Something Cosmic

There's a man in my life I can't be with. A man who isn't right for me and whom I am not right for in return. I'll just say the things we have never said to each other but know without needing to. He's too old for me, and I'm too young for him. Our families wouldn't understand, our friends would maybe indulge in empathy but ultimately succumb to confusion as well. We're at such different points in our lives that we would both need to give things up for the other. Not the regular relationship compromises that are necessary when merging worlds, no — the big things. He's already lived the life I want with someone. The love, the marriage, the child-rearing, the family. Our generations just barely missed each other, not enough to affect our incredible ability to connect, relate, and make each other laugh. But enough to mean that we can never be a we.

In the realest of terms, all other people aside, those are the reasons I can't be with this man.

I should also probably mention that he's in love with someone else. Someone who loves him back, balances him out, and dances the way he's always hoped for. Someone age appropriate and smart and sexy. He's happy, and that makes me happy.

But there's not nothing between us. In fact, there's something cosmic between us, something palpable and physical and real. Something that kind of tugs at the air around us when we're together and floats wistfully across the distance when we're apart. My words I rely on so deeply seem to not do it justice, this energy, this cosmic chemistry that bonded us instantly upon first meeting. So special and just ours.

Yesterday, we had lunch. It had been a long while, but seeing him felt easy in the way that seeing old friends, best friends feels easy. No need for potential conversation starters or silence fillers, no need to fake smiles or laughter, no urge to check your phone or watch. So fond of each other, so naturally compatible. He smiled a lot. He smiled as we walked and talked and ate and joked, sometimes at the words being said but more often into the silence between stories. I always asked him what he was smiling about because it's fun to elicit an answer, but I never needed to ask. I was smiling inwardly for all the same reasons.

Careful not to sit too close, careful not to brush our knees, that park bench felt like a mediator for good behavior. He's one of the few people I feel like I could talk to forever. Every story, every memory, every observation and opinion feels filling, traveling from his brain space into mine. Filling me with thoughts and joy and new perspectives.

It's weird to me that we're friends. It's weird to me that for those of us who are not polyamorous, there are two categories of relationships — friendship and girlfriendship. It's weird to me that with all the nuances and complexities of relationships, we've landed with two words to describe the people closest to us. I'm thankful for the relationship we do have, whatever category x it may fall into. It feels like something worth trying for, if we can make it through the ambiguity.

Originally published on Twenty Something Living