My period of austerity is going well. I might be pushing the river just a bit.
There are only three possible trajectories.
- Meh. No need to continue.
- Nice. What’s next.
- OMG, I’m drugged with the smell of you.
What could be the risk? (I make myself laugh.)
There must be some non-zero percentage in my mind that she has potential. If I go much further than that, I’m doing both of us a disfavor. Why not just engage? See what the vibe is. Move on if it’s boring.
But, if it’s not… I guess that’s the complication.
I am staying off the dating apps. I’m focused on my writing and resetting my efforts to include income potential. Sure, I’m test-driving cars, but I know that was a distraction. What does this woman offer me? A rash of love poems? A rash of some other kind? An escape from my stable paradise?
Burn baby burn. I want to go go go. I can hit the wilderness and rivers of Big Bend alone. I can go to Enchanted Rock and sit. I don’t need her. I don’t have anything holding me down, back, here. The burning is the goal, I think. Alone or with her. Tomorrow is Dia Day Los Muertos and the beginning of my birth month. Today, I prepare my first book on AI. Not, necessarily an income-producing project. But, I’m also not going to pay a publicity firm, so no loss of money either.
What I am doing is extending the match. The fantasy of my muse is wearing a bit thin. I’m certain the text message scared her. Campfire. Hair. Fingers.
I back off. I reset to myself. Again. Open, sure, but the overt expression of sex and love and happiness is not resulting in the desired connection. Fear. That’s a clear answer. Anxiety. That’s an unresolved quagmire I don’t want to wade into. I’ll sit over here, nurturing spiders and frogs, listening to music, and eating my own passion for dessert.
Disengage. No more test drives.
