Well - Part XVIII

The ensuing several weeks passed with a brevity that indicated an air of familiarity and contentment. This was an amazing turn of events at least to me. I saw Cheryl three times in the next two weeks. Twice on weekends (once in the city and once in Danbury) and once, surprisingly, out on Long Island at the Nassau Coliseum. We saw one play, a movie and a concert by Lou Reed.

Each meeting was a joy (from my perspective) that rivaled anything that had transpired within my life over the previous ten years. I was certainly feeling blessed during these following two weeks.

As is often the case, when something like this is transpiring, all things seemingly unrelated seem to be going equally as well. My job seemed to be less of a chore, the other mundane items that everyone wrestles with were moving along with less than the usual amount of participation / frustration on my part.

Cheryl too seemed to relish the experiences. She often mentioned that the times between our meetings were “ok” and “nothing much happened” but, she was very animated when we were together often going into long diatribes on a variety of subjects. We would debate the events of the day. Talk about how much we liked this artist or that musician. Banter about the relative merits of the NY Daily News versus the NY Times.

We had yet to even kiss. It seems we were comfortable in all other aspects of our relationship but we assiduously avoided any overtures towards physical intimacy. For my part I was perfectly content with this. I simply enjoyed connecting with a friend whom I hadn’t even knew I had. We had many similar interests and views. The lack of any kind of romantic element only seemed weird if I thought about it. It was the only subject I was reluctant to bring up in our conversations.

On our fourth “date” we chose to head down to the South Street Seaport in the city. Cheryl seemed to be gathering a comfort level with coming down and spending time in the city. We were just going to do some shopping. The holidays were coming so this seemed like this had some practical aspects to it. I had plans to steer us up into Chinatown later in the afternoon for an early dinner.
After we had gathered a number of packages each, it seemed prudent to take a cab rather than walk through Chinatown with the bags and one bulky box that contained a coffee grinder that I had latched onto as a gift for my sister from one of the specialty stores. During the cab ride uptown, we had placed the packages on the far end of the cab and were seated closely together on the bench seat. I was regaling Cheryl with a story regarding my office mates when she leaned into me and kissed me.