Sex with Harriet Miers

Just kidding. Really.

One of the great things--to my mind, one of the two greatest things (the other being the enhanced ability to avoid talking on the telephone)--about the Internet is tracking down former acquaintances, girlfriends (and/or boyfriends), lovers, enemies, fishing buddies, priests, or whoever. I've had pretty good success at finding former roommates from graduate school; one guy teaches in New York, one guy teaches in Florida, one is a liaison between the gay community and the healthcare community in Los Angeles; one is a PR flack in NYC, one is some kind of consultant, also in NYC.

I've missed finding a few; there was a woman in college that I almost literally lost my mind over; we actually had two dates, then she told me she couldn't see me anymore because it was clear she made me too nervous. So I got really drunk one night and called her to apologize for thinking she was too good looking. Needless to say, she's hiding from me, somewhere in Texas I think; as is another woman, who I guess got married and changed her name. There is also my old junior high girlfriend, who I did find and e-mailed a very innocuous note (to wit: "I just wrote to say 'hi.' Hi."). She, I'm pretty sure, thinks I'm still a maniac, and didn't write back. Little does she know that I am a maniac, but a much different kind than I used to be. Given the big fat loser she married, I think maybe this is part of a consistent pattern on her part of lacking curiosity and/or being willing to challenge, even minimally, our bourgeois notions of decorum.

I just like to find out what happened to them, really. This isn't a midlife crisis; anyway, if I have one of those, I figure it will involve a new banjo. (I believe, however, that my wife--who doesn't seem to read this [but if she does, hi honey!] thinks the last guitar I bought--yes, a Collings D2H that completely kicks ass--was my midlife crisis, and so thinks we're all done with that.)

One of the most gratifying reunions was with a woman who was a year ahead of me in high school, who I shall call "Fumiko" for no particularly good reason. She was really quite beautiful, very smart, and very, well, interesting. (Yes, I know--because I tell my students--that the least interesting word in the English language is "interesting.") She just had a different approach to things, seemed curious in ways that few of our fellow students were, and was an artist (she's turned out to be a fine artist, by the way.) Needless to say, I was madly in love with her, but so unbelievably timid and intimidated by her that I could barely talk to her, let alone ask her out; possibly it was the age difference, which between jr. and sr. in high school can seem vast. On the other hand, I did end up going out for a fairly longish time with another woman a year ahead of me, who we can call the Lutheran. The Lutheran was also kind of good looking, and definitely smart as hell; but the whole conservative Missouri Synod religious nonsense kind of interfered, plus she also thought I was kind of a maniac. While being a maniac was what attracted her to me, it also prevented us from ever being all that serious about each other. The sex stuff wasn't happening either; perhaps I was saving myself for Harriet Miers?

In any case, to wrap up this boring entry, which is really written almost solely for myself (and Fumiko, who will probably read this), she turns out to be married with kids, 50, and--according to her--weighs more than she wishes and has wrinkles. Of course, the image I have of her remains a gorgeous 17 year old, ready to take on the world (if not, necessarily, St. Louis). We have talked a fair amount over the last couple of months; she is very wise, and although she denies it, seems very grounded. Her life sounds quite fascinating; she lives in a very cool part of the US, she's lived in other places around the world, including Sri Lanka, and she still follows (although probably not with sufficient intensity) the University of Kansas basketball team. The poignant moment was when she told me that if I had asked her out in high school, I would have been--her words--the "main event." Personally, the whole thing reminds me of quantum mechanics.

The moral of the story, for my non-readers, is that it is fun to go Googling for old acquaintances and see--as Robert Frost might put it--how they have lived without you. Some may blow you off, and some may write and say "You still owe me $12.73, you bastard"; but some might, with the passing of the years, find the whole relationship/friendship worth pursuing and, with that perspective, of remarkable value.