EPHEMERAL

I harbor few illusions.

Of those that I do allow myself—for all of the dreams and visions, the starry-eyed supposing, whatever the figments, the filaments, or the flights of fancy—most tend to involve the trappings of rock stardom. Were it only the case that I had been born with pipes, or blessed with an innate comprehension of the pentatonic scales, then you and I might be having a different conversation. I might be off touring the country from the back of a beat-up van, but in that case, this would surely be a different kind of blog.

Never mind that I am able to play the guitar. Forget for a moment that I am not exactly tone deaf. Ability is something far removed from aptitude, and so these two facts, even added up together, do not in my case equal talent. Rather than playing to sold-out rock cathedrals, instead of strutting across some far-away stage, or roaming before a rack of amplifiers, all the while wielding a Gibson or a Gretsch, it has become my predilection—my proclivity, even—to express the ways in which I’m feeling with a pen.

It’s a pretty decent gig, if you can get it.

Though I enjoy what it is that I do, don’t think for a moment I’ve been tricked into believing that this penchant for the written word amounts to anything more than a useful tool. (I’m quite good at writing thank-you notes. It’s in the sending of those notes that I am absolute and complete rubbish.) Despite the delusions heretofore mentioned, I have never allowed myself to suppose that the writing of this blog will wend some sort of existential uptick. Mind you, I do enjoy it. This blog provides the occasional outlet, and the thought that people even bother to read the stuff that I might write down will tend to elicit its own particular thrill. It's just that I’ve never expected these words, however they may be, to have any discernible bearing on, or in any way serve to burgeon, the prospects of my dating life.

Not that I find the concept inconceivable.

The title of this blog is derived from a short story that I started, once upon a time, but never found a way to finish. When the thought occurred to apply it here, I was solely motivated by thoughts of insinuation. I was more interested in concerning myself with what notions and ideas that the title might elicit, and less with the actual intent. In truth, the whole thing was a bit of an attempt to set people up. An Open Letter to the Girl I'm Going to Marry? It wasn’t just that I had a hunch some others might wonder; it was something I expected.

What happened next, I could not have predicted.

When the time came to scribble down the starting points, those opening lines of OLGGM, I found that all remnants of subterfuge had gone. Any hints of skullduggery had long ago left the building. Blame it on that part of me that grew up just a bit punch-drunk on a few too many Disney movies, but I had gone and fallen for the very trap that I myself had set. I was the one who had started to wonder. I had begun to ask the questions, to feel hopeful. Moreover, I was migrating towards the point of belief. An Open Letter to the Girl I’m Going to Marry somehow became exactly that—the very conversation that I wanted to be having, and with an audience of only one.

If there’s a problem with any kind of honest statement, it is that it has the tendency to sound somewhat romantic. You could be stating fact. The girl sitting across from you might indeed have bright, blue eyes, and yet the mere utterance of such an observation is likely to be taken as a compliment, as a sign that you’re certainly into her.

When I say that this became for me a chance to write to someone, to the "one," whomever she may prove to be, I’m not looking to score points. It might sound all kinds of quixotic, but before we fall too deeply, too completely, let me take you back, close to the beginning of this post. While I would allow that stranger things have happened, this site isn’t around to serve as some sort of online single’s bar. It was never meant to be a way of meeting somebody.

Of course, there are things in this world for which we can’t predict, let alone prepare. That’s what makes this life so very interesting.

So while I never would have imagined that this might be the kind of thing that would connect with complete strangers, I am glad to know it has. While I could not have foreseen the circumstances in which people would reach out, from places far away, offering up comments or heartfelt accounts of how and why they reacted to a post, I am grateful to hear from each and every person, all of those who have stopped and taken the time to write.

It was never my intention, to craft some sort of epistolary pick-up line. Then again, as it has been said before, weirder things have happened.

I hear the stories of countless individuals, all of whom meet people online and then go on to get married. It’s just the way things tend to work nowadays. Whereas my parents met through more ordinary circumstances, and while I may have expected a similar thing, at least once upon a time, I’ve got to own up to my own expectations: Never have I wanted to lead a life that could be described that way.

Maybe it comes to be that this effort leads to a circumstance, to an instance or a moment, and perhaps it is that spot in time that is destined to make all of the difference. If nothing more, I have been given an outlet to express myself, to relay bits of these thoughts, these feelings. Though ephemeral and altogether fleeting, they seem real every time that I sit down to write, and I now have an avenue by which to share them with others, to work them out on paper.

This blog began as an exercise, as an outlet, as a way of flexing those muscles that I seldom get the chance to ply. It was supposed to be a place for me to press a pen to a loose-leaf sheet, and a way by which to help help my closest friends avoid the clogging of their inboxes. Along the way, it has developed into something more. I feel that it has veered onto its own distinct path, and in the end, it has taken on real meaning—for me, most of all.

From an early age, I would imagine we all wonder. Who is she, where is she, and when might I find her? Those are answers I cannot supply, but here and again, every now and then, the thought of her is on my mind. Because of those who read, because of those who pay attention, this remains an opportunity to put a particular experience to words, to share in the circumstances that so many of us undergo and struggle with, and to relay the often conflicting emotions that so many of us feel.

I appreciate the fact that anyone would listen. It means something to me, to have the chance not only to sit down and write, but to possibly reach an audience. At the rate that I’ve been writing, though, it might seem as though I’m taking this circumstance for granted, that I'm eschewing the support. While it might sometimes appear as thought I don’t appreciate all of those who read, who choose to pass these entries on, who opt to recommend OLGGM to all of those they know, nothing could be further from the truth.

None of those among us can know how this tale might end, but it would seem to me that with this, I’ve signed up to the telling of a story—to the fulfilling of a certain expectation, on a more consistent basis, and with the hopes of ultimately seeing it through.

Though it has been said before, it deserves another mention. I appreciate the fact that anyone would listen, and I value that you might take the time to care. If these scribblings sometimes matter to you, if these entries and random posts of mine are, on occasion, the kinds of things that you value, then rest assured...

I promise to do better from here on in.