attentive to me this week, even in absence. He is leaving for Michigan on Friday morning and we won’t see each other for a few weeks. I am ok with it, much more secure in his return than the last time he left.

And completely unrelated to Railroad Man (except for the fact that I can’t talk about this sort of thing when he is around) I have been in contact with a former-love-of-mine.

I had thought about being in contact with him for years but never figured out how… I discovered him on Facebook and we have been emailing fairly steadily. I am enjoying the contact immensely, but haven’t really talked about it just because… sometimes I feel like I don’t know how over him I have been all these years. I mean, its easier when there is no contact – but there was a part of our past together that probably meant nothing to him that just still sits in the center of my being.

I try not to let the little things he writes mean stuff, because they probably don’t mean a thing to him. It is just different to feel the unsettled feelings I feel. I am no longer the plunge ahead, no holds barred Julie I used to be.

Instead, I hesitate – out of conscious intent, not fear (had to check in with myself out about that).... and that hesitation, because it is new, feels unsettling, too.