Text Silence

Dearest Rachel –

For all that I’ve told you about the more-than-occasional mad rush of messages I get from folks I meet on dating websites, this story is about the opposite side of the coin. Sometimes, you want to keep things going, just to make sure, but things go silent on the other end of the line.

You’ve seen me write about “Lee” this year, including the fact that I have trouble aligning our schedules sufficiently for us to generate the propinquity (now there’s a word you don’t hear often enough, but when it comes to dating, you absolutely need. Some day, I might write a letter to you specifically about the term, in fact) necessary to keep the relationship alive. Now, there are other things that cause me to question our long-term viability as well, but concerning myself with most of those are roughly akin to putting the proverbial cart before the proverbial horse, so I’ve mentally set those aside for now.

I’ve also mentioned about how I feel like I ‘owe’ her a second date for her having paid for our first one (which makes me sound a bit like Erin, now that I’ve typed that out, but oh well). And considering that our first one went reasonably well, despite the drive and the distance, that should be within expectations that I’d want to see this through a little bit further, at least.

The trouble is that, even though I don’t have any relationship commitments these days, it’s not as if my calendar is clear enough to actually date, either. You already know about Saturday mornings, although if I still had you (or if I can find and marry ‘Megumi’), I’d drop the guys in a hot minute. Indeed, I’ve asked them point blank in the past when in their week they’ve set aside for their wives, as most of them are married; it strikes me as crazy, after working and being unavailable for them throughout all week, that they would carve out yet another day (at least the morning of it) to be away from them. Or are they so old as to have lost their libidos? I hardly think so, as I probably fall in the center of the age bell curve (and maybe slightly on the high end, as I’ve wound up actually leading a small group of these guys – although that might be more due to the fact that I’m just there every week).

Granted, for all that Saturday morning is ideal for a married couple to get together, it’s not exactly what one thinks of when it comes to dating. In the secular world, the morning is when you’re sneaking away from your partner, either to not disturb them (which suggests things didn’t go all that well) or to hide from other eyes that might (justifiably) disapprove of your actions; the trope of the “walk of shame,” if you will.

So what about the afternoon and evening? Well, you know better than anyone else that I’m committed, more often than not to be working in the booth at church. And the weekends that I’m not have been taken up with travel to one place or another for most of this year, be it the island, Honduras or the North Atlantic. It’s hard to get a weekend free to get together. And all this is just on my side of the ledger. She still works for a living, so she has her own commitments that have to line up with mine. Last week, for instance, she’d been dealing with a water line issue at her house; and the last free weekend I’d had before the trip, she’d had a sister (or maybe it was a cousin) coming to visit. So you can see that things have not coincided to move this relationship along.

Still, for a while, it looked like there might be a chance; this weekend, for the second straight, has my calendar free – I honestly can’t remember the last time I’ve had two free weekends in a row, especially since connecting with her in the first place – and so I kept sending her texts, just to let her know I was still interested (yes, I’m as guilty as anyone else of engaging in that ‘love bombing’ technique). Except… from the very beginning of the week, it’s been silent on her end. No replies, no emojis, no nothing. Just straight-up radio silence – or would that be text silence? In any event, there’s no asking her out on a date this weekend if she’s not going to respond.

Which is where fate seems to have intervened; as it happens, cousin Clyde’s memorial service was set for this afternoon in the meantime. Had she managed to respond, and we had made plans, I would be on the horns of a dilemma; blow off the family to see her (and this despite my lingering doubts as to our relationship’s long-term viability), or ghost her, despite already making plans, for the sake of the family. Her silence for the past week has precluded this from having to deal with the question. I’m free to pay my respects as I ought to without disrespecting her.

Of course, this does mean that I still ‘owe’ her my time – and with my schedule starting to fill up (you didn’t think I was going to have three weeks in a row clear, did you?), future weekends don’t seem likely for a while. Then again, if she continues this silence for much longer, I’ll have to conclude I’m the one who’s been ghosted, and move on from there. So with that in mind, I could use a little wisdom, as well as a little luck, if you could see fit to wish upon me, while you keep an eye on me, honey. I’m going to need it.