Projection

Do we project our relationship hopes and desires onto the current-person-in-our-life?

Further to this morning's discussion about justafarmboy wanting, then not wanting, what I wanted: I wonder if a responsive date/mate leads me to believe he wants exactly what I want in a relationship. If so, what does it take for the projected-upon partner to communicate clearly to me that there's been a misunderstanding?

In the last two or three weeks we were together before he took off for the Pacific Northwest for the summer, justafarmboy was just as physically present as he had been from day one of the relationship, but he was more and more emotionally distant. I excused and reasoned it away, but also knew it wasn't going to get talked-about. He was a terrific conversationalist, and we could talk at length about Cone 10 glaze recipes or favorite restaurants in Portland or the latest episode of "Lost". But touchy-feely things just weren't on the agenda.

So after the "I'm just not where you are" e-mail, I started questioning my perceptions and wondering if I had simply been projecting my feelings onto him.

Then, to confirm or deny that sense, I started paging back through old e-mails. (A word to the wise: don't ever say anything in an e-mail that you are afraid might come back to haunt you later.) He did. He did! He did say kind and loving and affectionate and — be still, my beating heart — flirtatious things to me as recently as four weeks before he fled Tucson for cooler climes.

So I'm not crazy. I didn't make this up. He did have feelings for me and desires for a relationship that somehow got waylaid on his way to becoming a Lemonade Tycoon.

And what was the bottom line for me out of that four-month relationship? I was able to hold the contents of that final e-mail at arm's length and say, "It's not about me."

I'm grateful for small wonders!