I Had to Move On

I had to move on. I wasn’t going to be the one who loved her more than she loved me and never have the depth of love I wanted -- and I was falling in love. No, no, no! If I was going to succumb to love, I wanted someone who craved me as much or more than I craved her. Jane was not likely to be the one to fill that dynamic.

It was hard to say goodbye. Jane thought I was kidding when I said I wouldn’t be seeing her anymore. She smiled her confident smile and said, "I’ll see you later." “No.” I said firmly, “You won’t.” She stood looking puzzled for a moment then turned and went inside her parents door.

Jane was cute and slender and had the English manners of her parents and yet she was bold and confident in her quiet ways. She loved theater (Okay -- theatre, that is how Jane insisted we spelled it. So English.) and travel. With a fine mind and expressive eyes that reflected the hot blue flame that powered her being, Jane was a living, breathing enigma to me. Soft in demeanor and fierce in her opinions she was both a warrior and a lady. She was alive with excitement and passion for the world, just not enough passion for me.

Love making, she said, was not her favorite thing and being 18-19 it definitely was mine. Maybe I just needed to improve my skills and I did, over time. Sex was not the draw to her for me. I loved and admired her full being. Sex just complemented the feelings.

She wanted us to go to San Diego for a weekend and explore the city and I wanted to do it but work was low pay and I had just moved to my first place. I was afraid I would bust the budget if I did, so I hesitated. Money was tight and just normal dating was keeping me at my limit. Still I wanted to go to San Diego with her but I was honest with her, as always, so I told her my concern. Jane was disappointed in me and that hurt a lot more than it should have.

Many talks led me to believe she was not serious about me and I was not going to be the one who would pine away for her. No. I had plans.

I was saving for a Europe trip although I hadn’t actually started. I was going to be single and enjoy all the pleasures this world had to offer. I would never marry and I would live the life of a hedonist. I would not be tied down or fall into the trap society had designed for all of us of job, marriage, children, aging and death. I would bypass the heartaches of divorce and children and live as a bon vivant.

I would make my money and then travel and meet new people have new experiences all the time. I would make friends all over the world and enjoy lovers along the way.

I planned to live; not merely get by. I planned to revel in the richness of the world and experience all life’s joys and pleasures until I could live no more. I would never be tamed. Loving Jane did not fit my world view. I was falling into the trap of love and started to fantasize about sharing a life with her and I would not be trapped. No! I won’t be domesticated.

So I moved on. When I went to the airport to fly to Europe for the first time, I was excited. It had taken 2 years to save for this adventure. I would do the British equivalent of the Grand Tour where young men and women would travel when they were starting out in life to gain perspective and expand their worldly understanding of life and the peoples in other nations.

Then I saw Jane coming toward me and I wondered how she knew I would be there today. Was it fate pulling me back to the trap? Was I to get another chance to make a different decision? Why was I so giddy to see her now?

She disappeared into the mélange of people and my search for her proved futile. I boarded the plane, not thinking about the long flight over the country and then the ocean and what London would be like. No. I was thinking of Jane and why she would come and not at least see me off. Was she there for someone else? Was she even there at all?

On the plane I sat near the tail. Then I saw her. There was little doubt I wouldn’t recognize her from behind. That naturally streaked silky milk chocolate hair with a reddish hue, height, weight and demeanor were unmistakable. I waited until we reached 30,000 feet and refreshments had been served. I planned to ask a stewardess for another bag of peanuts from up front so I could 'accidentally' see her and be surprised when I recognized her on the way back to my seat.

My bag of nuts in hand, I thanked the stewardess (We called them that in those days before it was no longer politically correct.) I turned walking back down the isle and the silky milk chocolate hair belonged to someone else. Why did I feel so disappointed that it wasn’t she? After all, I had moved on.

I was beginning to live my dream of travel and exploration. I was embarking on a three month trip abroad that would take me wherever I wanted to go with a starting flight and an ending flight and no reservations in between so I could be as flexible as I needed to be. I wanted to be free to go where my interest led me. Would I go from England across to France? Then travel by train wherever it went until I had to come back to England for my flight home?

Once in England, I learned about cues from a patient English woman. People would line up politely at the London taxi stand and wait their turn -- in a cue. There was no pushing and shoving or tricky maneuvers to beat out fellow taxi hailers as I had seen in New York a couple of years earlier.

It was so delightfully English. It was so like Jane. There I saw Jane walking next to lady with henna hair as she rounded a corner and walked out of sight. Was she here? No. I was just seeing things, again. She was not here; not for me, anyway. There was no way that was Jane and besides, I’ve move on.

After seeing a play in Chelsea and a trip to Stonehenge, museums, cathedrals and a couple of tours of London I became aware of a cheap flight to Greece and it struck me that I could fly to Greece and make my way back to England going as many places as I could by train before my time ran out. As my departure time got closer I could wend my way back to England so I would be close and not have a mad dash far from England at the last moment.

In Greece there was a 7 day yacht cruise offered which was just a bit over budget but it was 7 days to 7 Greek islands and I just couldn’t pass that up.

I had been infatuated with a Greek girl, my first love, Magdalena in the 2nd grade. Our family moved to Torrance too far from Hawthorne for an elementary age child to bike to at the end of that year and I never saw her again. Near the end of high school, when I could finally drive, I went to her house but her sister said she was at the beach with her boyfriend. She had moved on as I had expected but had not hoped.

Love. Love is such a life-suck. When you are in love, the crazy world seems to makes sense. There is no challenge that matters much as long as you’re in love. It is such a siren song that pulls you off course and is just as likely to crush you on the rocks of failed love as it is to last and make living so worthwhile.

Love is undependable and becomes too important. It blinds one to reality and is like a drug that makes one in love make bad choices in it's name. Love is not life but an aberration of life. Love is a four letter word and like most 4 letter words does not belong in my vocabulary.

In Greece, the first thing I discovered was that I was literally illiterate. I could read but I could not read the Greek signs. The phrase, "It is all Greek to me" finally made sense. I did not know the Greek alphabet and to sound out road signs to get to my youth hostile was impossible for me.

I had to rely on the good Greek people and a few who could speak a little English did all they could to help me. People are mostly good all over the world.

I thought I saw Jane in Greece on a passing sailboat and in Marbella, Spain. Twice, I thought I saw her in Paris and once in Denmark. I became concerned that I wasn’t moving on, by then.

I got back to the States and picked up my career and buried myself in it. I had many loves, I thought, and was grateful for them but now I was to make money and gather my skills so that I could make my fortune so I could again pursue my dream of travel and exploration finding all the pleasures of world around me.

I stopped thinking about Jane then. I had truly moved on. That is, until our high school friend, Thom, suddenly died and I found myself sitting next to Jane at the funeral. She still looked the same and she smelled fresh and alive as only she did. She had started early graying which surprised me a little as she was in her early 30’s by then. Still, the gray looked good on her. We talked and laughed a little. That was all. We were just old friends sharing grief for a mutual friend.

I married a few years after Tom's funeral. I found someone who adored me even more than I adored her which was just right for me then. She was a surprise. I wasn't looking for a wife. Quirky and smart, talented and funny, I had succumbed to the trap and society’s pigeon-hole and it was okay. We had children and strife and good times and when she got bored, asked for a divorce. Having given her everything I could before, I gave her that as well. That long 12 year life -aberration was over.

Sick of dating and looking for love that I didn’t believe in anymore, I married my friend who wanted to be married at least once in her life. It wasn’t going to happen unless I did it and she only asked for a short 2 years and we would part still being best friends. Why not? She will have been validated as a woman in her mind and could no longer be called, "Miss(ed) Smith" by her nasty students and I would be out of the dating world and free from pursuing the love that doesn’t exist for me. I married and was instantly responsible for 7 more children whom I grew to love despite their antics and we did everything we could to keep them safe, healthy, and loved.

We are still married 27 years later and I have successfully traded the passionate type of love for the more stable friendship love grounded not in attraction but common purpose and mutual respect. It's been a hard life for us but we had grown as people with each challenge and are better for it.

My wife is dying now and I visit her almost daily even though she doesn't know me anymore. She deserves the attention and was a fine wife for 27 years and my best friend for 37 years.

I will soon be free to choose my next course. My fire and passion are no longer visible to the world and instead, stays deep inside me as a hot blue flame ready to ignite whatever passions I can muster this late in life.

I had gone 40 years without thinking about Jane, much. I did a search on the Internet for her as the Internet became mainstream in the 1990's. I had checked from time to time with the school websites and befriended many of my old friends. One I befriended was one of her closest friends but I didn’t ask her about Jane. Years later, I saw her posting asking if anyone knew where Jane was so now I know that avenue has closed.

I just want to know how her life has gone and if she is happy. Jane is, if she is alive, is 63 and probably totally gray by now unless she found some vanity and colored it. I don’t think she would as she was always her own person and not given to vanity when I knew her. Her lust for life was quiet but confident and I expect that she has grown older yet remained the same. I’m probably wrong and it is good to know that I won’t have that image of her damaged by the reality of knowing.

I would love to hear her stories, though -- her discoveries, her loves, her tragedies and the wisdom she has found through it all. I would love to take that trip to San Diego with her now; one of my very few regrets in life.

I wish her well. I always have.

I’m so glad I have moved on. Maybe not glad, actually.