And home again, Jeeves

Back from what wasn't exactly the best beach weekend ever. Lots and lots of rain, but I did get to sleep in some, and finished two books -- big ole hardcovers that I had lugged down with me, so I was glad to have read them both (if not the two other paperbacks I had with me, just in case). One was another Nora Roberts, Blue Smoke, and the other was Widdershins by Charles de Lint, which I really liked. It has that urban fantasy thing that I really enjoy, a la Holly Black, Neil Gaiman, and others. American and European mythology, all mixed up and living among us. I'd read a few others of de Lint's books, so it felt a bit like I knew the characters vaguely, or that I knew someone who knew them, which was a nice feeling to have. Oh! And he started the book with this great epigraph (not sure if that's the exact right word for it, but it's close), that I liked so much I'm quoting it in its entirely. If you like, you can go here and check out some of de Lint's other books set in and around his fictional town of Newford. (He's got an official site, too, but that only lists his complete bibliography, not the handy divisions that Wikipedia has). Anyway, enjoy:

Remember how it was when we were young? It was like a dance, couples pairing up, together one month, the next everybody has a new partner, sometimes from within your social circle, other times a stranger brought in, but there was always this ebb and flow, like a tide, as though dating and love were a game of musical chairs, except you played it with your heart.

As I've gotten older, I've found that we seem to divide into two camps: the ones who keep a partner and settle down, maybe have kids, maybe buy a house; and the ones who stay in the musical-chairs dance and end up living on their own, who are on their own for longer and longer periods of time until they grow to like their solitary lifestyle -- or at least accept it. Some keep a hope buried for that certain someone to fall into their lives, but nobody's really looking anymore. Or they're not looking hard.

It's hard to pinpoint exactly when that happens.

For me, hope runs eternal, even though my relationships never really work out in the long run. Maybe I set my sights too high. Maybe I'm just hopeless. I don't know. Or maybe I just never met the right woman, for all the times I thought I did.

Or maybe I did meet the right woman, but I never knew it and went out with her sister or her friend instead.

Or maybe I did know it, but I told myself it was never going to work out...