northern

Well, my mom is back from visiting her sister and mother.

Thankfully my grandma is doing well actually. She's much more lucid than last time. Apparently last time, it may have been medication-related. And she's getting better at adapting to living in a home and having attendent care. A couple years ago she was mortified by the idea that someone would help bathe her. Now she even has a male attendent doing it, and she told my mom he's really cute, so she wanted to dress in her best clothes for him. Hearing that made my day. She doesn't like her roommate though, because she never says anything. My aunt tries to explain that the woman can't talk because she had a stroke, but my grandma doesn't quite get that.

So I'm done with house-sitting. My mom lives literally just down the street from me, so it's about a one minute walk to get there. She likes the place to look lived in. And I like spending the night there. It seems so much more quiet. It's not actually quieter, but it's quieter in a psychological sense. It's like being on vacation. Even though I'm half a block away from home, I'm away from home. No annoying phone calls, no looking around at all the cleaning I have to do. It's calmer somehow.

Since I've been spending so much time there, I haven't been around my computer much.

So I apologize to everyone for not responding to comments in my usual timely manner, and not keeping up-to-date on your journals. I really feel awful about that. It'll take me a couple days to play catch-up.




Happy Birthday Dallas!

Everyone go and wish her a happy birthday.

She's finally able to drink legally, and I'm sorry I wasn't able to make it to Toronto to help her do that.




In other news, it looks like I may soon be meeting that special someone in person.

I met her here on SG, and we've been talking since May, although I think we may have initially met in April.

She's simply wonderful.

She lives in Iowa, and according to MapQuest, she's about a 14-hour drive away. Of course, that doesn't take into account things like stopping to get gas, or eat, or just stretch your legs. So it's bound to be a few hours longer than that.

Right from the start, when we first exchanged messages, she's been great.

Smart, funny, interesting. We quickly switched to email, rather than the SG message system, since I find it easier that way.

We first spoke on the phone at the end of May. I was nervous, but she was even more nervous.

Thank God I have an incredibly inexpensive long-distance calling plan - only 3.5 cents a minute, anywhere in North America. So our two or three hour long conversations are actually very affordable.

And I love talking to her.

We rarely run out of things to say, and the occassional silence isn't uncomfortable.

If it were up to me, I would have hopped in the car and driven to meet her way back at the end of May.

But she's nervous about meeting. Initially it was due in part to a worry that her first impressions of me might not be accurate and I'd turn out to be some creep if we met.

Now that a few months have gone by, she doesn't seem worried about that. Now she's worried that we'll meet and I won't like her, won't be attracted to her.

I NEED to meet her. I'm bursting with excitement about meeting her.

No, I haven't built up great expectations about the first meeting. I've met people online over the past 16 years and had them disappointed with me. So I can understand her fear of that happening.

I'm not actually worried about that. I'm pretty sure she'll like me in-person just as much as she likes me over the phone.

Every so often when we talk, I'd ask when we'll meet, and she'd say something that would indicate that we'd meet eventually.

Not too long ago, it began to be in 'a few months'.

A few days ago when we talked, it finally turned into a 'few weeks'.

So now I feel the excitement building.

And now I get kind of nervous.

I want to meet. If it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out, and at least we'll know and can move on.

I'm almost certain that it will work.

And yeah, that's what makes me nervous.

The long-distance aspect is a big pain in the ass, but the phone and email will help reduce the distance in some ways.

It's more the idea that, wow, this might be it. She may actually be the one.

I know that that may sound lame, considering we haven't met in person yet.

But I'm pretty confident about how well we get along, and that's what makes me nervous.

Other than a brief dating relationship about a year ago, I've been single for well over a decade.

So maybe it's just the uniqueness of the situation that makes me nervous.

Of course, there's the distance.

And the border too.

I HATE crossing the border. I always feel like they're going to flag me for a body cavity search and strip the car down because they don't like the way I look. And so I'm certain I end up projecting that fear, thus making me look like I have something to hide.

Well, I'll keep you up-to-date on when I'll be meeting her.


And since she's reading this, I'm hoping she doesn't chicken out and change her mind.