I sat outside last night for a few minutes before I went to bed. I was tired, I have been sleeping poorly, as I guess could be expected from the events of the weekend. I hadn’t talked to S for most of the day. I gazed at the half moon, with thin clouds racing by it.  Sitting out there, I could feel S’s sadness. I knew he was at his home, 50 miles away, and feeling bad. I messaged him, and my intuition, that connection we have, was right.

I know he just doesn’t get it, why I just can’t do it anymore, why things can’t stay as they were for me.

The only thing that is permanent, is change.

My emotions of the last week, maybe 2, have been more and more to separate our lives, to end this relationship that never could get off the ground. I look at him, and I love him in that unconditional way. I accept who he is, I accept the direction he has wanted to take. He is the one who has come to me in times when he’s been introspective, to tell me he needs to be on his own, he needs to find out who he is by himself, without being attached to someone.

I totally support that.  I can’t imagine being this age and not knowing what I want.  I have told him to do it, to keep me in the loop if he wants.  I have told him I’m not going anywhere right now.  No one can forsee the future. But if we keep the communication open, we can remain friends, and honor the connection that I find rather exceptional.  It doesn’t mean that we have to be intimate, it means that we can remain close friends, if he wants to.

Right now, we want different things.  Neither of us can cross over to the other side, not and remain true to ourselves.

I know…that in the end, he knows that, he will get it, that we want such different lives. At least, that’s how it seems to me. Since he doesn’t know what he wants, I guess I can’t speak for him. But I certainly want something different from the relationship I have had had with him, than he wants.

I think it’s just hard to be single at this age. I don’t think anyone makes it to being single in their 60’s and doesn’t have baggage, even though I have seen profiles of men who say they don’t. They do, they have just buried it. I’ve tried to let mine bubble up and deal with it when it does. It’s not always easy. Like I told S, early in our relationship, he was the first man in my life since my marriage, and even though I thought I took plenty of time to be aware of my baggage, my triggers, there are some you don’t even know about until you are in a relationship. And lucky him…he got to experience those.

Don’t worry, he had plenty of his own, to pay me back, lol.

But the fact remains….I’m ready to move past friendship. I’m ready for someone to love me, the way I loved him. I’m using past tense, because I feel like there’s no way back. It will take time for those emotions to ebb to the actual flow of the events.

It was fun, for awhile. But since I came back from Florida in March, when he came to my house and came as close to saying he loved me as he ever would, it’s been work. The enthusiasm is gone, the desire to just hang out isn’t there. For him it’s backed off to wanting an occasional “nice afternoon”. For me, it’s progressed to “I would have liked to spend Saturday night until Monday night with you this weekend.”

How’s that ever going to work?

It’s not. And I’m OK with it. I really am. Enough water has passed over the dam that my grip has loosened, I am not holding on any longer. I’m sure S’s grip is also loose, he maybe isn’t as clear on why as me, I hope he gains that clarity.

I hope we remain friends. We’ll see.

In the meantime, I wish him love and light. Always.