctive to 'tap into' a source outside herself. She listens to the Universe, as it were, almost without effort. Sometimes, it's as though she has an extra antenna -- she senses things that others don't pick up, predicts certain things before they happen, 'feels' her place in the universe in a way that most people never even think about. As a child, she was always the one to act beyond her emotional years (holding an injured baby squirrel for hours until he died, greeting her kindergarten teacher every single morning "because I thought she might want to have someone tell her good morning"), and as an adult, she still amazes me every day (buying a Starbucks muffin for the homeless man on the street, going far out of her way to corner, catch, and find a home for an abandoned 10-week-old kitten, etc.).

On the face of it, I am her antithesis. I was raised an atheist and have never really put much faith in the idea of there being anything beyond this physical existence. I wasn't a particularly sensitive child (although I think that was more conditioned than instinctive, since every time I got emotional about something that my mother didn't think warranted such a reaction, she would tell me I was being hypersensitive and that I needed to calm down. In time, I learned not to react externally.)

However, since meeting Aphrodite, I'm realizing that this is more the result of what was forced upon me than a result of what I really feel. Spirituality was never discussed in my house -- literally, never -- and most of my religious experiences ('friends' attempting to convert me, etc.) were negative. But I'm slowly realizing -- mostly due to Aphrodite's influence -- that what I thought I believed isn't really what I feel. (Side note: I'm not discussing this with any particular religion or belief system in mind at all -- just offering up the (to me) new idea that maybe there is something beyond our physical bodies, whether that's energy between people, beams of light from a universal source, or something entirely different.)

I could go on about this for pages and pages, but I'm going to focus on one specific aspect here: touch.

I was never touched much as a child beyond the perfunctory bedtime hug and kiss, and yet I'm realizing now that touch is actually my strongest 'love language', that is, I feel love most strongly when someone is holding me or stroking me. Words are nice, but physicality, to me, speaks louder. I have extremely sensitive skin (in the old-fashioned sense: for example, I don't like running the pads of my fingers over textured surfaces like carpet or sandpaper, and I'm incredibly ticklish), and I'm not sure whether that is a byproduct of not being touched, an occupational hazard of loving physical contact, or simply a coincidence. But recently, I've started to realize that I may have the ability to heal. I don't mean lay hands on you and cure your cancer -- but I seem to be able to do something that others can't.

Aphrodite's gifts don't come without a price: she carries a lot of stress at different points in her body, and often gets painful twinges in her upper left chest and shoulder. (Don't worry, heart problems have been ruled out.) The other night, when she said she hurt, I made her lie down on the sofa, rubbed my hands together until I felt them tingle, then laid my right hand over the affected area and my left on Aphrodite's forehead. (I felt strongly that I needed both hands on her, not just one, and the left hand just seemed to naturally gravitate to that spot.) I felt them gradually get warmer and tingle, and had the impression of blue-green light flowing in a circle from my left hand (on her forehead) through her body and back to my other hand (over the painful area). We sat that way for who knows how long. It felt very peaceful and comfortable, like time had stopped, like nothing else was important.

I eventually removed one of my hands to grab the remote and stop the annoying DVD menu music -- and then I couldn't get the sensation back. I rubbed my hands together again, and they didn't tingle. I laid them on her body, and they didn't get warm. Whatever had been happening, I couldn't get it back. I stood up, then realized I had a slight headache and felt far more tired than I had before we'd started. Aphrodite, on the other hand, said she felt much better and practically bounced up off the sofa.

I'm sure there are a ton of explanations for this -- it's not exactly a miracle cure, after all. All I can say is that it felt significant, which is why I'm writing about it. I did something similar when she had gallstones -- one hand on her front and one on her back, which she said felt really good -- but that obviously didn't help in the long term. (On the other hand, we didn't know she had gallstones then, and the pain was referred to her left side, so I wasn't exactly touching the right spot.) Anyway, Aphrodite says her grandmother can do something similar (she called it "healing hands"), but that she's the only one she knows who can do that.

Anyway, okay, now that you all think I'm completely crazy, I'll shut up. But if any of you have similar 'sensitive' experiences, please do share and let me know I'm not all alone out here! :)