Chapter 2 – The “L” Word

On Christmas Day, 2006, I flew to Italy. The destination choice belonged to my friend and travel partner, whose turn it was to decided where we would go next. Neither of us had been to Italy, but I feared it lacked the "adrenaline rush" I had tasted on our last trip, which had been to Southeast Asia. Italy seemed so tame by comparison, and I was looking for ways to bring a new twist to the journey.

I learned about the hospitality groups available, which consist of people all over the world that like to meet up with travelers. I joined one and contacted a couple of members in a city we'd be going through to see if they’d like to get together for a cup of coffee.

The response was a reminder of how wonderful the world really is. The group all got together, and threw us a dinner – just because we had gone to Italy. It was a strange and wonderful experience. They gathered at a local restaurant, and we had a lovely meal full of getting to know each other and much laughing. Then, we all walked to an after hours club for some more drinking and music.

It was on this night I that I first met Lo. While he was very nice, he was not the person I spent the most time talking to, or the person I would have guessed I would stay in contact with.
A week later, however, I found myself in London, heading to a party hosted by the London chapter of the same hospitality website. My friend had already flown back to the states; I was headed home the next morning.

When I walked through the doors of the bar, Lo was the first person I saw; there he was, in London. His eyes lit up and he greeted me happily:

"My love!" he yelled.

"My life!" I replied, playing along.

Some girls sat by, amused by our game. "You know each other?" one of them asked.

"Oooooh yes!" replied Lo – "We used to be married!"

"For a long time." I added, following his lead.

We proceeded to weave together a silly tale of true love and a blissfull wedding day, while the girls laughed and listened. Lo and I just seemed to know what the other one would say next, instinctively timing the lines to the other’s response.

"Why did you get divorced?" one of the girls asked.

"She’s very bossy." He sighed sadly, shaking his head.

"He smells!" I cried, in what I hoped was my most distressed voice.

From there we created the tale of how our love had faded. It was great fun, but still I thought little of it.

Over the next 10 months, however, our friendship continued through sporadic emails and updates and I grew to think of him as a good friend. By November, I decided I would spend my birthday (in late January) with my best friend, who lives on the other side of the country in Brooklyn. Without much planning or thought, I was shocked to hear myself inviting Lo to meet me in New York.

I was far more shocked when he said yes.

Our emails became more regular, and our time on Skype began to build up. He was funny and sweet and I loved that we could play off each other so well – and it also made me feel good that he laughed at my jokes with such delight. With the power of technology he was able to use a webcam to not only give me a tour of his apartment, but also show me his woefully stocked refrigerator. The weeks were passing quickly and I was really looking forward to our trip to New York.

In the beginning of January, just a few short weeks before we should be leaving, Lo found out that he needed either a visa or a new electronic passport to gain entry to the US. This was a shock to us both, since I had only needed my regular passport to go to Italy, and had assumed it would be a reciprocal system. He immediately paid for an expedited new passport, but I knew it wouldn’t come in time. By then, through the passport issues, I had realized with a shock how badly I wanted to see him. I was sure it was hopeless.

The day before I left for New York, I woke up to find an email waiting from Lo with the subject line of "GOOD MORNING!!" Upon opening the email, I found a photo he had taken of himself, smiling hugely, with his new passport up to his face.

He bought a ticket that morning for the very next day; he was coming to New York.

He’d never been to North America before, so I went to meet him outside of immigration at JFK. As he walked out the doors, I couldn’t breath; he seemed so happy, so handsome…and I knew I was lost.

It was a magical trip. My friends all adored him, and he thought they were great. We stayed with my best friend and her boyfriend, and the four of us fit each other perfectly. For my birthday he presented me with large bouquet of flowers, and gifts brought from Italy.

Some evenings, we’d all play cards. My friends taught Lo and I how to play "Bullshit". I decided the best way to play was simply never to lie – if you always told the truth, I reasoned, you could never get in trouble. Lo refused to believe my claims, and time after time he called me out on the cards I put down – only to lose, to my delight.

I was feeling quite good about this until, during a lag in play when my friend had gone into the kitchen and her boyfriend was momentarily on the phone, Lo turned to me with a disappointed look of concern on his face and whispered,

"You take no chances."

I was shocked, and hurt. I knew that it was true – I don’t take any chances. I always felt that if I had a small piece of something I loved, I couldn’t take a risk that might lead to me losing that little bit I already had. I was always so sure I would lose if I risked anything; the idea of doing so seemed like sheer folly.

I had not, however, realized that the trait was so deeply embedded in me that it would present itself in how I played a card game. He was right. I had chosen the one technique where no chance - at all - was taken.

We said nothing more about this, but it weighed heavily on me through our last two days and our saying goodbye. I realized for the first time in my life, that perhaps I wanted something – ALL of something, badly enough to take some risks. And what I wanted, right or wrong, was Lo.

So I returned back home and began what would be nearly a year’s process of preparing myself for my first, and perhaps last, real attempt at risk. We agreed I would come to stay for 3 weeks over Christmas and New Years, and I went to work, preparing to take the biggest chance of my life.

I quit smoking, because I knew that as nice as he was about it, he hated it. I began trying to learn Italian.

This is also when I made the final decision to have the ablation done. There was no way I was going to allow myself to have one of my out of control periods during my three weeks at his house. Also, while I never dreamed that the hymen would turn out to have been my real problem all along, I did realize that the surgery would in effect "pop my cherry". I felt any portion of pain I could remove from the sex equation, regardless of how minor, was a step in the right direction.

I reasoned that at the end of the surgery, at least something would have passed through my vagina once, and hoped this would have to make a favorable difference.

How could I have known that the surgery would remove my 36 year issue all together?

So, my body is healing. I am able, for the first time in my life, to have sex. I am nicotine free. I quit soda. I know how to say "goose" and "duck" in Italian.

I leave for Italy in 140 sleeps.