Thursday, August 22, 2013

Lost in Translation


I would like to preface this post with a reminder that Boy Toy has been on a family trip since the first weekend in August in East Jesus Nowhere, NY. Cell reception is spotty and wifi is sporadic. Tomorrow will be the first time we’ve been in a room together since July.

He’s called and emailed a few times since he’s been gone, the most recent being a call from this past Saturday. We chatted a bit when he said he’d probably be back Tuesday. We didn’t get a chance to make any concrete plans for this weekend before the reception cut out. He texted me at what is technically today (Thursday at 12:02 AM) that he was back among civilization and will see me at our usual Friday plans.

I sent back a joke text: “He lives! And here I was thinking you’d forgotten all about the poor, lonely girlfriend you’d left behind all those weeks ago.” I’d hoped the melodramatic nature of the text would imply that it was a joke. The lack of tone makes it lose something because he replied “What!? I just talked to you on Saturday afternoon.”

In boy time, you ‘just talked to me.’ In girl time, “Where have you been?” Women won’t usually say “I just ran into her” if they ran into the person more a few days ago. After that they’ll attached a time frame e.g. “I just ran into her last weekend” Men will say they ‘just did something’ that was 3 months ago and think nothing of it. This is a gross overgeneralization but there’s definitely a kernel of truth in here.

I told Boy Toy that I was joking and 2 phone calls over a 4 week separation was not a lot. If you compare the time we usually spend together versus the amount of interaction we had, there’s a big gap. It’s not easy to go from a lot of togetherness to a lot of alone time.

It’s a lot easier to deal with being apart for so long if you can actually talk to the other person. I know the radio silence wasn’t his fault or choice. If he’d really wanted to he’d have disappeared completely. It was still tough for me since I like to be in touch more than he does (clearly).

As terrific as he is, Boy Toy is a pretty typical guy. I don’t think he’ll realize how maddening this was for me until I either tell him or he reads this. I’m sure we’ll be OK once we actually get in the same room and start spending time together

Music: Best Days of Your Life by Kellie Pickler

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