Twitterpated

What a whirlwind of a week…

It started not so great still being sick and adding a ridiculously timed UTI. I reached a rather all-time low on the homework front. Yesterday I received an assignment back. Eight out of twenty-five. May as well have not turned it in at all! Oh well, I’ve got four weeks to redeem myself. Right?

That might be a little complicated.

Beside that my professors all scheduled my big papers the same week—seriously? Do they not collaborate?—I have something new occupying the majority of the space in my mind, much as I try to shove and fight it into its compartmentalized space in my head.

There’s this guy.

He’s not just any guy. He’s great. The story actually begins before this week. I have Creative Nonfiction (CNF) with him. For the last few weeks I’ve been fascinated by him. There are no words to explain why. It’s this crazy magnetic attraction, and an inexplicable I-really-need-to-get-to-know-you siren song. But he’s impossible to read. Like, I graduated in interpersonal communication, including an entire semester on non-verbal communication. This guy is a blind, deaf mute; well, he makes me feel like one.

I’m pretty ballsy. I’m not afraid to take the lead and just go for something, but I usually act on a cue that the interest might be reciprocated. So I was a chicken and didn’t go for it. My friend Bethany told me to just go for it, so I promised her if he didn’t do anything about it by the end of the semester I would ask him out (that way if he wasn’t interested I didn’t have to face him three days a week and feel like an idiot).

Two weeks ago there was a shift that, at the time, seemed nothing but a nuisance. I was sick. By the second week I was exhausted and decided to take sick days from school to get well (but I already wrote about that). I knew I missed something in CNF, so I just shot an email to my professor asking her what I needed to do. Then, through my mucus lined membranes an idea slowly burbled to the surface.

An in! I knew he was on Facebook from something he had said, so I found him, and requested he be my friend. In the “personal message” box I said something to the effect of, “This is me asking you to be my friend…and a shameless plea for help to know what we did in CNF.” He didn’t get the message until it was too late for me to get it about the homework, so he felt bad (oops!), but we became fb friends. I put little hints out there, but did not expect much.

Then came the email. In short, it was the cutest thing ever. And he asked me on a date. The best part was, he didn’t just ask me out, he had a plan. It was a good plan. It was a great date.

It took everything in my power not to get too excited. Beside that I was interested in him this was a first for me. I’ve never met someone in person, and had them think enough of me to ask me out on a date. Riding that high was enough, so the added attraction was shooting sparks into the tinder and I just couldn’t do that to myself if, for some cosmically unjust reason, things failed.

But they didn’t fail. Epic win.

Anybody who knows me knows I’m touch oriented. My friends and I great each other with a hug on a daily basis. But it’s not just friends, almost anybody I have a one-on-one conversation with I touch on the arm or hand or shoulder or knee during the course of our conversation. It’s called skin hunger. I crave touch. And if I’m interested? TOUCH! But with his stonewalling nonverbal, it was like hanging a big “DO NOT TOUCH” sign for me. If you know me, I broke the rules, and I touched. You would have thought I shocked him when I casually draped my hand across my leg and his while visiting with my roommate. I left it there for a minute or two longer before removing it.

I knew if I would’ve asked for a hug when he left he would’ve given me one because he was a gentleman (yeah, like opened all the doors and did everything right kind of gentleman), but I figured I’d already pushed him out of his comfort zone enough for one night.

As it turns out…he’s totally into me. Wanted to kiss me and everything. Yeah, the feeling’s mutual. Saw him, outside of class, three times in three days. And, let’s be honest, if I wasn’t out of town this weekend, we’d probably see each other today, too. I’m cooking dinner for him on Tuesday.

All the excitement and twitterpation does not come without some reservation. He has a history that caused some flashbacks in me I never anticipated. My kneejerk reaction was to run away. I just barely moved into a good space in my life after the last time. It took a year to put the pieces of my life back together. But reason prevailed. First, I have a history that could be scary, too. Second, I can’t make him pay for someone else’s mistakes. So with reckless abandon I have thrown caution to the wind and submitted myself completely to whatever this turns out to be.

I can’t wait.