the problem with projecting...

One night when he was out, his eyes met hers across a crowded dancefloor. As much as he was trying to avoid being with anyone, in spite of himself, he felt it happening. As their eyes met once again, he lost himself in a montage of romantic projections. Do you know the kind I mean? It's the future one can paint, between oneself and a stranger.



I think of writing to my friend, of saying to stay clear, to proceed with caution. And yet...I can't blame him. My views may have changed on such matters, but I'd be lying if I said i didn't understand.

It's like when I hooked up with him, who I don't even talk to anymore. Waking up the morning after, wishing I had something other to wear than the cocktail dress from the night before. I remember, hazily recounting in my head, what was not an altogether satisfying sexual experience, and yet still, I was doing it again...

I watched myself making polite conversation in his minimalist mitte flat. My mind was elsewhere. I was secretly fantasising about future mornings. We would sit at this table, sip dark strong coffee, lazily finishing our breakfast while listening to nu soul or hip hop. He would talk about what meetings he had to get on with that day, and I would talk about gigs I had coming up.

Maybe days after we'd meet at some film screening, and I would be his exotic new girlfriend. I'd get on so well with everyone, they wouldn't even mind that I didn't speak much german. When he came to my gigs and met my friends, all the auslander girls would be impressed that I scored a german boyfriend. Everyone would remark on how compatible we were. It would all be so easy, so effortless. We'd be perfect together, obviously. .

And I would think all this, after I'd known him for barely 24 hours , just after walking through his door.

But this was just a way of fooling myself, embarrassed by the reality. This was just one in a series, of inconsequential one night stands, with someone I had met in that least romantic of places, a night club. In weeks to come, him or I, would consider the other's number, once on our phone display, as something to ignore..

The truth is, you don't have any idea of a future with someone when you meet them. And if I've learned anything, it's very very dangerous, to project.... Yes you may feel a click , a connection, a chemistry, but when its really relevant, charged with true potential, in that very moment, all you're feeling... is that moment.

You can't begin to think beyond it then.

It is those moments, with that person, where there's no room in your head to consider, to conceive what will follow: That in five months time, the hand that just extended for you to shake, will be curved around your waist as if it belongs there...

Because by then, it does.