More of NeverTooLate

I couldn’t understand what happened. She told me she was ready and then all of a sudden she was taking everything back. The way I saw it, I had the right to get in touch with him if I wanted, but I also wanted to respect her and her decisions.  The way I saw it, I didn’t have to go along with what she wanted when it came to SinginInTheRain, but I had my reasons for not contacting him.

First, I was afraid that if I contacted SinginInTheRain, NeverTooLate would stop talking to me and second, that she could possibly try to sway him away from getting to know me. These people were strangers to me, even though I had been talking to NeverTooLate for six months at this point. At the same time, I also felt like it wasn’t fair to SinginInTheRain. The way NeverTooLate saw it, I was “her” thing, and that it really wasn’t his business. I think she was thinking about telling him as her husband, and not as my natural father.

I was at my wits end and wasn’t sure what to do. I asked my friends, my parents, anyone who would listen really. My friends all had different takes on it. Some thought I should go ahead and contact him on my own. They said that is wasn’t as if there were social standards for me to adhere to. Others thought I should be more patient. My parents were on this side of the coin. My mom especially thought I was being too pushy and should back off and not be so upset. Looking back on it now, I think my mom was afraid of what was going to happen if I got closer to NeverTooLate. I think my parents always thought I’d eventually get in touch with NeverTooLate and SinginInTheRain, but thought it would be a one-time thing, not a continuous relationship.

In the end, I decided to back off and give NeverTooLate a bit more space. I didn’t want to hurt her. As upset as I was, I was upset at the situation (note: this is how I viewed things at the time, as is the whole story, not always how I view things now). I didn’t want to try to judge NeverTooLate because I wasn’t in her shoes and didn’t know what she was going through. I’m a pretty understanding person, so I always tried to put myself in her shoes. I felt bad that she felt the way that she did.

Instead, I asked her if at some point over the summer we could talk on the phone. I figured that if we could talk in person, I could communicate with her better about why I thought it was important for her to tell SinginInTheRain. I thought that if she could just hear my voice, she would start to think of me as a person with thoughts and feelings, not just a computer on the other end of an email. She agreed to talk to me but rejected the first day I suggested. She had to wait until her kids weren’t around, and the summer wasn’t exactly the best time for that. She would have to call me from work. Then she didn’t mention it again for the rest of the summer. I was a little surprised but wasn’t sure what to make of it. Then the emails started coming at longer and longer intervals. She used to email me once a week, now she started emailing once every other week. She also stopped answering my questions. What I didn’t know at the time was it was the beginning of the end.