Why I can't forget.
1. The crow thing.

Few pages back, you will find a story where I had this stand-off with a crow in front of Cloud Hall. I am pacing this crow that talks smack to everybody that comes near its tree. I mention somebody coming down and giving me a funny look while I was doing this. It was him.

I remeber looking up and seeing him come down, and I remeber clearly the look on his face. His eyebrows were bunched together, but at the same time he was wearing a huge grin. He coudn't have been saying more clearly "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING, YOU LUNATIC?" if somebody had handed him a bullhorn. It was instantly obvious that he had glanced over and accurately sussed out what I had doing in that one glance. I figured out this information just as quickly, and I nodded at him good-naturedly, without breaking my stride. I knew that would make him laugh. It did.

I also knew he would bring it up the next time he saw me-- was so sure, as a matter of fact, that I sort of rehearsed my explanation. Sure enough, next time I saw him in ____, he wandered over to me, apparently abosorbed in the papers he was shuffing in his hand.

I waited. I could tell the papers were a prop. Sure enough, he cleared his throat.

"So, what was with that crow earlier?"

I could feel myself blushing. "Oh, you noticed that." I said breezily, as rehearsed.

He shrugged, smiled, and fixed me with a firm, questioning look. He is really good at this look, There is no retreating from it.

"well, I was noticing this crow that hung out in between two of those pine trees every day. It was challenging everyone that passed by, and I finally got curious about what he would do if I challenged him."

"And?"

I grinned. "He didn't like it."

"You're sure it was male?"

"Yes, " I said definitely. "It was acting male."

At this his eyelids dropped to half-mast. He blinked a couple times, and his grin grew a tiny bit wider and a little less polite. I became suddenly aware of the extreme maleness of the person I was talking to.The heat came back to my face.

"No offense."

"None taken." There was definitely a twinkle in his eye now.

Now, this is gonna sound weird, but it was at this point that I realised I was kind of flirting with him. Yes, sad as it sounds, that is how I flirt. And I was still married at the time, and I was feeling kind of guilty about it, so I sat up straight and made sure to wave my left hand around and made some comment about how male crows were very territorial and females tended to hang back. He just sort of rolled his eyes as if to say "too little, too late" and went back to shuffling papers. He was still smiling, though.

2. Cayuga Park

THe day after my ex left, I was in the hallway of ____ , looking at a display in one of the cases. It had been up for weeks, and I found it fascinating. It was a pictorial of Cayuga Park.

Cayuga Park is the result of a neighborhood repair project. A local gardener/woodworker took on the task of cleaning up the park after a storm had knocked over several trees. He carved the trees, large brances,etc into santos and garden gnomes and animals, sometimes using trees that were still mostly standing as a base. The pictures were gorgeous, and I finally got out my notebook to jot down the address.

His voice came over my shoulder."You gonna check that out?"
I guess he had been looking it over too.

"Sure," I said. "it's only a few blocks away."

"Really?"

"Yeah, I have like a two hour break till my next class anyway.Cayuga is just about two or three blocks down Ocean, and it sounds like you just find it, take a right, and drive to the dead end. Really have no excuse not to go it it's that easy. "

"Right." he said soberly. I looked at him. He was staring past me at the display, and seemed to be taking my words to heart."Right," he said again.

I took advantage of his apparent mood. "Do you have an office?"

His eyes flashed at me."Sort of," he grumped. (Later I found out what he meant; he basically shared a closet with two other people.)

"Do you usually eat lunch in your office?

"Yeah."

"Well, you can sit in your office and eat lunch, or you can drive two blocks and take it to a park." I shrugged.

He tipped his head as if he were rocking the idea around in it. He looked pleased. 'Yeah, you're right."

I turned back to the flyer and kept jotting directions. "Well, anyway, I'm going."

And I did go, a while later. But in that time the reality of the night before was hitting me. John had given me a speech about how unhappy he was, particularly with me, and had moved to his best friend's house that night to decide what he was going to do with me. I plodded around the park, which was indeed as cool as described in the flyers. They had just watered everything and there were puddles in one area, which I slogged through anyway, because I didn't want to miss anything. There were also a lot of cool little cubby bench type things, which I loved.I sat down on one of these to have a good cry, because I really wished I could share that place with John. The whole time I was there I was thinknig about how I woud have described it to him, how cool he would think it was.

Ir was getting cold, and I finally got up to head back to my car. I passed a man heading in as I headed out. I nodded shortly, he nodded back, then I realised I recognised him.

He bit! I thought, completely forgetting about my soon-to-be ex for a moment. He took the bait!

"You came!" I crowed. I was really happy, becasue based on the conversation I had with him he sounded like a creature of habit and I figured he was only humoring me when he said he might come. He shrugged and smiled, but gave me that pointed look.

I ignored it, still too pleased to remember I had been crying. I tried to wipe my face without being obvious about it. "I'm glad you did, it's pretty cool!"

"Is it? Were you impressed?"

"Oh, yeah" I was relieved. If I kept talking, he woudn't bring up the condition of my face. "There is some cool stuff up in the trees, there is a little treehouse sort of thing over there, but be careful walking around in that are because it's kind of muddy."

"Well, I'll just not go over there." His look was getting more and more pointed.

"Yeah, true," I kept trying to wiggle out form under that look. "Anyway, there is plenty of other stuff to --"

"Yeah," he nodded briskly. "Yeah. Are you OK?"

I faltered, because I wanted to lie so bad. Anybody else I think I could have done it[Oh, nothing is wrong, allergies], but I couldn't with him. Becasue he wasn't just asking, he really wanted to know.

"No,"I finally said.I couldn't look at him.

"Anything I can help with?"

I thought about asking him to give John a call and convincing him to come back, and that made me smile. I just shook my head. "No."

He actually laughed a little.But it was a kind laugh, and the warmth in his eyes told me he knew what I meant. "No. Ok."

He was so disarming I laughed a little, too. Then I shrugged. "Life is just sort of... happening right now."

He just nodded and looked at me sadly. The one thing I remember, the one thing that I found the most attractive about him, was the way one glance from him could convey what would take a paragraph for somebody else to cover. He didn't give me a bunch of phoney-balony sympathetic platitudes, he just gave me one long look that said he knew just where I was coming from. It was a little too much for me, in my state.

"Well, hope you enjoy the park," I said, moving to the gate.

He nodded. "Take care."

That was the beginning, and there were other, more involved, perhaps more meaningful conversations, but this is where it started. He was just different. he saw things differently in general, he saw things other people missed. I think he saw things about me that other people miss. And I miss having that gaze on me.

And he took my advice about the park,. He let me affect him. That happened more than once.