On holiday.

My nickname-less friend, a.k.a. My Black Brother who's not black a.k.a. Miss Gibson's Surprise Mystery Visitor a.k.a. the Harvard Alabaman, is, I believe, in the air on the way to visit Miss Gibson in London. Since I know they'll likely read this because they're two of the three people who do besides me, I'm going to send them well wishes.

Have a good time, both of you.

While I was packing this weekend, I found an old letter from Welsh Guy, my best ex-boyfriend. The letter had been written in May of 1996, about one month after he visited me in Athens.

In it, he wrote to remind me that he loved me. He wrote to remind me that, though parting had been hard on both of us, the experience that we had at the time was valuable, the sort of thing that you always treasure no matter how old you get. He told me that we'd always stay in touch, which we haven't, but I haven't forgotten him or the time I had with him. And I doubt he's forgotten me.

Occasionally, life gives you a break. It gives you this moment of enchantment to spend with someone you connect with and care for, and I think the truly passionate and truly blessed are the ones who run with those moments, in spite of and yet aware of the consequences. Those enchanted moments are worth the risk, the potential hurt, the passion.

I'm not used to writing about this sort of thing, so forgive me if I become a bit cliched. But the only time I felt willing to abandon myself and truly risk falling deeply, unreasonably in love with someone was back in 1996. His name was Paul, and, though I probably won't see him again and probably shouldn't, his memory is burned into my brain.

Paul's letter said our relationship wasn't a holiday romance because we'd known each other long before we'd met physically. But I've not seen him since.

I knew it was love because, even though I could see the problems ahead of us, I didn't think there was any other choice but the one in front of me, to hug him and hold him and take care of him and let him do the same for me for as long as we could.

First love is weird. It echoes in your life. It's gone, but you don't ever let it go.

Kacoon says real love lasts. Kacoon says I've never known love because none of my love attempts has endured. Kacoon holds up her marriage to me sometimes, without even knowing that she's doing it and without knowing that it stings me a little, and says to me that I've never really been in love because I've never had a relationship like hers.

She's right a little and wrong a little.

(Kacoon is the same woman who said that an enduring love like her marriage would also help someone better understand and appreciate The Matrix Reloaded's endless orgy dance scene, so you can determine her credibility as a modern-day romantic philosopher right there.)

I've never known an enduring love, but I have known love. An enduring love hasn't been offered to me yet, but love was offered to me and to Welsh Guy.

And we, because we liked each other in an unexplainable way different from anything we'd felt before, took it on the terms it was available and enjoyed it while it lasted.