We lived on different continents and met online because of my job; it was just a simple exchange, barely long enough to be called a conversation. I left a message unanswered, not out of disinterest, but because life was moving too fast. And then, as quickly as he’d arrived, he disappeared from my days. I went to Argentina for a month, then to Miami to start something that turned disastrous and ended right there. Finally, a hurricane hit my town and destroyed parts of it.
Six months passed. I didn’t think of him. And yet one morning in February, my intuition — that wild, nocturnal thing that speaks to me only when the world is asleep — tapped me gently awake. Message him, it seemed to whisper.
So I did.
We connected in a way that felt like instant karma, like meeting someone from an old, unfinished chapter written in a life you barely remember.
Our interactions were intense from the beginning. He was one of the most special people I’ve ever met. What I felt with him was a delicious mix of warmth, curiosity, desire to know his mind, and wonder. He sent me the best songs. Think about Pat Benatar, Peter Ivers, Roxy Music, and Pulp. I still haven’t met another soul who knew so much aobut about pop music.
Oh, and he loved ABBA! («I’m not gay; I just love a good tune.»).
His voice… God. It resonated so deeply. On his good days, it was the perfect blend of a playful child and a gentleman of the 1800s. He felt like an old friend I had somehow misplaced. I once told him he was the friend I wanted when I was fifteen, the kind who would have changed everything. He laughed and told me he often felt as if he had been born in the wrong decade.
From the hundreds of messages we exchanged, I keep only one. In it, he’d sent me a voice note. There was a faint metal scraping sound behind him, and when I asked, he told me it was his cat eating leftover yogurt from the bowl he’d just put down.
He told the story while laughing, and then laughed some more. That voice note is a treasure. That belly laugh! It burst out of him, unrestrained and so alive that it still makes me laugh every time I hear it. It was joy in its purest form, a sound that could cross the Atlantic Ocean between us and still land warm on my skin.
I also keep a photo of him from his childhood. His beautiful blue eyes look a little sad in it, the kind of sadness children don’t have words for; it makes my heart ache. That child is still very present in him in such a raw, unfiltered way. I see him.
He had days when he was in a deep, dark place he wouldn’t share with me. He told me that once he had a dream in which I was begging him to leave that place and step outside, into the garden, into the sunshine. In the dream, I was wearing a long, white dress.
This is how I choose to remember him:
Full of life. Ridiculously silly. The most vivid imagination. Highly intelligent. Choosing amazing words that would leave me in awe. Laughing as if he were made of light. A passionate cook and the creator of the most unbelievably snack combinations. Stronger than he thinks. Cat dad. Loyal. Brave. Patient. Sensual like the feeling I get when lying on the grass in the sunshine or under the moon, when I remember I am a being made of earth and sky. The intoxicating smell of steam rising from the ground after rain. Serious. Loving himself in big and small ways every day.
I live a magical life full of synchronicities and whispers from the universe, and yet he was something extra, like an amusement park where I wanted to play for hours.
Be well, my beautiful friend. Wherever you are, whatever you are. You have always been perfect in my eyes, and I hope that, one day, you can see yourself as I see you. I’m just happy to know you exist on a green, cold, and remote island 🙃
I wish you so much happiness and health!
Sometimes, connections can’t evolve into relationships. Still, you can’t let something beautiful go unhonored. Some connections are meant to be catalytic, to awaken something in you.
They touch your heart so it can expand.
Have you ever met someone who felt instantly familiar, as if your souls had met before?
What brief connection changed you more than any long relationship ever could?
«We don’t measure love in time; we measure love in transformation.» (Jeff Brown)