I believe this is as good a time as any to try and tell our story. Warning: it’s going to be very long. I hope some of you will bear with me and find it at least slightly interesting or not too boring 
Part 1: The virtual
I am still not sure as to when I can date back the beginning of our acquaintance. I’d like to say May 2002, which is when I first joined the music forum he was a member of. But that wouldn’t be exactly true, since I didn’t notice him right away (nor did he notice me, I’m sure; it used to be a rather large online community), and even after I did, we didn’t start interacting until much later. I remember at some point seeing a photo of him in one of those “post a picture of yourself” threads and thinking that he looked particularly handsome. And really out of my league!
During the winter of 2006 I was enjoying a sabbatical after the company I used to work for got shut down, so I would spend much of my time online, on the IRC chatroom of that particular forum, and that’s when I think we first talked, though we didn’t have any significant conversations. To me he was that hot guy who didn’t say much (he is that to many people who only know him online). One day, out of boredom (it was in February 2007) I messaged him out of the blue, asking him a very personal question (I was dared to do it by a dear Australian friend of mine, who was in on the joke) and to my surprise he humoured me and we struck up a long correspondence that was quickly switched to emails. We’d write each other very long, detailed messages about our lives, work, families, and pretty much everything. We also exchanged pictures and phone number. I didn’t think there was more to that then friendship, because he had made his opinion about long-distance relationship pretty clear. He thought they were overall a bad idea, pointless, and that he didn’t see himself ever getting into one in the future. At least that was settled, right?
We had our first phone conversation in May 2008. Granted, he was very drunk then (Finns tend to overcome their shyness more easily with the help of alcohol, apparently) and many hilarious things were said. He didn’t remember much of them the day after, and was rather dismayed that he had used his work phone to make such a lengthy long-distance call, but it was only the first or many, many long calls, and after that most of them had been made when we were both sober.
I never really stopped to consider whether or not I was falling in love with him. I thought about him all the time, couldn’t wait to come online to tell him about this or that event that happened to me during the day, wanted to have his opinion on different subjects, felt sad and bored when he couldn’t be online... but at the same time, I was telling myself that nothing will ever happen because he probably only saw me as a friend, and anyway, he was against LDR’s. However, during that summer of 2008 I did feel that his way of interacting with me was changing. That he was showing more concern about my wellbeing than a regular online friend would, that he was as used to being in touch with me as I was with him. Well, it all lead to one phone call, one October night, in which he told me he loved me. Naturally I said I loved him too, but I hadn’t seriously realized that until that very moment. It was magical. I was walking on clouds for the following days.
Unfortunately it didn’t last. We broke up a little less than a month later, after he got very distant from me. In hindsight I suppose it was because I didn’t want to give him false hope at the time, as I was religious, and in that religion, a woman cannot be in a relationship with a man who didn’t share her beliefs. I kept struggling with the conflicting feelings, and even though I had already started having serious doubts about my beliefs (doubts that had started before the relationship, so I can’t say it was because of him), I kept them to myself. And I never made any plans for us to meet. I never spoke of travelling, or anything. That probably made him feel like it was pointless for him to be with me, if it wasn’t going to lead anywhere. So we parted ways and of course it hurt like hell and I was a total mess. I wanted to cut all ties, and I did... for a week :P I was too weak to go beyond that, and we tried to remain friends. But that was a really shitty situation to be in. I kept hurting for weeks and weeks. But I tried my best to hide it from him.
I don’t want to dwell on that part of my life, but to be succinct: I had come to terms with the fact that I didn’t believe in my religion anymore, I started trying to figure out what I was, what I believed in, what my views on this life were, and that helped me cope with our break-up a bit. He was the very first person to whom I admitted that I didn’t believe in religion (or in a god, for that matter) anymore. We discussed that extensively and he was very supportive. Also, I decided I was going to travel (I had never travelled before, except a few trips to a neighbouring country with my family, when I was very young), and started the proceedings to get a passport, etc. When I shared my plans with him, I gradually started sensing that he was getting closer to me again. I suppose that it’s because he felt that there was a chance now for us to finally meet and, well, do something about our feelings. We got back together the day after my 26th birthday, more or less three months after breaking up.
I spent much of the following months trying to plan a vacation for both of us, but that wasn’t easy because I needed money, I needed my family’s approval (rather conservative, they are) to travel by myself, and more importantly I needed a visa. The original plan to meet in Barcelona in July for a week’s vacation fell through because I was denied said visa. It was very hard for both of us but we tried not to let it affect the relationship too much. I kept working on it until I finally was granted a short-stay visa and could plan a visit to Finland. Tickets were booked for December 2nd 2009.
And that’s where the first part ends
Thanks for reading.
Part 1: The virtual
I am still not sure as to when I can date back the beginning of our acquaintance. I’d like to say May 2002, which is when I first joined the music forum he was a member of. But that wouldn’t be exactly true, since I didn’t notice him right away (nor did he notice me, I’m sure; it used to be a rather large online community), and even after I did, we didn’t start interacting until much later. I remember at some point seeing a photo of him in one of those “post a picture of yourself” threads and thinking that he looked particularly handsome. And really out of my league!
During the winter of 2006 I was enjoying a sabbatical after the company I used to work for got shut down, so I would spend much of my time online, on the IRC chatroom of that particular forum, and that’s when I think we first talked, though we didn’t have any significant conversations. To me he was that hot guy who didn’t say much (he is that to many people who only know him online). One day, out of boredom (it was in February 2007) I messaged him out of the blue, asking him a very personal question (I was dared to do it by a dear Australian friend of mine, who was in on the joke) and to my surprise he humoured me and we struck up a long correspondence that was quickly switched to emails. We’d write each other very long, detailed messages about our lives, work, families, and pretty much everything. We also exchanged pictures and phone number. I didn’t think there was more to that then friendship, because he had made his opinion about long-distance relationship pretty clear. He thought they were overall a bad idea, pointless, and that he didn’t see himself ever getting into one in the future. At least that was settled, right?
We had our first phone conversation in May 2008. Granted, he was very drunk then (Finns tend to overcome their shyness more easily with the help of alcohol, apparently) and many hilarious things were said. He didn’t remember much of them the day after, and was rather dismayed that he had used his work phone to make such a lengthy long-distance call, but it was only the first or many, many long calls, and after that most of them had been made when we were both sober.
I never really stopped to consider whether or not I was falling in love with him. I thought about him all the time, couldn’t wait to come online to tell him about this or that event that happened to me during the day, wanted to have his opinion on different subjects, felt sad and bored when he couldn’t be online... but at the same time, I was telling myself that nothing will ever happen because he probably only saw me as a friend, and anyway, he was against LDR’s. However, during that summer of 2008 I did feel that his way of interacting with me was changing. That he was showing more concern about my wellbeing than a regular online friend would, that he was as used to being in touch with me as I was with him. Well, it all lead to one phone call, one October night, in which he told me he loved me. Naturally I said I loved him too, but I hadn’t seriously realized that until that very moment. It was magical. I was walking on clouds for the following days.
Unfortunately it didn’t last. We broke up a little less than a month later, after he got very distant from me. In hindsight I suppose it was because I didn’t want to give him false hope at the time, as I was religious, and in that religion, a woman cannot be in a relationship with a man who didn’t share her beliefs. I kept struggling with the conflicting feelings, and even though I had already started having serious doubts about my beliefs (doubts that had started before the relationship, so I can’t say it was because of him), I kept them to myself. And I never made any plans for us to meet. I never spoke of travelling, or anything. That probably made him feel like it was pointless for him to be with me, if it wasn’t going to lead anywhere. So we parted ways and of course it hurt like hell and I was a total mess. I wanted to cut all ties, and I did... for a week :P I was too weak to go beyond that, and we tried to remain friends. But that was a really shitty situation to be in. I kept hurting for weeks and weeks. But I tried my best to hide it from him.
I don’t want to dwell on that part of my life, but to be succinct: I had come to terms with the fact that I didn’t believe in my religion anymore, I started trying to figure out what I was, what I believed in, what my views on this life were, and that helped me cope with our break-up a bit. He was the very first person to whom I admitted that I didn’t believe in religion (or in a god, for that matter) anymore. We discussed that extensively and he was very supportive. Also, I decided I was going to travel (I had never travelled before, except a few trips to a neighbouring country with my family, when I was very young), and started the proceedings to get a passport, etc. When I shared my plans with him, I gradually started sensing that he was getting closer to me again. I suppose that it’s because he felt that there was a chance now for us to finally meet and, well, do something about our feelings. We got back together the day after my 26th birthday, more or less three months after breaking up.
I spent much of the following months trying to plan a vacation for both of us, but that wasn’t easy because I needed money, I needed my family’s approval (rather conservative, they are) to travel by myself, and more importantly I needed a visa. The original plan to meet in Barcelona in July for a week’s vacation fell through because I was denied said visa. It was very hard for both of us but we tried not to let it affect the relationship too much. I kept working on it until I finally was granted a short-stay visa and could plan a visit to Finland. Tickets were booked for December 2nd 2009.
And that’s where the first part ends
Thanks for reading.
Comment