Lone and Bitter Trail...

So yesterday I had lunch with this guy who has been courting me, I think. He's a nice kid, if you go back to the post about out of the mouth of babes, he's the kid. He has take up to dropping by my office unannounced and to sit at the table in my office and work. I let him, as he's an undergrad and needs a quiet place to study. I sit at my desk with books and articles strewn about, writing and reading, working, while he sits on yonder table with his oversized headphones on studying. I catch him every so often peering over his glasses staring at me. It's a little uncomfortable, but he's a nice kid and a philosophy major. I've had major crush on Immanuel Kant since I first read, a Critique of Pure Reason as a freshman in college, as well as John Rawls. Turns out this kid has a similar crushes, we tend to joke and laugh about the categorical veil of ignorance and really how asbtruse that is. Anyhow, he comes by quite a bit. He asked me to come over and study with him several weeks ago, and I did, actually I had worked close to 80 hours that week, so I took copies of the DVD True Blood with me to watch on my laptop while he studied.

It was a pleasant visit, we sat on the patio behind the house he was at, I watched my DVD and he worked. Eventually, we got into a conversation about the paper he was writing on Shakespeare's Tempest. He then asked me to read his paper, which I did and quickly applied my PhD critical thinking skills. I gave him extensive feedback on style and substance, which led to a great conversation about Prospero's use of what the kid termed empathic power, or the right use of agency to influence and gently persuade.

The point of this is that the kid has been coming by my office a lot. He came by yesterday after his last final, and rammed his head into my back, I was sitting at my desk distracted by the music and my work. He then pulled a chair close to me and starting chatting. After an hour or so he asked me to have to lunch with him, I acquiesced. We got out sandwiches and took advantage of the break in the rain, when the sun peeped out and sat on a bench near the law school. I sat down and he sat down right next to me. This was odd, we've sat next to each other before, but he never sat that close. And he started, as he does, making me laugh. I think I enjoyed it. He then explained to me the type of guy he wants to settle down with, to an objective listener that description fit me. I was both delighted and taken aback. he then proceeded to touch me, he's never touched me. But this is all g-rated touching, I would even call them flirtatious touches. After about an hour, I told him I needed to get back to work and he convinced me to stay a little longer and we ended up watching Looney tune on my smart phone. Something about Elmer Fudd's laugh...

I went back to my office confused by this interaction. I was confused for two reasons: 1) I thought that I was not averse to getting into a relationship with a man, and 2) I thought I wasn't desireable. To the first point, I had settled within myself that I was ready for a relationship with a man. But the interaction yesterday, despite what it enlivened and quickened inside of me, seemed awry. Something was off. Perhaps it is the light of Christ with its faint glimmer pointing me towards righteousness (rightness with God) no matter how long and difficult the road. I conceded that point, it remains a quandry, but I feel I am more able to surrender without anger and resent. And to the second point, this is at the core of my addictive behavior, I have to constantly remind myself that I am loveable, that I am desireable, but I can't make others responsible for me feeling desireable. This must come from within. The more I recognize my inherent worth, the more I allow the love of God to permeate my being, and the more I strength I have to trudge the lone and bitter road, as did the Christ.