Two girls discussing relationships, a guy named Ben. What would it be like to be in love with a guy named Ben? How would his name roll off your tongue, your mind? "I didn't know what I was going to do, so I decided to just throw myself at it." Is that like tumbling through a plate-glass window? Rolling down a hill? Talking about application processes, conference deadlines. In my mind somebody turns to me and says, I understand you.
Adam read it, smiled, and said: "I understand you."
Of course he does. He understands me better than anyone. He knows me better than anybody. It has less to do with being my husband than with being my best friend.
I'm flashing back on this time long ago, years before we were dating, when we went out drinking at some Irish bar in the city, in the Richmond, I think. We wound up so drunk that we were sitting on the sidewalk on Geary and he was brushing my hair. Then we made it back to the East Bay (shamefully, I drove -- something I haven't done for a long time and won't do again, this driving while messed up) and I dropped him off at his car. He was parked at Lake Merritt BART for some reason. I don't remember why and it's not important.
Five minutes after I dropped him off, my phone rang. I rarely hear my cell phone because it's always on vibrate, and I rarely answer it because I still hate cell phones and probably always will, but this time I heard it and I answered.
He'd made it home and had just gotten out of his car. "I wanted to make sure you made it home okay," he said. Then he leaned over and puked in the street.
"Sure," I said. "I'm just pulling up now." I was in downtown Oakland passing the City Center buildings. I was drunk and lying and driving, and I shouldn't have been doing any of those things.
I don't know why I just related that story. Stream of consciousness.
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