Poets, Artists and Madmen.

This weekend, for the first time in about eight years, I spoke with my ex Ash. I saw him at Burkhart's, and we did a lot of talking, hugging and kissing. There's still chemistry there. And we're older now. So I called him last night, and I hope he calls me soon. I'd like to see more of him.

In 1995, we sorta had a damaging, tumultuous relationship from Halloween to Christmas vacation at the University.

When we came back from Christmas break, I told him that I wanted to be a heterosexual Christian, and I stopped talking to him. I banned him from my e-mail when he would write me. My roommate once helped me kick him out of my room. I would leave a room if he entered it.

My ex-girlfriend Pam, telling me that I needed to do something symbolic to be rid of Ashley (who saw himself as god of his own universe and was frequently depressed) helped me burn a black trenchcoat he'd given me in the middle of the barbecue pit on Myers Quad.

I was a horrible idiot. I made everything dramatic because I didn't know what I wanted or who I was, and I didn't regard Ash's feelings in the matter. I only knew that I wanted to be away from him because part of who he was both excited and frightened me. And I didn't know how to deal with it.

He found out about my stupid, ridiculous, immature and hateful coat-burning, and Ash started to hate me, even though he wanted to be around me.

He ended up writing a poem about me, sending it to me. I liked the poem, found it flattering, but I didn't really want to be around him.

He slept around a bit, then had some sort of emotional breakdown where he didn't leave his dorm room or go to classes for two weeks. Then, he left school.

I, of course, went on to Welsh Guy, then my own emotional breakdown of sorts that summer.

Ash is doing better now. He owns a house. He's cut his hair. He's still tall and lanky. He wears glasses. And he still thinks. And he's still attracted to me, I think.

The poem he wrote about me in 1996 and another poem he wrote about me in 1998 were printed in his self-published anthology sometime this year. In his explanation for "Green," the poem he wrote about me during our breakup, he called me "someone who truly hurt me very deeply not because of what he did - but because of who he was."

I was trying to be something I wasn't. I was afraid of who I was. There was so much on the surface that I didn't like about Ash, the parts I did love were overshadowed. But there were parts of him - physical and emotional parts - that I loved.

He kissed me this weekend. And he told me that I still smelled the same.

His book is called So Bold.