When All Wrongs Have Been Righted

I should totally be doing work right now but I'm indulging myself for 15 minutes to give a quick update. As you can see, my slowdown in posting is indeed a sign that things are going well.

1) I'm flying out to see SC this Friday night. I am completely thrilled. We've been talking on the phone, texting, emailing, and more recently Skype-ing. (For any of you who have loved ones far away and are interested in video conferencing with them online, you should totally buy webcams and start using Skype. ) I can't even begin to tell you how good it feels to finally openly like SC and have it be okay. In fact, it's better than okay that I like him...because he actually likes me back! Dreamy, I tell you.

2) Caught up with the Ex last Sunday. He helped me install my air conditioner again (please note: he was the one who did it last summer and completely did all this crazy engineering stuff to make it fit in my old apartment window. So in fear of watching my AC fall 4 stories to a sorry death if left to my own devices, I enlisted his help.) It was actually a perfect visit. We caught up on everything (including all the dirt on who we are both now dating), grabbed lunch, and then went through my Israel pics. I am really proud of him -- he's taking so much better care of himself and seems so much happier, comfortable, and confident. All things that I had been praying for him.

The other thing that made the visit fantastic was that we were very honest about the lingering feelings of sadness we both feel at times (ie: "I'm really going to miss our camping trips this summer.") and the anxiety we both feel about the inevitable awkward moments that will happened and have already happened. I mentioned to him my freak out about his dating friend (oh yeah, he definitely does not consider this new girl his girlfriend -- he made sure I knew that!) doing the same races as me...and he completely understood. So it made me feel more normal to know that we both have empathy for the other and actually do worry about the other's feelings even though a lot of this is just unavoidable. And I gave him the full scoop on SC and he was genuinely excited for me. Also a good thing.

We'll both be training later this summer for the same marathon and agreed that we should do some long runs together (trust me, 3 hours out on the road alone just running...you need the company!). So I think that will be a good way to re-cultivate our friendship in the context of new and improved separate lives. This may sound corny, but it truly is a blessing to know that even after all the joys/heartache/time that we can salvage our friendship. When you date someone for a couple years and it ends the way ours did, I've learned that sometimes you don't need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. And that even though things didn't work out, we can still appreciate the good qualities (and probably qualities that attracted us to each other to begin with) of each other and be supportive of each other's new adventures.

3) I also extended the olive branch to EP. We met for a quick sushi dinner. Not much to discuss except I'm glad we are no longer dating (I know I was originally attracted to him because he was a "planner" but now I'm realizing he's a little too much of a planner), he too is doing fine, and I don't think he's used to being friends with girls he's dated. The dinner ended non-dramatically and he offered to still look at my bike later this summer.

With all those things above in mind, now I can exhale.