I have a new lover.

“What’s his name?”
“Valentine.”
“Where do you find these people…”
“I don’t know… they find me!”

I first met Valentine at Deep’s bar when they were having a special rum night last September. Newly single, i was chirpy and happy to hang out with friends and have a good laugh. Val and i hit it off straight away cos we’re both mischievous and cut from the same cloth. We laughed heaps at the bar and he said, “I feel like kissing you.” I remember leaning back in my bar seat with one palm up and said, “Please don’t! I just got out of a relationship!”

I told him my plans to travel to South America later this year, and how i was just going to have lovers until i decided whom i should marry in a couple of years’ time. I mean… i just say that but who knows what will happen in the future -_- Maybe i will end up not marrying at all.

A few weeks later, we hung out just the two of us. And again after that. He finally did try to kiss me and i let him. And then this whirlwind of a romance unfurled most naturally… We’d end up calling each other after work every day and run off to play by meeting at various bars. There was this one beautiful moment i will always cherish in my memory, when we were both dressed up and sitting in a quiet corner at 61Monarchy. A jazzy love song was playing. I looked up at him, he looked down at me in the most affectionate manner, tilted me back with his hand behind my waist, and we kissed. I felt like i was in a romance movie.

I changed his name on my phone to Princess Aurora and put her cartoon picture, cos he kept passing out all over my apartment every time he came over. It’s prollie cos he’s tired from work and felt safe in my space. But that doesn’t stop me from taking pictures of him every time, amounting them to a decent collection by now. (Actually, a lot of friends love falling asleep here. Either the energy must be very calming or i’m really boring.)

The first time he napped in my apartment one Friday night, i poured myself a glass of wine and sat on the sofa, watching him fast asleep on my yoga mat on the living room floor. I felt this gigantic surge of love for him, and the strangest thing happened. I felt these emotions of loving him, then being with him, going through a whole cycle of being in a relationship with him, and then breaking up, and then letting go. All i was doing was SITTING there and i felt a lifetime of emotions squashed into 10 minutes. I felt all this love and pain, and i started crying… it was ridiculous. I can’t believe i’m crying over a guy i just met, and he’s lying there fast asleep! I looked up at the universe, Really? You couldn’t give me a break for awhile? Who is this person?!

We both agreed that we’ve been together before, loving each other before, in some way in the past.

I don’t think all my friends approve of him, but i don’t care. I want to see him and spend time with him. So many internal lessons have been surfacing for me since we’ve been spending time with each other.

The first lesson i was learning, and am still learning, is attachment. The theme of attachment kept coming up in my space late last year – tarot card i drew at Ohanajo, on IG, and in this Tibetan book i randomly open to read sometimes. The lesson in the book reads that human suffering is caused by attachment. Attachment to anything and everything around us – things, people, situations, our expectations. I agree with it… that every time i felt pain was because i was being attached to an idea of how i wanted something to take place, or exactly how i wanted someone to be. In this case, i was trying not to be attached to an idea of how i wanted him to be, because who he is is already why i love him. I am learning how to accept and embrace him and everyone around me for exactly who they are. Everyone is already perfect in their imperfect ways.

I was also trying to release the attachment of a label, like ‘girlfriend’. I didn’t want to call him my boyfriend… plus that leads one to think it might head towards marriage. “Marry me,” he said, “We make a great team. We’ll make beautiful children. You can stay at home and finger paint for all i care.” I feel my heart ache every time he asks. Baby thinks i’m absolutely crazy, and said i should just marry him. I’ve been repeating my truth to him… that i feel my calling to venture to Cuba, and this (kinda annoying) premonition about ending up with someone else.

I told him from the beginning that i’m not his girlfriend, and that he can see other people because i shouldn’t stop him from having connections with others, “just have the courtesy not to tell me about it,” cos i didn’t want to know. At the time i was like, oh great, now i’m in an open relationship? I really don’t plan these kinda things to happen to me, they just… happen -_-

I much preferred him to refer to us as lovers, cos that’s what we are. We’re just in this thing together because we love each other, and i have taken on some roles that probably define me as ‘girlfriend’ but i’m just dispelling the whole label thing (still) for now. I find myself doing things for him that i do just because i love him… and i don’t expect anything in return. Like supervising his cleaners once cos he can’t speak Malay, and helping him buy all these cleaning products he never realised he needed cos it just isn’t his forte.

“That’s too much effort, i prefer to have low maintenance men,” Dianthus said to me today.
“I know…” i gave up trying to explain myself.

Since today is Valentine’s Day, i figured what better day than to commemorate this guy who has been giving me a lot of love.

I’ve never been big on Valentine’s Day (with my past posts bringing up stories about letting an ex go gaming with his buddies, or staying in to avoid the crowds) but this year, it does seem extra special cos i’m spending it with Valentine… and Yishyene.

It’s the only night Yishyene has available to spend with me before she heads back to Europe, so i convinced Valentine that if he wanted to have dinner with me, he’d have to have dinner with her too, “Take it like a 2-for-1 deal!”
“Are we going to have a threesome?”
“… *actually thinks about it for a millisecond* … no.”

For now, i’m having the grandest time with him, and he with me.
We can be 100% ourselves around each other, and have a lot of laughs while at it.

In his words, “Till the wheels fall off.”

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