lost acquaintances

I got an email from an acquaintance of mine yesterday. We became friendly when our children were in the same school. She's one of those blondes that look like a famous actress. Depending on the It Blonde of the moment, it could be Jodi Foster from Taxi Driver, to Scarlett Johansen from The Girl with the Pearl Earring. Luckily she doesn't look like Paris Hilton. Since Scarlett happens to be the It Blonde of the moment, that's what I'll call her.

Scarlett is a very nice woman, a bit of an Elitist like me. Very opinionated, with a sense of appreciation for the finer things in life. It's not all about money and materialism, but a good appreciation and sense of things. I do say shoes do not count. One can never have enough good shoes. Classic styling or latest fashions, shoes are exempt from any negative materialism comments.

She emailed me because we lost touch. I honestly have not kept in contact with her, when we moved. Lazy or busy excuse on both our parts. She's almost done with her MA, just needs to write her thesis. She's doing graduate teaching right now. I'm very happy for her. I'm also worried about her.

She admitted to me for the last two years her relationship with her boyfriend deteriorated very badly. He became more and more controlling, and demeaning. She put up with it, and sort of fought back, but stayed with him. She developed anxiety disorders and worse. As she was telling me her tale, I wanted to get up and smack her for not leaving sooner. She says he did not become abusive to her daughter until the end, which then caused her to leave.

Last year, she started plying internet RPGs. She met someone this way. Finally she met the man, and since her relationship with the boyfriend was really at this point detrimental to her physical and mental state, and fear of her daughter becoming a victim she moved out. I know from reading between the lines of her words, she was trapped because of money. Many women are. This new man, gave her money to find a place to live. She admitted that her teaching did not pay much, so she must have gotten help from him. Not that I blame her.

She is happier now, than when I first met her. I hope she remains this way, but at the same time cautious. She's engaged and planning on marrying this new guy. I'm going to call him Titus, she says he reminds her of the actor from the HBO show Rome. Titus moved across country to be with her. Obviously I haven't met him, but I hope for her sake he's genuine.

As she is telling me of all the things the boyfriend has done, and what Titus has meant to her since, I think rebound. But then again it's not rebound. She's finally managed to open up to a man. What I mean by that, is that she admitted she's never let a man get close to her, not in terms of talking, spending time together, small physical gestures like hand holding. This is a good thing for her. She admitted she's never truly opened herself to her ex husband, or the boyfriend. I guess I don't understand that part. If she couldn't stand to be so close to either men, why marry or live with them?

I can not do much on this side of the coast. I can only listen and wish her well. She is planning to send an invite to the wedding. It will be a cruise wedding with Royal Caribbean, the wedding would be in Bermuda, and the cruise would continue on to St Thomas. This will be a June wedding. I'm not sure if it would be feasible for us. I would like to use the excuse of going to the wedding and spending a week of vacation on the cruise with the family. We'll see how that goes.