“life is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but comedy in long-shot” – Charlie Chaplin. so i guess this is a long shot. I’ve put off writing about him for almost a year now, but im not sure if it’s long enough to qualify as a long shot. nor did i ever come close, or did any tragedy happen in between. the very thin line separating tragedy and comedy tangles with the line stretching from short to long, and if we’re somewhere in the middle, there’s not even a name, an adjective, to describe or categorize it properly, just another “experience”. i also wanted to start with ‘I’m thinking of ending things’, but between us there was not much ‘things’ to speak of, i just thought i should stop this long-distance regular chat with him. I told myself, this is not good, me and him, we live very different lives, way apart, and the longer I keep myself hung up in this, the harder it will be to detach later. but it really feels like a relationship: everytime i decide to pull away, he would ‘sense’ it and sends something more profound than the everyday chitchats (which are already quite heavy contents, the Vietnam war, the current wars, fuck the US, communism, and Putin), like a long voice message or a picture of the moon! it’s as vicious a circle as any on-off relationships, to the point that i had to decide, “let’s ‘break up’”. But this really isn’t a break up, we’re not in any kinds of relationship – how do you call a prolonged intimacy (because i think sharing the hatred to recognizing your own accents from some random people on the street in a foreign country, and the resentment of a communist origin exploring freedom in capitalism, are very strong grounds to becoming intimate) between 2 strangers living 7 hours apart and only met once? On top of that, this would be the 2nd break up for me this year, that’s way above the quota. The guy is 100% my type. Tall and handsome, looks like David Beckham without the squeaky voice, caring and gentle, already has a daughter (yes, already have kids ticks a major box), studies anthropology, reads a lot, can quote Dostoyevky and Chekhov (because he’s Russian), and is an artist. I had a tingling feeling that I would have some interesting encounters in the trip right before I booked the flights, but didnt know it would be my airbnb host. No. 1 tip for 1st impression if you’re going on a blind date (because yes, it felt like a blind date, except we didnt plan to meet): pretend you’re fat. He asked what I would want instructions or help with during my 2 nights in the city, and I simply said: I love food. I knew he was hooked, right away, standing there with a spark in his eyes the moment he saw me at his doorstep when i arrived. stumbled around in his own apartment, confusing the bedroom with the kitchen, almost forgot the bathroom (got me worried for a moment, thinking, dude is it even your place?), and later managed to squeeze in a few hours to meet for a drink, after a few other suggestions to go see a show or go to his friend’s birthday party, amidst my busy schedule touristing the city. He has a studio, where he paints, very badly, and everytime looking at the photos of the works he sends, i feel a huge relief. Oscar Wilde: ‘all art is quite useless’. Me: ‘all art is fucked’. Particularly with music, i think there should be a study on the correlations between paintings and songs, or painters and singers: those who could sing can normally draw pretty well, which also means their lives are guaranteed to be very unpleasant. so since he’s not a very good artist, he’s not that fucked up. or so i hoped. i didnt have any measurement of how a fucked up he might be when he greeted me, standing very tall at the doorstep, sleepy eyes, stubble puppy face, fresh out of the shower, wet man bun. later i found out that it wasnt much of a bun, because his hair was so thin – or was it because his head was too big? – when i stroke through them with my fingers, waiting for the train on platform 8w. It was completely haywire. Another theory that i think should be made into academic papers: the stupider the brain, the softer the hair growing around it. His hair was dry and poky, hurt my palm touching it, not at all as soft as it looked and he might have had to to pull it up into a bun because it was too messy. i asked immediately: what happened to you? to which, as though aligning with my theory perfectly without having to say anything out loud, he responded: my brother died young. later: my other two half brothers from my dad’s side are being treated in the hospital and wont be able to go back to the war, because of their severe head wounds. recently in our texts, me: “the birds outside my window are way too noisy today!” and him: “i’m going to court in 2 weeks, having to deal with the paperwork for the upcoming resolution in regards to my daughter and my ex-partner”. after my 1st break up this year, i spotted a gray hair, right above the hairline of my forehead. if i successfully go through with “this second one” (but i think it’s very unlikely after he confided about his issue with the ex, an explanation for not being able to respond thoughtfully and at length to some of my messages), i might just have another shiny white hair. (to be continued, told you, it’s a long shot)