Relationship People

It's funny how you can forget about things you once said.

I was having coffee with a friend the other day, and she reminded me that waaaaay back when Goat and I were starting to date, I was freaking out and kept worrying that maybe I just wasn't a "relationship person." I'd had nearly 30 years of being mostly single, moving around, starting over, traveling the world, doing whatever I felt like whenever I felt like it, and I was really worried that being in a relationship would feel boring, tied down, stuck... although at the same time, on some level I may have been just a teensy bit worried that maybe I was actually incapable of being content. I suppose I could say that about a lot of my 20s, and for 90% of my friends. We were having adventures, exploring, making great friends, but always looking for what was coming next. I had a string of jobs I didn't enjoy, never felt like I had roots, I was always either moving or people were moving away from me. And even though it was exhausting, we weren't ready to stop, because we weren't really happy, or settled, where we were at.

What a difference a few years makes. Somewhere along the way last year, I woke up and realized I was really... content. It was a surprisingly delicious feeling. Not that I never wanted anything to change ever again, but I felt like I was finally on some paths, in work and in life, where I wanted to just keep going in those directions, and for once I wasn't thinking about jumping ship and overhauling life and wiping the slate clean and starting over somewhere else again. Meh, maybe it's a normal part of getting a little older. Or maybe everything kind of fed off each other, and I wouldn't have even thought about settling into a relationship if I hated my job and was still feeling the need to make drastic changes that could send me fleeing. Maybe I never really let myself fall for people I dated in other places because I had one foot out the door before I even started.

Anyhow, somewhere along the way I seem to have become one of those "relationship people." Go figure. Clearly, I miss Goat for a million reasons about who he is, but I also just miss the boring little life we had going. So it's very interesting to realize that about yourself, and then find that you're single again and not sure what to do next. I could revert to "old single mode," filling my time but avoiding roots... but I think it would be at the expense of my shiny new ability to be content. I think, somehow, it will all answer itself without too much angst on my part. Or at least I hope. Or at least, with less angst than I had five years ago about all these things.