Meh. I brought work home with me tonight because I�ve been less than stellarly productive at work this week, but do you see me doing it just yet? Not yet! I�ve been watching (you guessed it) Law and Order and chatting with Keith and I�m just grumpy about my non-date.

What happened was is that this guy called me yesterday (I�d given him my number something like a month ago, yet this was the first time he ever called me; he never offered his number in return, that should have told me something) and suggested we get together for coffee tonight, and I figured, hey, what�s the harm, why not? If nothing else, I should practice, practice, practice for this interaction-with-single-straight-men thing that I�m still so woefully clumsy at. So we agreed to meet at 6:00 at a caf� at 81st and Columbus.

Well, I showed up at 81st and Columbus at six, and no caf�. I called information and it turns out that the caf� was at 87th instead, which frankly annoyed me � I wouldn�t ordinarily have minded the walk except that it was raining and cold (and I didn�t have a jacket) and I was wearing spectacularly non-sensible shoes (to look good on this damn date) and it took me forever to get there (okay, not that bad, only 15 minutes between calling 411 and fielding a phone call from Keith and figuring out where I was going and struggling with my backpack when the straps came undone.. ugh!) So it was about 6:15 when I showed up at the caf� and lo and behold, no one was there. You see, I made the mistake of agreeing to meet him without having seen a picture, which I have done before; however, he also didn�t tell me what he looked like � somehow I wound up hanging up the phone (without a number to call him back) without having much more than a vague verbal sketch of his appearance from his profile to go by, not even a �I�ll be wearing [fill in the blank]� But he�d seen my picture, so I figured that he�d at least be able to recognize me, and he�d have to be the one to approach me. But I sat and drank my (not very good) coffee until 6:45 and absolutely no show. I�m not so disappointed because as I�m writing this out, it doesn�t sound like it would have worked out all that well anyway, if he wasn�t even gonna give me a number to call, but I�m damn peeved at having wasted the time. I didn�t get home until almost 8:00. And when I went to go donate blood last week the computers were down and they told me to come back; I could have donated tonight instead. Meh.

Last night I went over to Cristin�s to work on our family tree of the Greco-Roman pantheon last night, in preparation for Grove on Saturday. I haven�t been to Grove in ages, because of vacation and holidays � I�m so out of touch! But we had a good time, cutting out pictures of the gods and goddesses and taping them to blue posterboard (the picture of Persephone was lovely; I feel somewhat proprietary of her) and she and Kaleb (her fianc�) always make me feel so at home when I visit. Kaleb made homemade pizza with mushrooms and caramelized onions, and popcorn with melted chocolate drizzled all over it, yum! I totally need to start cooking again; Kaleb�s inspired me. They also have three cats (most of whom I never see), and a dog � a Chihuahua/Jack Russell mix with an underbite, named Dino. It�s the funniest thing; you can hug and pet him all you want, but if you kiss him on the head or back (or anywhere, I guess, but I didn�t try anywhere else), he starts growling! It was a good night last night.

So my sister-in-law is due to give birth practically any day now; her official due date is the 25th, but word on the grapevine (i.e., my dad) is that it could be much earlier. Originally I was going to go up to visit right away and spend the night at their place for a couple of days (I think this was at my brother�s invitation; it was a while ago that we discussed the details), but Aimee decided it would make her crazy to have overnight guests right after going though labor, and dealing with postpartum hormones and breastfeeding, which I can completely understand. So what I�m thinking of doing is taking the cheap Chinatown bus to Boston, getting a bed in a hostel for a few days, and doing some sightseeing during the days, and visiting Marty and Aimee and kids during the evenings. (I have a few vacation days left over from the summer that I need to take sooner rather than later.)

I haven�t been to Boston for more than a day or two since 1997 (Shalini and I were visiting Lisa and we were hanging out at the Boston Beer Works and we were all really drunk when the news came on that Princess Di was killed in that car accident and we were all maudlin from the beers and the atmosphere more than genuine sorrow), and I really did love Boston � it gave me my first real taste of adult independence; it was the first city I fell in love with. For years I�ve been operating with this veneer of I�m a New Yorker, of course no other city could possibly compare, and of course there really is only one New York, but San Francisco (oh, my glorious city on the bay!) knocked me off of that pretension, and lately I�ve been feeling sentimental about Boston as well. I think that it just hurt too much to think of going back for years; so much of Boston for me consists of the streets and the shops and the parks and the landmarks where I loved Brian #2 so much.

We spent many a weekend on Newbury Street: the Trident Caf�, where we would get French toast with powdered sugar and green apple slices on the side; the pet store (Newbury Pets) where we would stop in regularly to coo over the puppies (the store pet was a stoic Bouvier des Flandres that would merely tolerate my affections); the gourmet ice cream parlor (across the street from Tower Records, or close enough) with the booths shaped like tea cups and the cowhide d�cor. We strolled the city and rode the T: we went to the beach at Wonderland (on the end of the Blue Line) and rode the E branch of the Green Line past North Station to go to the Museum of Science and the mall at Lechmere. We walked to the Prudential Center (in his dorm rooms, I would look out the window to look at the red light blinking on top of its tower every night before bed) and window-shopped at the tony stores we couldn�t afford to buy anything from. We would walk through the Fens on sunny spring and crisp autumn days; we would sit at the edge of the reflecting pool at the Christian Science Center (where I once � blush! � briefly and illicitly indulged him in his obsession) at twilight and talk and talk and I remember one night as we flanked the edge of the pool, under the darker shade from the trees, he grabbed me and spun me around and kissed me, clear out of the blue and I loved being in the middle of the city in the middle of that kiss.

I don�t miss him one bit, even though these reminiscences may make it sound like I do. But I was 18, 19, 20 years old, in love for the first time, even though the entire time that love was tainted with the constant fear of losing him. Once I did lose him, I would have called the next two years in Boston bittersweet except that the pain was too great to be anything but bitter. The streets and shops and parks and landmarks did nothing but remind me of what I�d lost, taunt me about what I could never again hope to have, and yes, I�m being overwrought and melodramatic � but that�s what Boston was to me and my broken heart at 20, 21, 22, until I left.

I imagine my going back. I suspect that I will go to Copley Square and the Common and maybe even Newbury Street (perhaps the air will be a touch more crisp, I may need a jacket, the trees might begin to hint at their coming color), and that as I walk, the autumn air will be tinged with melancholy and a sweet sadness for that hopeful girl in love I was ten years ago. Perhaps I will even grieve a little for how I have kept myself from coming back to Boston for fear of facing these ghosts, and then I will celebrate for coming back nevertheless. I will welcome the new baby � new life and new love � and I will hopefully get to meet my newest friend Brian and visit my old friend Lisa, and all the while I will remember how much of Boston I loved all on my own, fo in some ways I am very much a solitary person. It was in Boston that I first learned how much I enjoyed going to movies alone (quite by accident at first!) On days off from school I would sneak off by myself and ride the Red Line from Cambridge to Boston; as the subway came out of the tunnel to cross the Charles, I would always catch my breath in a little gasp at the beauty of the skyline studded with skyscrapers.

So this September, I will go back and fall in love with Boston again and alone; not as the girl I was then, but as the woman I am today.

Overwrought and melodramatic? You bet.