Must Be Something in the Holiday Air

So I'm standing in the kitchen, slicin' and dicin' a carrot salad to take to Klaire's this evening, when the phone rings.

"Jan?"
"It is!"
"This is Mike in El Paso"

Well, you could have knocked me over with a carrot stick. Remember Mike of the combover and nose hair and unruly eyebrows that stabbed me when we kissed? Holy Catz. I haven't heard from this boy in sixteen months!

He said he was just remembering the fun times we had together and missing me.

He did not ask if I had missed him. I haven't. Last year I told him he needed a haircut and to pay attention to his grooming, and I didn't hear from him for a week. We had been hot-and-heavy for three months (this was the first of last year's three-month relationships) and he was willing to throw it all away for a freaking haircut!

But that made me wonder how many hearts I've broken as I terminated this relationship or that for whatever egregious (or perceived-egregious) idiosyncrasy that appeared.

I could hear the loneliness and sadness in his voice. And I thought it ironic that on a day when I was also feeling sad and lonely, I receive this call from long ago and far away.

It's truly not my goal to break hearts. It's my goal to find the right heart to hold the future alongside my heart.

I guess hurt happens.

As he hung up, he said, "Well, I'll be talking to you." Then he caught himself, paused, and said, "No, I guess not."