Update

It would seem that my long held belief that I won't have any luck on the woman front until this book is finished is once again proven. I had a remarkable time on my silent retreat this past weekend, and I mentioned my book project with one of the priests. As he heard about the project, he told me that this book was greatly needed, and that I needed to finish it.

When I arrived home Sunday night, I had an email awaiting me from the lovely Claudia, telling me that she wasn't interested in any romantic involvement with me, and that she only wanted to be friends.

On Monday, I heard from another priest whom I have been communicating with, who then gave my name to a publisher who is supposed to be calling me this week. He also wants to see this book published, and wants to encourage me in this.

I just turned off my match making service. I think it's absolutely pointless for me to even think about dating until this book is finished. I don't think God wants me dating, or married, while I'm writing the book. Which is a darn good motivation to get writing!

I'm a bit disappointed by Claudia's news. She seemed like an ideal candidate for a wife. God's will be done.

An Interim Report

Well, I have a date set up from the Hail Mary website, with a lovely woman named Claudia. She's coming over to my side of the state for a Nutcracker performance, and probably because of the weather, and because she has bad night vision, it'll be a very long first date, since I expressed a willingness to drive over there and pick her up. Trust me, she's worth it to have a chance to get to know.

She's sort of seeing a guy right now, so it's a full court press that's on right now. I'll be making her chocolates, very soon, and recently found out what kinds she likes. There should be some at her door in about a week.

Chocolates have helped me woo one other woman--I think it's very useful in wooing a woman's heart!

I'll keep you posted...

Online dating, take....10, maybe?

It's probably the result of the holiday single man's blues, but I decided to pull the trigger and do another online dating service, this time solely for Catholics with a rather Popish sounding name: Ave Maria Singles. I must admit, ashamedly, that I'd probably be embarrassed to share that with anyone but Catholics and my closest friends. I'd probably stick with a "Catholic online dating service." Regardless, it's a matchmaking service designed for and by Catholics, and it seems that the vast majority of members are drawn to it for the same reason: to find other Catholics who believe the fullness of Catholicism, which is the camp in which I have rather unexpectedly found myself.

We'll see how things go, but I feel that it is rather blogworthy to state that the first woman I wrote is an English teacher, and so I pulled out all of the stops with my writing, and the first words that I read in response were these: "Your writing style is absolutely delightful! I don't know many people who know what assonance is though I would have used 'arguably assonant' because, it's more and alliterative and, to me, more accurate. :)" Yes, I was able to drop the word assonant in the first email I sent to this woman, and it flowed rather naturally. That's the way to an English teacher's heart...or at least getting a response.

For some reason, she seems to think that I'm sophisticated as well. That will change when I tell her that I dropped food on the floor of the American Consulate in St. Petersburg, Russia. Thrice.

This blog of mine has collected some dust. I have been woefully inattentive, but life has been filled with a myriad of other things. I just returned from a tour of Russia, and tonight I play a world premier performance of a triple concerto for brass. Prior to that, life was filled with preparation for a recital and completion of our negotiations. It's been a very busy summer.

Today I also received an email from an eHarmony woman who has decided to move on. Not a big deal--there was very minimal interaction, but I was anticipating getting to know her on the heels of this concerto performance. I was looking forward to it quite a bit since my life has been so consumed with work related obligations.

It seems to me that all that we desire, and all of the promises of God that we long to have fulfilled are the very things God asks us to place on the altar. I believe that God has called me to a married life. Each day I hope that my wife will enter my life. There are glimmers of possibility that emerge from time to time, but for two decades, every door that has ever opened with hopeful possibility has been slammed shut. I do not understand why this is so, yet the only answer that I can find is that this is God's will.

When I think of Abraham's willingness to offer his son Isaac on the altar, the son who represented the fulfillment of God's promises to Abraham, I realize that I must follow his example. I am beginning to believe that God calls me to live in daily hope that today might be the day, but that I must place that hope on the altar each and every day. Unlike in Abraham's case, however, God doesn't always give us back what we place on the altar, at least in the way we expect, or in the same way that Isaac was given back to Abraham.

There are times when I become cynical and wish that I could excise this desire I have for companionship, since life would be easier. I believe that God has placed this desire within me, and I realize that it would be sinful to shut it down, or to eliminate the daily hope and prayer I have that I might meet my wife today. We all carry daily crosses, and I'm becoming to realize that perhaps my vocation right now is to be a man who desperately longs to be married, and nurture the hope that it will happen, while living with the possibility that it may not happen for a long time, and the subsequent disappointment that comes from actively pursuing women with the hopes that perhaps "this is the one." If that's the case, then for some divine reason, I'm better off to the Kingdom as a man who is single and longs for marriage.

Though I'd like to be married yesterday, I've read someplace before that God's ways aren't our ways.

It's very hard being patient with God. It's one thing to recognize that you are in the palm of God's hand, and to know this in a cerebral way, and to have faith that it is so. It's another thing altogether to rest in that knowledge and completely allow your desires to become wholly subservient to the will of God.

I grow impatient with God, and desire so much to be married. The longer I have lived as a bachelor, I find that there are times when I wonder if God's plans for me don't include a wife. I know that if that's the case, then I will ultimately be happiest and most fulfilled by remaining single, but the death of the dream to be married would be a long and painful one. I sometimes muse that perhaps if God's will is for me to be married, maybe I'll only be married when it becomes irrelevant to me whether I become married or not, because at that point I would have learned to trust in God's plans for me in this area completely and fully.

I'm not sure if I'm man enough to do that, however. I take comfort in the knowledge that God knows our weaknesses, and He knows what my desires are, and He indeed knows that though I wish to leave it all completely in His hands, that I have a very hard time doing it.

I'm accustomed to this single life, and I don't really wish to remain so, but on days like today, it seems very conceivable to me that this will perhaps be my lot in life. I hope not, but God's will be done, right? Even if I'm wrestling with Him, and myself, while I say it.

I do believe this: that I'm supposed to be single right now, since I am. It's clearly God's will for me, even if I don't like. God help me, but I don't like it.

The Search Continues...

Sarah and I are no longer an item, and for that, I'm thankful. Though I was hopeful, it turned out that we would not have been a good match. She's a bit uptight, and last night, as I drove home from David and Torey's after an incident that kept me laughing in the car my entire trip home, I couldn't possibly see her laughing over what happened. I think she would have viewed my hijinks as being far too juvenile.

When I talked with her, she said that she really learned that she needs someone who's "mature" and who is as "professional" as she is. My thought in response to this was something I shared with one of my colleagues today at work: one can by playful and yet mature, or be serious and and yet be immature. Seriousness is no indication of wisdom or maturity, nor is playfulness an indication of childishness. I think she construes my playful side as immaturity, which is unfortunate. She could use a little playfulness in her life, but I for one am glad that I escaped a relationship with her.

OK...just for the record, I'm a very, very happy man. I don't think things could possibly be going any better with Sarah than they are.

How time can change things, dramatically.

Life is good, my friends, life is very good.

I think I may have found a girlfriend.

Valentine Chocolates

I can't believe how good the raspberry chocolates are that I made tonight. I mean...they're really, really, really good. Like crazy good. I think Sarah will be a fan. I also made some blood orange/cinnamon chocolates, with Grand Marnier, using milk chocolate in the filling, in a dark chocolate mold. Blood oranges are apparently one of her favorite fruits, so I figured that was a no brainer. They need some tweaking--these turned out a little too boozy, but I think they'll be good when they sit for a day or two. The third kind is a creme de menthe chocolate that I think is an improvement over the creme de menthe chocolates I made for Christmas. When I made them for the holidays, I used only dark chocolate for the filling. This time I used 3 oz. milk chocolate and 5 oz. dark. It makes them still very intense and dark, but the milk chocolate mellows them out so they seem more "creme."

I'll finish sealing them up tomorrow, and they'll be ready to give to Sarah on Thursday, when I'll see her next.

Ups and Downs...and Ups!

I think anyone who peeks in at my blog from time to time easily sees the contours of the hills and valleys of my life. A few posts ago I spent some time in a valley where the landscape was disappointingly familiar to me, another wrong turn ending in a dead end where instead I had hoped to find the promised land of companionship.

Thankfully, there's always another path to trod, more roads to explore, and days filled with new opportunities. I'm happy to say that I've begun seeing a woman named Sarah. We went out for a drink and an appetizer last Saturday after spending quite a bit of time getting to know each other on eHarmony. For our first date, we joked about meeting early enough so we didn't have to wait around in the lobby for who knows how long, which is always uncomfortable on a first date. I told her that for us to just commit to an appetizer, neither of us would feel "trapped," and I said, "you know what I'm talking about, right? Those moments when you're just waiting until you can bail on the date?" She laughed, and said she knew exactly what I was talking about, and appreciated the option of keeping things short.

Soon into our date, it became quite clear that neither of us was feeling trapped, so a few glasses of wine later, and dinner and dessert, we found that we had been there for three and a half hours. We decided we didn't want the date to end, so we headed to a coffee shop and were there until a half hour after closing. All told, our date lasted five hours and it felt much shorter than that.

We spoke last night on the phone for a couple of hours, and tonight for quite a bit and made plans to get together again on Thursday night.

Life right now is absolutely fantastic. I'm going to enjoy the ride, and enjoy the opportunity God has given me to get to know a wonderful woman, who's as interested in getting to know me as I am in getting to know her, and leave it all up into God's hands as to where things go. For now, there's no question that I'm falling for an adorable woman named Sarah Marie.

And on Thursday...I'm bringing her chocolates.

Me: happy.

I had a rather onerous task to do today, one that I was not relishing, but that I realized I couldn't put off any longer. Though I haven't written about the entire story, a week or so ago I saw Meg again, at my request. I needed to profess my love to her one more time, and I needed to know that she had heard everything I ever wanted to say to her. I needed to know without a shadow of a doubt that I had risked everything, had been bold in my pursuit of her and had done everything in my power to win her heart. I even went so far as buying her a very nice ring--not an engagement ring, but a ring that was a sign of my love for her.

As I suspected, and as I have alluded to in my blog, she said no again, but I could rest in the fact that I had done all that I could, that I had not cowered in fear, and that I had been bold enough to tell her exactly how I felt. By buying her a ring, I hoped to give her a tangible sign of how much I cherished and valued her. I felt that this was what was needed to truly write the last chapter in our story, and now I can say that the ink is finally dry.

As you can imagine, I didn't really want to go back to the jewelry store to return a diamond ring that I hoped would be residing on Meg's finger. There was a part of me that considered keeping it, but realized that hundreds of dollars were at stake and it made no sense to have a ring that was of no use to me lying around in the bottom of a drawer somewhere. I circled around the store a couple of times, took a deep breath and dove in.

There were three people working there: two women and a man. I was hoping to be able to work with only one person, and I hoped that it would not be the guy. I wanted to be as discreet as possible about the entire affair, but as I walked in, all three turned to me, and the guy happened to be closest to me and asked how he could help me. In my typical manner, I communicated through body language that I was there to regretfully return a ring, sending clear signals to anyone with any empathetic radar at all that this course of action was not desirable to me. The guy looked at me as if I was returning a shirt that had a coffee stain on it, and asked me, "was there anything wrong with the ring?"

Please. I told him no, and then in an exaggerated, verklemptish voice I said, "It's not the ring--apparently it's just that there's something wrong with me."

Awkward laughter all the way around, and it worked as I expected it to and stopped any further questions, allowing the transaction to proceed very quickly from that point on. They didn't even bother to count the diamonds, (of which there were over 30), and I think they just wanted the entire situation to be past them.

I didn't say that comment to them because it's what I believe: that there's something wrong with me. It was a quick response that I instinctively knew would allow me to get through the whole thing as quickly as possible. I am not writing this to communicate the belief that I feel that I'm "damaged goods," or something to that effect. I just needed a way to get through the damn transaction as quick as possible, but even so, as the words came out, they caught in my throat. I know that the very words I said were the very things that I have had to confront as lies in my own thinking for these past two years, and they worked. It helped bring a quick end to a squeamishly awkward situation. Never one to feel very comfortable with silence, and feeling a bit apologetic for making them go through something as uncomfortable as this, I said, "I suppose these are your least favorite transactions--the ones where the guy brings the ring back because it wasn't accepted."

She said, "Well, we're always just sorry to hear the reasons why, that's all." And with that, she handed me the receipt and out the door I went.

Ugh.

It's not fair to the other ones...

Let's just be honest here: you can only fall for a woman so much when you're constantly thinking to yourself that you wish that the woman sitting across from you was a different woman.

Argh! Is it possible to get some sort of procedure to expunge feelings for someone who has chosen not to be in your life?

Bah-humbug! (And heavy sigh...)

Argh!

Dating is a stressful endeavor. Even when you're having a good time, as I did tonight.

Duo Ubera

I've been reading a very good book sent to me by Mark M., of Hillsdale County fame, called Interior Freedom, by the French author Jacques Philippe. It's a short book filled with profound wisdom about attaining what seems so illusive to most of us.

I sit in my living room, late into the evening, reflecting on what I have read in the book, accompanied by the music of Giovanni Palestrina, with no light other than five candles. I'm in a contemplative mood and I keep thinking about a passage in the book that speaks to the freedom that comes from accepting those things which we would never have chosen. Philippe writes, "when we are adolescents our lives seem to stretch before us with a broad range of possibilities to choose from; but as time goes by, that range will get progressively narrower. We have to make choices, and the options we select reduce the number of possibilities left open." He writes about the modern notion of freedom, reflected in a desire to see life as a marketplace of infinite choices spread before us and points out the repercussions this brings to our lives. He points out that for so many of us today, we "put off making a final choice, because choice is perceived as a loss of freedom." The result? People who desire continual choices "don't dare decide and never actually live!" And then he writes these words that ring so true: "Yet life chooses for them anyway, since time passes inexorably."

Very few of us can look back on our lives and say that our lives are what we would have chosen them to be. Life chose for us, and we are now living as a result of time and its inexorable passing. In my life, there are so many issues which are things that I would never have chosen but they are my lot. I am no different than any other man in this regard, and if anyone is even an occasional reader of this blog, they will know that the one area in my life that I would not have chosen is to be an unmarried man at age 38.

I have attempted to come to terms with my single state. I work towards saying to God, "Thy will be done," but underlying that very prayer is the keen desire that God's will would be that I be married, and soon, and to one woman in particular. Then there are moments of fear and trepidation that perhaps God's will is for me to be single the rest of my life, and if that is the case, the only thing I can pray for is my daily bread. There is a constant stream of uncertainty that flows through my life and I realized tonight that what I desire more than anything is to simply know: to know if I will ever be married, with children, or if I will be single the rest of my life. This continual state of not knowing is a hard place to be.

As I sit here late in the evening tonight, reflecting on the words I have been reading, reflecting on a week of dates with two different women, reflecting on a week that was marked by seeing Meg again, hoping with the vain hope that only a man consumed with love can know, hoping that she would return to me after hearing me profess my undying and unfailing love to her again with all the eloquence I could muster, yet knowing beforehand what her answer would be, I realize that time has passed inexorably before me. And I have not chosen the path that I find myself on, yet it is my life.

Where is the freedom in this perpetual state of not knowing? I have often felt that my life would change if I could only know this: will I be married or single? To know that I will be married would allow me to wait with calm and steady patience; knowing that I will be single would allow me to steel my resolve and embrace the single life completely, without the constant bombardment of torturous hope that assails me every day. Sometimes I feel like C.S. Lewis in the Shadowlands, in the scene where he is reading in the library during the end of winter, and he says that he detests the "in between time," where it is neither winter or spring. I feel like I'm in a perpetual "in between time" and I want to know if it's going to be winter or spring. If I could but know what my future holds! But that is not our lot, and it has never been any man's lot. As Richard Russo has written, "Lives are like rivers. Eventually they go where they must, not where we want them to." Time passes inexorably.

So what are we to do? Tonight I am weary of the perpetual hope of knowing. What I have come to realize is that it doesn't matter where we are in our lives, we will always not know. We will not know what tomorrow brings, we will not know if we will suddenly become ill, or if our parents will die in a car crash on their way home from Italy. We will not know if our job will be there tomorrow, or if the ones we love will return our love. What we do know, and the only thing we can know, is that we are loved and cherished by God, and all that happens to us is for the betterment of our soul, as I learned from a blind Carthusian in the film Into Great Silence. This "in between time," then, is my lot now, because it is for the betterment of my soul.

Jacques Philippe writes these words, which I feel warrant much reflection:

It is natural and easy to go along with pleasant situations that arise without our choosing them. It becomes a problem, obviously, when things are unpleasant, go against us, or make us suffer. But it is precisely then that, in order to become truly free, we are often called to choose to accept what we did not want, and even what we would not have wanted at any price. There is a paradoxical law of human life here: one cannot become truly free unless one accepts not always being free!

May God help me to embrace the freedom that comes from accepting those things that I would not have wanted at any price.

(Go listen to Duo Ubera by Giovanni Palestrina. Do it. Now. Your life will be better for doing so.)

You know, I'm just not sure how helpful dating really is for finding your future spouse. I mean it--I don't know if it's very helpful at all. I just got home from a date with an attractive woman, but it's clear it would be a mistake for me to pursue a relationship with her, though there are parts of me that would love to do so. I've got a second woman I'm thinking about, but I'm suspecting the same thing will be the case with her. It would be very easy to have a relationship with each--we could get along fine, I'm sure, and we could have a good time, but that's where things would stop.

Part of me is beginning to believe that I shouldn't even worry about "dating" per se, and completely trust God to reveal to me who my wife will be. If he can make the earth keep revolving day after day, He can certainly reveal my wife to me in His good time.

Where have all the men gone?

So I just went on a date tonight with a woman who was recently engaged to be married...to a real A-class, numero uno self-absorbed, narcissistic jerk. Leaving your sick fiancee asleep in O'Hare airport, while you get on the plane you're both supposed to be on together isn't acceptable behavior.

Are there a lot of men like that out in the world?

Unbelievable.

A Good Day

Today's turning into a good day--it appears I licked the cold that was nipping at my heels, thanks to plenty of sleep, vitamin C and Zicam. I was able to sleep in and come downstairs to an immaculately clean kitchen, thanks to my new found mother/daughter cleaning/support network. And it made me want to have some fun in the kitchen tonight for dinner. I'm not sure exactly what I'm going to be cooking, but I'm going to have some fun chopping and dicing, and doing it up right. I think I'll head to my favorite grocery store, The Fresh Market, and see what's in the store and come up with it when I see what they have in the offing.

And within the next hour or so, I'm off to coffee with another woman. We'll see how it pans out. I'm all spiffed and polished, and ready to chat with a delightful woman.

Then tonight, I think I'll light the first fire of winter, and actually enjoy a rare evening off and watch a movie, complete with popcorn with plenty of butter, and perhaps a bottle of wine.

The Woman Front

So I'm going on a date Thursday night. Surprise, surprise, especially on the heels of that last post. And more than that: I'll be going out with a second woman either this week or next as well, a woman who I met a couple of years ago and reconnected with just this past week. And there's even a third woman who someone is hoping to set me up with. I'll be emailing her in the morning.

We'll see what happens. There's just a slight problem: I seem to still be in love with my ex-girlfriend, even though it's been well over two years since we dated. I spoke with a wise friend and counselor of mine this week about Meg and I said that I find it hard to believe that I could ever love a woman more than I love Meg. I told him that I have felt that when indeed I could love a woman more than I love Meg, I would know I've found my future wife. He told me that it's quite possible that I would never love a woman more than I love Meg. I had never considered that possibility before but I realize that it may very well be true. I hope not, but if I use my love for Meg as the benchmark of whether or not someone else is worth marrying, I don't know if I would ever marry. And part of me thinks that if I can't find someone that I love more than Meg, I'd rather be single.

I suppose that all sounds rather melodramatic, but it's exactly where my heart is tonight.

Musings on Women and Dating

I received an email today that I feared would come. As I live my life as a bachelor, wondering when and if God will bring me a wife, I often think about the women I encounter who most certainly are asking the same question. Throughout my life I seem to attract occasional attention from women who are hopeful that I might ask them out, or who seem to hope that there might be a chance for a relationship with me. I'm reminded of a passage in Elisabeth Elliot's book, A Path Through Loneliness where a woman writes that God somehow had created a hedge of protection around her. She didn't necessarily like it, but it resulted in God protecting her from any romantic entanglements because, as she put it, all the men she was interested in didn't seem to know she existed, while the ones who were interested in her weren't her type. I feel the same way about most of my life and most of the women who have expressed interest in me. They're just not my type.

I saw a woman at our opera production this weekend who I used to know at one of the colleges I taught at for awhile. It was clear then that she was interested in me, and I think the fact that I made a point to say hello to her and catch up with her this past weekend caused her to think about the possibility again. I just received an email, hopeful that we could get together sometime, that she felt it was unfortunate that we hadn't had enough time to chat, etc.

I'm not going to do that because I don't want to send her the wrong signal. But I know she feels the pain of loneliness just as acutely as I ever have, probably more. It's not my job or anyone's job to salve that pain however. In fact, to get together with her because I know her pain would actually be a disservice. The answer for her, and for me, and for anyone, is to turn to Christ. That's why I think Elliot's book is so, so brilliant. If you know anyone who is single, divorced, widowed are is just struggling with what God wants to do in his or her life during this time of loneliness, have them read this book. It's amazing and powerful.

I also have decided I don't like it when women initiate things with me. That's my job, not theirs. Elisabeth Elliot writes about this too--if a woman initiates anything with me, that's a surefire sign that I'm not biting, ever. My job is to be the pursuer and the initiator and I don't want any woman to usurp that role from me. I think most men feel this way, or at least men who know what their God-ordained role as a man needs to be. Elisabeth Elliot speaks of this in her books on relationships, The Mark of a Man, Passion and Purity, and the latest book I read of hers, Quest for Love: True Stories of Passion and Purity. Incidentally, I hate the cover the latest edition of The Mark of a Man. It's hogwash, since the model they used is a GQesque model, perpetuating the mythic status of what the world thinks a man should be. Notice below the new cover compared to the original. Elisabeth Elliot wrote the book to her nephew, who is pictured with her on the front cover of the old book. Nothing spectacular about either of them--they are real people. Notice the chiseled features of the guy in the new edition. The very cover of the book is in direct conflict with all that Elisabeth Elliot writes in her book. I fall short of that sort of worldy ideal, and so I ripped the cover off of the book, (in admittedly Dan M. fashion). I'd prefer to be like Elisabeth Elliot's nephew Peter than this GQ guy, though I of course sure wish I was more handsome. But that's the lie of the world, isn't it? Shame on Revell for succumbing to worldy marketing in selling their book. They should have a picture of dowdy C.S. Lewis on the cover instead of this yahoo, who probably needs what's written on the inside of the book as much as anyone. Genes don't make a man a man.

Out of the Comfort Zone

I had one thing that I needed to do before I stop "doing the right things" in regards to finding a woman to share my life with. Last week I went to a local watering hole with my buddy Dave P. and I was completely smitten by our server, and I had the guts to tell her so. I screwed up the courage to ask her out, but she demurred somewhat and told me to put my number down and that she would decide to call or not.

I've been thinking about her quite a bit. She hasn't called, but I wanted her to know that I was in earnest. Dave told me that I needed to go back by myself, so I steeled my resolve tonight to do just that, but I decided to write her a letter as well. I didn't know if I'd see her or not, and even if I did, I figured a handwritten letter on on some really nice cotton stationery is something your average woman doesn't receive very often. Besides, in that sort of context, I'd rather rely on my written word than extemporaneous stammerings.

I almost didn't go in, because I felt silly, but I did anyway since I told myself that the best things in life have only happened to me when I've taken risks. Once I got in, I sidled up to that bar and had a couple of beers and contemplated how to close the deal and pass on the letter. I saw her once, and I think she saw me, and of course I manufactured a million reasons in my mind why she was freaking out that I was there. The whole time I was trying to figure out how to pass on the letter to her if I saw her again. All in all I was pretty uncomfortable thinking about why I had come, half ready to turn on my heels and walk out the door and burn the letter when I got home.

After awhile I started to get chatty with one of the other waitresses who kept coming up to the bar to fill her orders. I made her chuckle a few times and I began to formulate a plan in my mind. I figured that she could be my accomplice, so I worked on her a little more, chatting with her every time she came up. After I paid my bill, I waited for the right moment and asked her if she'd do a favor for me. I must have appeared conspiratorial because she leaned in really close and said yes. I told her she should only say yes after she heard what I was going to request. I then proceeded to tell her that I was in last week and had a server by the name of (get this...) Meghan, and that I was immediately smitten by her. I told her that I was sort of a hopeless romantic and that I had written her a letter, and wondered if she would mind passing it on to Meghan when she saw her. I told her that now I was embarrassed, and that at least they'd all have something to talk about tonight, but she agreed to pass the note on. I have to think it added a little excitement to an otherwise ordinary evening. I don't think it's every night that someone drops off a note like that, and if I know anything about women, they like the thought of something like that being done, even if nothing comes of it. I would imagine every woman would enjoy a random guy writing them a note like that, even if there was never any interest in the one who penned the letter. And that's what I said in the letter, that even if she wasn't interested in me, that I hoped receiving a letter like this would brighten her day. I told her she was beautiful and adorable, and that she should never forget it. I figure that's a nice letter to receive, even if she never calls.

I'm not holding my breath, but I'm glad I passed it on rather than turning on my heels and going home with my tail between my legs. It's out of my hands now, but all that matters is that I did it.