Oh man. Great time with the Special Guy last night. We met at the Original Espresso Bar on Christopher Street (site of the first laying on of eyes). Tongues dueled furiously between sips of iced coffee. Then we headed out to dinner, and were promptly caught in a downpour. Both of us agreed that it was 'kinda nice.' While taking refuge under the awning of the flower guy at Christopher and Bleecker, we necked some more. He bought me a single red rose (a first... no one has ever...). Then, he said, 'You wanna be boyfriends?"

"Oh man," I said, "I totally wanna be boyfriends with you."

The rain let up. We headed to K-Bar. Great dinner. Amazing conversation. He told me about his religious experience at the age of five. I told him about my dad standing me up when I got him tickets to see Jessye Norman for Christmas. He told me about getting picked up in a basilica in Florence. I told him about my karmic footstool theory. (Briefly, all of us have a karmic flaw that trips us up again and again, like the footstool that Rob Petrie would trip over on the Dick Van Dyck show. You can determine the footstools of people you know well, but all of us are ultimately blind to our own footstools. Nice, huh?)

Oh, and I established a ground rule. Special Guy has to like my friend, the Baron of Philadelphia. Baron and I go back 15 years. When I was with my Ex, every time I would get together with one of my friends I'd spend the next 3 days defending the friend against a fervrent attack from my Ex. So who needs that. Eventually I just decided it would be easier not to do the friend thing. After I split with Woe-is-him, Baron was my first phone call. He was thrilled and we quickly renewed our friendship, but Baron exacted from me a promise that I would never again let some man come between us. And that's fine. I'm wiser now. (Huh. Maybe I just caught a glimpse of my karmic footstool out of the corner of my eye...) But a few months ago, Baron was coming to stay with me for a few days. I told him that he'd have to fly solo on Sunday night because I had a date, and you could feel the chill coming through the phone. Hope this doesn't get weird. Nah.

Anyway, tonight, the Special Guy and I are gonna have a sleepover party. Red and yellow black and gray could very well be on the menu. And navy blue of course.

Life is good.