This is intimacy: the trading of stories in the dark.

Zen masters say you cannot see your reflection in running water, only in still water.

When I get lonely these days, I think: So BE lonely, Liz. Learn your way around loneliness. Make a map of it. Sit with it, for once in your life. Welcome to the human experience. But never again use another person's body or emotions as a scratching post for your own unfulfilled yearnings.

Maybe it's just me but I would suspect that a man trying to impress a woman would be more likely to bring out the steak - "I killed this for you, now I'm grilling it for you."

he was still my romantic hero and I was still his living dream

Well, just remember--all your misery will be waiting for you at the door upon your exit, should you care to pick it up again when you leave.

Our relationship now thoroughly ruined, with even civility destroyed between us, all I wanted anymore was the door.