So it's been over a couple of months since my last post.  I've been busy.  This is what happened.  About the time of my last post, I started having this weird psychic connection to this guy I had met a couple of times at functions in the homes of mutual Baha'i friends.  Initially, we met in April at a Nawr Ruz celebration, March 21.  I remember when I first saw him.  He came in with a friend.  He stared at me and my kids practically the whole time.  But it wasn't strange.  Only once did he come near me -I was in the kitchen most of the time while he was in the living room- and when he did, he came real close and it felt really right.  That caught my attention more than anything because I don't even care to have my children stand too close to me, and I am very aggressive about telling people when I feel that they are too close to me.  Anyway, when the evening was drawing to a close he said, "You need a ride home don't you?"  And I said, "No.  Travis is bringing us home."  (Travis and his wife are our friends whose home we were in.)  "I'll bring you."  He said.  "Oh that's alright."  I said.  So he called out to Travis and said, "I'm bringing them home."

So the next cool thing I notice about him is that he drives a big American sedan from back in the day.  His friend whom he arrived with offered for me to sit up fron while she hopped in the back with my kids.  I was intrigued by all of this because I lived about 20 minutes northwest of where we were, while he stayed about 20 minutes southeast of where we were - and he didn't know the area because he hadn't been in the area long.  The man was adamant though, plus he had one of those cool GPS gadgets.  Anyway.  The conversation was terrific.  We found out rather quickly that we share a lot of the same ideals.  By the time we pulled into my driveway, we knew that we shared a passion for education reform and were both great admirers of John Taylor Gatto.  We exchanged contact information. 

We emailed a couple of times but that was it.  I thought about him constantly, though.  I wasn't more aggressive because as soon as I met him, my husband wanted to see if we could try to reconcile, one more time.  What could I do?  So I tried.  We spent weekends together and were getting along great.  During this time, I found myself talking to him about that guy I met at the party.  A lot.  Ernest this and Ernest that.  Well.  In early June, some other mutual friends of ours were having a house-closing party (They'd closed on the sale of their home and were moving to Arizona).  I invited my husband to come along with the kids and I as he had never been to a gathering with a bunch of Baha'is before.  There were a lot of other folks there too but the vibe around Baha'is is usually intensely multicultural and diverse and open and friendly.  My husband was not accustomed to this.  Well.  Ernest was there.  We were there for a couple of hours or more before we finally gravitated into each other's sphere, but when we did - well, that did it for me.  There just wasn't any more pretense between Peter or I of trying to reconcile.  My everything was with Ernest.  But I had to play it off because I had a divorce to take care of first.  Plus Ernest needed to know of my intentions for him . 

A month later, I emailed him to inquire about something we spoke about.  We made plans to meet for coffee once I got my car back on the road.  That was early July.  By late July, his essence was all over me.  For about a week and a half, I could barely sleep due to it, and I'd wake up every single morning with his essence in my bed, and the feeling of wrongness that he wasn't completely there.  I have no words to express the intensity of this sensation and knowingness.  It just was.  I was desperate enough to confide in an elder Baha'i whom I esteem much.  Not one to worry overmuch what others think, I am loathe to besmirch the name of my beloved Baha'u'llah in anyway at all, so I asked her for counsel, explaining that I was in love with a man whom I barely knew, while still legally married to another - that my spirit was not waiting for the process of divorce.  That I needed to communcate with this Ernest faster than I could process divorce.  She reminded me that it was chastity that was the issue - that if purity was behind this feeling and if we approached each other with care and respect, it was alright.  So I emailed him that I wnated to see him but that my car was not ready.

He emailed back immediately:  "I can get to you."

Well, he came the next evening ( 8-8-8 @ 8p ), and we have barely been apart since.  That first night, all we did was sit and stare at each other the entire night.  ( The kids stayed up and chaperoned - Joseph said it wasn't the staring, but the sigh-ing that killed him  )  Then, in the morning, the kids went to bed and he and I sat on the couch.  We nodded together, already knowing for sure that we had found in each other all that had been missing all of these years.  Although we plan to marry when my divorce is finalized, we are already wed in spirit.  Our euphoria is affectionately referred to as, The La-Di Da...