Saturday 28 January 2006

I Want My Money Back, and Don't Forget My Black T-Shirt

It’s not things I want back from The Married Guy. It’s my time. Time spent with him, time spent on him, time spent thinking about him, and yes, time spent daydreaming about him.

I met him just about a year ago – fresh off a fling in Kabul that had made me feel alive with possibility. But The Married Guy (though obviously I had a different nickname for him then) was the first person I had met in ages that I was really excited about. He was wickedly smart and funny and interesting, and usually, he made me feel like I was the same.

I keep wondering why this happened to me. Not so much what signs I missed, but why. In time, when I look back at this year will I find something I learned from the whole experience – something worthwhile that came out of this? I can’t think of what, and it’s depressing. And that’s why I want my time back.

One of the most frustrating aspects of this is that I may never get an answer from him about when – if ever – he was planning to tell me he was married. I found out by a coincidence so bizarre you wouldn’t believe it in a novel, and I’ve only just told him that I knew. So far, he hasn’t done any explaining, and I’m not holding my breath.

* * *

Took a two-hour cycle lesson today, one of the coldest days this winter in London. My instructor was spectacularly irritating, repeatedly asking me questions he knew I had no idea what the answer was. I hate that. Plus we were practicing – practicing stopping quickly, arm signals, looking behind while riding in a straight line – on a football (soccer) field. So there were about a million teenage boys watching. Just great.

As we didn’t get in any on-road practice – the whole reason I bought the bike in the first place was to cycle to work – I need another two-hour lesson. There goes another 50 pounds (nearly $100). I initially bought the bike because the Tube is not particularly efficient (for my particular home to work route), completely unpleasant, and outrageously expensive. But between the bike and the kit (translation: gear, but isn’t kit, like flat, a way better word?) and the lessons, it’s starting to seem like a black cab every day would be about the same price.

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